The Pact (Winslow Brothers #2)(84)

“You motherfucker, you lied to me. You lied to everyone.”

Normally, I might feel angered by his aggressive approach, but I’m all tapped out. After I watch Daisy walk away, my entire body feels numb, and my mind is thriving off the kind of emotion a man like me purposefully avoids.

“You know, I knew it was all so ridiculous. I fucking knew something was off with the whole situation.” He walks into my kitchen and grabs himself a beer. “I expected something like this from Ty, but not from you.”

I have nothing to say to that. Don’t care to say anything to it, actually.

Because your concern right now isn’t about Rem or your family. It’s about her.

“How in the fuck did you end up marrying a random stranger to help her get a green card?”

Damn, he really did hear the whole blowout in the street.

“I know your usual MO isn’t to say shit, but you’re going to have to ante up an explanation, my man. And I promise, I’m not leaving until you do.”

“You know her.” Those are the first words that have come out of my mouth since he barged in here on a rampage and started making himself at home.

“What?”

“You met Daisy. In Vegas.”

He stares at me like I have two heads, and I use that time to take several needed gulps from the beer that’s still in my hand.

“What do you mean, I know—” He pauses midsentence, and I can see the wheels turning inside his mind. “Wait…she’s not the chick Ty gave money to at the slot, is she?”

I nod. Bingo, brother.

“What the hell?” he questions, but it’s more to himself than to me. “Damn, I knew she looked familiar.”

Yeah, well, now you know why.

“For fuck’s sake, Flynn,” he mutters and runs a hand through his hair. “How did you get dragged into a fake marriage?”

The fact that he’d even insinuate a woman like Daisy would drag me into anything makes my spine prickle with irritation. A woman like her doesn’t drag a man into any-fucking-thing. A woman like her makes it impossible not to come willingly.

“I didn’t get dragged into it,” I answer firmly. “I offered.”

“You’re fucking with me.”

I shake my head.

“You offered to be get married to a complete fucking stranger?” A sharp laugh escapes his throat. “This just keeps getting better and better, doesn’t it?”

The truth is, I think I fell in love with Daisy the first moment I saw her. Some part of me offered to save her because, deep down, I knew she’d save me.

The realization is so acute, so visceral, that I lose my grip on the beer in my hand, and it crashes to the floor in a bubbling mess of broken glass and booze. But all I can do is stand there and watch the beer make a river on my hardwood floors.

Rem looks from the floor to me and back to the floor until, eventually, his gaze locks on my face.

“Oh no,” he says. “I’m…such a fucking idiot,” he says quietly and sets his beer down on my coffee table. “I know that look. I’ve felt that look. You love her. You’re in love with her.”

I don’t deny it. I don’t even stay silent or just offer a nod. I face the truth head on.

“Yeah, Rem. I love her.”

“Shit, I’m sorry.” He shakes his head and runs a hand through his hair. “I just came blazing in here, all fixated on the fact that you were lying to me, but I didn’t stop to think about what was actually going on with you. I’m a real fucking bastard.”

I nod. He chuckles, but it’s devoid of amusement.

“I didn’t plan on it,” I admit. “When Daisy and I made the pact, I didn’t plan on it ending like this.”

“Yeah, well, that’s usually how it goes. I mean, when I asked Charlotte to marry me, I didn’t plan on it ending with her leaving me at the altar. But love is a real motherfucker.”

And that right there, seeing what Rem went through, still goes through because of it, is exactly why you’ve stupidly tried to avoid it this whole time.

My mind drifts to the distant past, and I think about the night of Rem’s bachelor party when all four of us Winslow brothers were young and had our whole lives ahead of us.

I think about how excited Remy was and how ridiculous Jude and Ty were.

I even think about the stupid fortune-teller that Jude made us all go to after a stripper had all but torn Rem’s boxer briefs to shreds with her stiletto.

You mean the fortune-teller who correctly predicted Rem getting left at the altar? And the same one who also correctly predicted Jude would make a bet that would change his life?

Instantly, the words crazy Cleo said to me ring loud and clear in my mind.

“There will be a night, though. One wild, unexpected night in a seemingly predictable life where you, my sweet boy, will make a pact with a stranger from which there will be great consequence.”

Holy fuck.

One wild night. A pact with a stranger.

How in the hell did I miss this?

Probably because you wrote Miss Cleo off as a nutjob.

“What are you going to do?” Rem asks, pulling me from my racing thoughts, and I look at him long enough to come to a final conclusion.

“Make sure that fucking fortune-teller is wrong about the consequences.”