Ruined (Barnes Brothers #4)(50)

The sincerity in his voice kept her from laughing, although the outright insanity of this whole debacle was about ready to do her in. “Thank you . . . Henry, right?”

“Yes, ma’am.” He glanced around and then leaned, almost conspiratorially. “Ignore Dash. He’s just pissed because we were . . . well . . . having fun and he had to go an’ answer the phone. I told him not to, but . . .”

“He should have listened,” she said soberly.

“For f*ck’s sake!” Dash shouted. “He called ten times!”

Henry stiffened, his cheeks going red. Clearly the only thing intimidating about this man was that first impression, Marin decided. He was more like a teddy bear with feelings easily hurt. She smacked Dash’s arm. “Would you chill out?”

Henry scowled at Dash. “Yeah, chill out. You know what? Or don’t. Call me when you have that temper under control.” He turned on his heel and strode off. It was a wonder the building didn’t shudder under his steps. Dash turned, gaping at the man’s back for a few seconds, as if he was just now processing what his short fuse had done.

“Now that’s just another thing to be pissed off at Barnes for,” he said, looking back at her.

“You can be mad at Sebastien for calling at inopportune times.” Marin shook her head. “But he wasn’t the one standing here like an * and ranting at his . . . um . . . boyfriend? Hook-up?”

Dash opened his mouth, then snapped it shut. After a second, he sighed and shoved a hand through his hair. “Hook up. Most definitely a hook up. Hank’s a nice guy and fun, but he jumps at his own shadow.”

“You shouldn’t have snapped at him,” Marin said. “He wasn’t to blame.”

Dash’s eyes narrowed. “Well, I came here to snap at you. The way I see it . . . you are to blame. At least in part. When in the hell are you going to tell Sebastien that I’m not the baby’s dad? This bullshit of his is getting out of hand.”

“I . . .” Marin groaned and turned away. Gesturing for him to come in, she shut the door and moved over to the couch. “Look, I’ve tried. Several times. The last time I went to talk to him, he was all wrapped around Evie, okay?”

She made the bad mistake of looking up at Dash.

He could be shallow and temperamental, yes.

But Dash was also surprisingly insightful at times.

Those eyes narrowed on her face and in a second, she knew he’d seen too much.

“Son of a bitch,” he whispered. “Marin . . .”

“Don’t.” Rising, she went to evade him, but he just caught up with her, catching her arm.

Unable to avoid him, she focused on his chest but he cupped her chin and tilted her head back until he could look into her eyes.

“He’s the father, isn’t he?” Dash demanded.

Tears, always insanely close these days, sprang to her eyes.

She tried to fight them but they spilled free and she just couldn’t stop them. “Yes.”

“Marin . . .”

As she started to cry, Dash drew her up against him.

And she let him. As the misery broke out of her, she leaned against him and wept.

***

Okay, so maybe he’d been as ass, calling so late.

He’d only tagged Dash because it had occurred to him that it might help Marin if she had a body pillow.

He’d seen her rubbing at her back and although she didn’t even look pregnant yet, he knew that sometimes when a woman was pregnant, her back hurt. He knew that only because he’d been reading about it some. He was curious—that was all. While he was reading up on Google, one of the pregnancy boards he came across had mentioned that a body pillow helped.

But if he mentioned anything to her, she’d snap at him again.

So he thought maybe Dash could do it.

Dash was something of a night owl, too. Sebastien knew that for a fact, so when he’d sent him the text at eleven, he didn’t think much of it.

It was when Dash was a little bit of an * in his response that Sebastien got pissed off. He didn’t have to be a dick.

If you want to tell Marin something, call her and do it, dumb-ass.

Well, so much for trying to be helpful and nice.

So he’d called Dash, intending to just . . . hell, he didn’t know. He tried to tell himself it wasn’t jealousy driving him, but he knew otherwise.

He was jealous as hell but that was beside the point. He was also irritated because he had been trying to help. One might think Dash would have appreciated that.

When Dash came on the phone, voice full of irritation and music blasting in the background, Sebastien had snapped. “Did it ever occur to you that maybe you should spend some time with your pregnant . . .” What the hell were they? They didn’t exactly act all hooked up. “With Marin?”

“Sebastien . . .” Dash’s voice was slurred and rough. “You sexy sumbitch . . .”

“Aw, shit. You’re drunk, aren’t you?”

Dash laughed. “Drunk. Horny as a f*cking teenager. Gonna do something ’bout that, though. You wanna come join us? You might even like it.”

“Hell.” Dragging a hand down his face, he blew out a breath and turned to stare out the window. “Where is Marin?”

“Marin . . .” Dash huffed out a breath. “Now there’s an innerestin’ question. I know . . . I think I’ll call her. I bet she’s not afraid to try new things.”