I let it slide, knowing it wasn’t the time or place to point out that he technically was in the gay man’s world since I’d bet anything he’d never taken so much as a finger up the ass.

Then a thought sprung to my mind out of nowhere.

“Wait. You said, nonexistent girlfriend. What about the girl from last Friday? The one you went out with. Kirsten? Kristen? How did it go? Oh my God, are you cheating on her with me? That’s… Wow. So not normal.” I cringed.

Part of me didn’t want to know, but it had been eating at me all week—among other things—and if Asher and I were going to be … incesty … together, I figured I had a right to know.

Asher stepped closer in the dark, his cold toes stepping on mine for a second before he adjusted them and settled one foot on either side of my own. Both of his hands gripped my robe-covered arms, and his face was close.

“There was no Kirsten. I lied.”

“What? No. The one from your program. Remember? You said you had a date.”

“Atti, I wanted you in that hotel room. I wanted there to be no way for you to say no or put it off. You’d been avoiding me, and I knew it. If you thought I was busy all weekend, then I knew you’d come with me Thursday night.”

“There’s no girl?”

“I haven’t been able to look at a girl or think about anyone else since that first night in my room when we kissed.”

I took that in, and my heart fluttered. It wasn’t normal for me, Atticus Charming, to be that desired by someone. I’d had boyfriends. Kinda. More like hookups. No one who meant a whole lot. Once we’d explored sex, it was common for us to drift apart and never talk again. Case in point, Ryan, who hadn’t said two words to me since my deep-throat failure at my parents’ house.

“That would explain why you barely noticed Aria.”

“Who’s Aria?”

“The girl doing makeup. The beautiful girl doing makeup. I mean, dude, I’m one hundred percent gay, but I can see how gorgeous she is. You looked right through her like she wasn’t there.”

Asher chuckled. “I guess I need to pay closer attention. I’ve had a lot on my mind.”

“Well, we best get moving because Lewis will demand you sit with her again to fix these sad puppy eyes.” I kissed both his eyelids then lingered near his mouth, wanting more but feeling strange about it for a second because the reality was so obscure. Could I just kiss my brother freely like this? Is that what had happened? Is that who we were now?

We needed free time to ourselves to talk this out.