“That’s a big heck no. I wasn’t just talking to talk when I said you were the only one who knows that secret.”

Brady feigned feeling honored. He touched his chest with one hand and pulled away from the house with the other.

“Wow, Sloanie, I’m touched.”

“No, you’re a bartender. A good one, who keeps emotional women hydrated with too many of Cassidy’s specialty drinks.”

“I’m still going to take it as a compliment. It’s nice to know my bartending superpowers are so efficient.”

Sloane’s mood looked nowhere near humored. Not that he’d seen a side of her that was anywhere close to what he considered carefree. It was like her attention was always split between what was happening now and a continuous loop of worries about what might happen next. Even as they drove away from the neighborhood, Brady could see her look back at the house.

“But you did tell your brother about us dating?”

“He got an email from his middle school ex-girlfriend about it.”

“Middle school?”

“Yeah. She lives in California now and is out of touch with Arbor Bay gossip. Apparently she thought he might dish to her, since they have ‘history.’”

“Wow, that’s a stretch.”

“And an annoyance. I was hoping to clear out of the house before Callum came home for lunch, but he caught me. Asked one point two billion questions about you, about us. I spent the last ten minutes trying to avoid answering any of them.”

Sloane was genuinely bothered by lying to her brother. Brady could hear it in her voice.

“Why not just tell him the truth? Or at least about our arrangement? Are you two not close?”

Sloane let out a sigh that Brady instantly empathized with. He’d heard himself make that same sound when things weren’t going well at the bar. And during the dark times—as Dixon had once called them—while he was still moping around about Felicity. A feeling of helplessness given a few seconds of breath.

“We’re very close. It’s just that, well, while I hate lying to Callum with all my being, he hates lying more. But if I asked him to do it, to lie for me? He would, without a doubt. So, to save him from that, I’d rather skip over that part and have him just be upset with me for now.” This time, he could see her turn toward him out of his periphery. “Though all of this lying, by any of us, is going to be pointless if we can’t get our story straight.”

“Our story?”

“Exactly! We don’t have one! We know nothing about each other, so how are we going to make a believable story about ‘us’?”