“Unless you want to tell him you’re fucking the cop he told you to keep watch over.”

“One time,” I grunted.

“Yeah, for now,” Gin joked.

I couldn’t find it in me to disagree, not when I’d been thinking about it on repeat. Seeing Tex tonight had only made me hungrier for him.

Getting Gin home was the easy part; his townhouse was still the same. I made a mental note to come back and clean. There was a layer of dust on his bookshelves and lampshades. The walls were painted in dark greens with burnt orange as an accent color. My brother lacked the ability to design or put colors together. Which was why he hadn't changed the place after his last girlfriend left him.

“Stop looking around. You aren’t cleaning shit.”

“You aren’t doing it,” I said. My fingers twitched at my side, the need to organize the place gnawing at my psyche.

“No, thank you, I know where everything is. You come in here, and I won’t even know where the hell my underwear is.” He pointed at me. “Don’t touch my shit, Enzo. We’ve had this talk. Boundaries.”

My shoulders dropped as I forced my gaze to focus on him. “Fine, but you need to get someone in here.”

He shrugged. “I’ll think about it.”

The doorbell rang before I could point out every single thing that needed to be cleaned and why. I opened the door, and Melony stood on the other side. Her rich brown skin shimmered with painted-on glitter. Heavy pink and purple eyeshadow framed her big brown eyes. She smiled, and even her lips were covered in glitter.

“Can I come in, Mr. Vitale?”

“No, go away,” Gin shouted.

Melony rolled her eyes. “Don’t be a baby.”

I stepped aside, avoiding glitter like the plague it was, and let her in. She made her way up the three stairs and into the living room, where Gin was resting on the green sofa.

“What did you do this time?” She took her jacket off, and a bright tutu and glitter mesh shirt greeted us.

“Man, doc, did we interrupt a party?” Gin asked instead of answering her. He looked tense sitting on the couch. His shoulders practically touched his ears.

She nodded without hesitation. She’d been around us long enough she was relaxed and treated us like we were any other client.

“You did. My niece’s glitter ballerina ball.” Melony unwrapped Gin’s hands while still talking. “She was very excited, and it was going great till I got a text pulling me away.”

Melony kept Gin distracted. I knew me standing there was only going to make him even more nervous. It didn’t matter that Melony was only checking over a wound. Giancarlo didn’t do well with doctors.

“She turned fifteen today. You should send me back with a good gift,” Melony suggested.

Slowly my brother’s shoulders relaxed as she kept talking. I cleared my throat, and our eyes met briefly.

“I’ll leave you to it.”