Maybe. She was probably hoping he hadn’t turned into a complete prick since they’d last seen each other, hoping he could explain this absolute shitstorm in a satisfactory manner. Which he really wished he could, but … crap. What was he supposed to say? Me and my marauding penis want a lot more from you than that?

Ha. Abbie hated feelings stuff. She’d been single for two years, and she sent him more men-ain’t-shit memes than she did Rihanna selfies, which was saying something. If he admitted he’d come here hoping to charm her into crushing on him, she’d probably laugh in his face.

But if he said … if he said, Thirteen years ago, you came home from uni for Christmas, and I saw you for the first time in months after seeing you every day for years, and it hit me like a brick that I was in love with you, always had been, and that has never changed, it’s never changed—

If he said that, she’d be unbelievably freaked out, and it would make the family Christmas awkward as shit.

And he’d lose her. Or rather, he’d learn once and for all that he’d never had her. Years of the-time-just-isn’t-right hopefulness would fade away like smoke. The maybe-possibly-one-days he’d used to get himself through dark times would vanish. They’d never really have existed in the first place. Wanting Abbie had kept him going for so long that having to carve her out of himself might fucking kill him. And if he spilled his guts and she politely said, “No, thank you,” he would have no choice but to die right then and there.

But if he lied, and it made her sad again, he’d die even harder.

So what the hell was he going to do?

“I care about you too much to fuck with you on purpose,” he said. That was honest. That was real. “You know that, don’t you?” He watched her face and hoped and hoped—

Yes. Her thawing was slow, like a reluctant spring, but it was there. “I suppose I do know that,” she said finally. “You’re—you’re like my brother.”

“No,” he said. The word came out firmer than he’d intended, but he didn’t regret it. He held her gaze and repeated himself. “No, Abigail. I’m not.”

Her throat moved as she swallowed. She studied him with those clever, clever eyes, and Will suddenly felt that he must be see-through.

But if see-through was what she wanted, he’d try his best to give it to her. He wished he could offer better, offer more, offer truer, but it turned out that throwing away all your fears at once was nausea-inducing and semi-impossible. So he met her halfway. “I’ve been flirting with you because I … like you, Abbie.”

Her expression blanked. Her eyes said shock. Her mouth said “You—what?”