“It wasn’t my fault,” Greg said, standing up from where she’d told him to sit down and shut the hell up a half an hour ago when she’d found him on the ground trying to fend off blows from the other man that she was no longer talking to.

“Jodi,” Greg said, sighing heavily as he walked up behind her and placed his bloodied hands on either side of her on the kitchen sink, boxing her in, “can we just talk about this?”

“There’s nothing to talk about,” she said, sighing heavily as she scrubbed her hands clean.

“There could be,” he said just as she felt his lips brush the top of her ear.

“Oh my God!” she gasped, quickly turning in his arms. She looked up at him, scanning all the cuts, bandages and quickly darkening bruises, worry twisting her stomach as he stared deeply into her eyes.

He leaned in, tilting his head to the side as he came closer. “Jodi,” he whispered, ducking his head and-

“Ow! What the hell?” he demanded, but she ignored him as she twisted and turned his head, looking for a head injury that would explain why he’d suddenly lost his damn mind.

“We should get you to the hospital,” she said, trying not to panic and wondering where she’d put her car keys. Maybe she should call an ambulance? Head injuries weren’t something to play around with.

“Wait,” he said, shaking his head as he stepped back out of her reach, “What the hell are you talking about?”

“Getting you to the hospital!” she snapped, wondering what the hell was wrong with him.

Time was of the essence here!

“Because I’m trying to kiss you?” he asked, frowning.

“Yes!” she snapped, shoving past him to find her keys, but he grabbed her hand and pulled her to a stop.

“I’m fine, Jodi,” he said, sighing heavily as he used his hold on her to turn her around.

Worrying her bottom lip, she let him turn her around. “Then what’s going on?”

He entwined their hands together, caressing his thumb over the back of her hand. “I’m trying to kiss you, Jodi,” he said softly as he pulled her closer.

“Trying…to….kiss…me,” she mumbled back, trying to make sense of what he’d just said when he leaned down to-

“Whoa!” she yelped, slapping her hand across his lips.

“Ow!” he winced, stepping back and pressing his fingertips against his split lip.

“Why are you trying to kiss me?” she demanded, not giving a damn that she sounded a bit hysterical, because this was her best friend and best friends didn’t kiss each other!

“Because I want to,” he said, reaching for her again, but this time she saw him coming and jumped back.

“Now? Seriously?” she couldn’t help but shake her head in disgust. “Five years ago when you took me out the idea of kissing me turned your stomach and now suddenly you can’t seem to keep your lips to yourself?”

“It didn’t turn my stomach!”

“Really? Because you could have fooled me,” she said, crossing her arms over her chest.

“You didn’t want me to kiss you!’ he snapped.

“No, you didn’t want to kiss me!” she snapped back.

“The hell I didn’t!” he shouted, getting in her face.

“I-”

But he wouldn’t allow her to get a word in. “I asked you out, because I was attracted to you, but by the end of the date………,” he let his words trail off with a shake of his head, “you started acting like I was your brother, not a date.”

“You started to treat me like a kid sister!” she snapped, pissed that he was playing this game with her.

“Because that’s how you acted! Like my kid sister! We’d barely got through our first drink when you started treating me like a brother and by the time I walked you to the door you’d placed me firmly in the friend zone.”

“No, I didn’t!”

He sighed heavily as he headed towards the front door. “Yeah, you did. You do it with every guy,” he said, only to pause with a lazy gesture towards the front door before he added, “except for the asshole living across the hall. You treat every guy you meet like he’s your long lost brother, even that asshole that you were going to marry.”

Chapter 22

“I’m not going to keep apologizing,” Danny said, pulling to a stop in front of a large colonial house.

“I don’t want you to,” she said, distractedly as she continued to stare out the window, not really seeing anything as she kept running the conversation she’d had with Greg through her head.

He was wrong. At least, she wanted to believe that he was wrong, but maybe…

“If you don’t want me to keep apologizing then what’s wrong?” Danny asked, reaching over and taking her hand into his. “What’s wrong, Tinkerbelle?”

“Besides the fact that you beat the shit out of my best friend?” she asked with a small sigh as she shifted her attention down to their hands.

“Besides that,” he said, waving it off like it was no big deal and making her lips twitch.

“Do you think….,” she started to ask, only to shake her head and look back out the window. “Forget it.”

“No,” he said softly as he gently gripped her chin and turned her head so that she was looking at him, “I’m not going to forget about it when there’s something bothering you, sweetheart.”

She looked up into his beautiful green eyes and sighed. “Do you think that I have a habit of treating guys like they’re my brothers?”

“Yes,” he said with absolutely no hesitation as he gave her a reassuring smile and her hand a small reassuring squeeze.

“I don’t do it on purpose,” she mumbled, wondering why she’d never realized this before.

“I know that, sweetheart,” he said soothingly.

She shook her head. “I can’t believe I never saw it before. I always thought……”

“That it was the other way around,” Danny said in understanding as he gave her hand a light squeeze as he gently tugged her up on her knees so that he could pull her onto his lap.

“Yeah,” she mumbled as she laid her head against his chest and sighed pathetically.

“You give off a sisterly vibe,” he said, nodding slightly, “that much is true, but you play off it. You use it to push away men, but I don’t think you’re doing it on purpose.”

“Then why am I doing it?” she found herself asking as she took his hand into hers and began tracing circles on his palm.

“Because you have absolutely no idea how to tell a guy that you’re not interested in him. So instead, you friend-zone him by acting like you’re his kid sister,” he said, pressing a kiss against her forehead.

She shook her head. “There were a lot of guys that I really liked, a lot of them that I could have really fallen for and-”

“And they’re your best friends now, aren’t they?” he asked, guessing correctly.

“Yes.”

“They weren’t for you, Tinkerbelle, and on some level you knew it.”

“What about Jerry?” she asked softly.