The affair of the brains, p.1
My Brother's Best Friends, page 1
My Brothers Best Friends
A Reverse Harem Romance
Rebel Bloom
Copyright © 2022 by Rebel Bloom
All rights reserved.
No portion of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the publisher or author, except as permitted by U.S. copyright law.
Contents
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52. FREE Preview of My Best Friend's Triplet Brothers
1.
***Reagan***
“Do you think my boobies will be like Mom’s or Aunt Rea’s?” The sweet voice that woke me from a restless slumber belonged to Posie, my youngest niece.
Piper, her older sister, made a thinking sound, humming, and I could picture her tapping her chin. “I don’t think I want boobies. They just hang there. What if you close one in your sock drawer?”
“Aunt Rea’s wouldn’t get caught in anything.”
I scoffed and sat up, yanking my askew tank top back into place. I glanced at the small clock that Russ had hung on the basement wall in an attempt to make it feel less like a basement. It wasn’t even seven am yet. I rubbed at my gritty eyes and finally focused on my brother’s kids. “Go away. Come back in two hours with coffee and less comments on my boobs.”
Posie modeled for me and I realized that she was wearing one of my bras. “Aunt Rea! Now that you’re awake, can you play with us?”
“I’m not awake.” I eyed the expensive bra she was wearing and winced when I thought of how much I’d spent on the stupid thing in some ridiculous attempt to catch the attention of my ex. Little had I known, a woman named Stacey with an equally expensive bra but more expensive boobs had all his attention at the time. Rightfully so, considering she also had his giant diamond ring. “I’ll let you keep the bra if you go upstairs and come back after nine.”
Piper looked down at where she wore the matching underwear. “What about these?”
I thought of Russ’ face when he saw his kid wearing a thong over her pajamas and grinned. “Sure.”
They stared at me, considering my offer. After what felt like far too much time for a couple of kids to think anything through, they nodded in sync. Piper held the underwear up with one hand and pushed her sister towards the unfinished stairs with her other hand. “Let’s get out of here before she changes her mind!”
With matching ear-piercing squeals, they ran up the stairs. The door to the basement slammed and then I heard their little feet stomping overhead. I slumped back into my pillows and felt like I had barely closed my eyes when Russ’ voice boomed through my makeshift bedroom.
“Rise and shine, pumpkin! You’ve got a big day ahead of you!”
I dragged a pillow over my head and groaned. “Go away, please! For the love of everything good in this world, just let me sleep!”
My twin brother’s response was to reach under my blanket and grab my ankle. He yanked me down the bed, his big laugh almost enough to make me smile. Just before I could strangle him, he shoved a cup of coffee into my hand and ruffled my hair. “Has anyone ever told you that you’re a different person before your morning coffee? I saw your presents for the girls, by the way. Don’t think I won’t find a way to get back at you.”
“You don’t think your presence is payback enough? It’s so early, Russ.” I tried to see the clock, but he kept his head firmly in the way.
“You’re right. We’re even. Now that that’s settled, let’s get you up. You’ve got a full day with Lisa and she’s almost ready.”
I knocked back half of the coffee in one go and gritted my teeth as it burned all the way down my throat. As much as it hurt, my mood instantly started to lift with the first hit of caffeine. I pushed my hair out of my face and really looked at my brother. It’d been too long since I’d seen him and I’d gotten in just late enough the night before that I’d been too tired to spend any real time with him.
We had the same dark brown hair that almost looked black in most lighting. His was kept short and styled, while mine was long and wild unless tamed into a braid for work. We had the same bright yellow-green eyes, but that was where the similarities ended. I had our mother’s delicate nose and full lips and Russ had our father’s more masculine features. I got Dad’s dimples and Russ got Mom’s bad eyesight. I got Mom’s figure and mostly gentle personality; Russ got Dad’s large build and ability to talk anyone into anything.
I already knew I was in trouble when Russ gave me his most charming smile and raised his eyebrows, waiting on me to inquire about what I was going to be doing with Lisa that day. Because I knew my brother well enough to know that he only needed an inch to take a mile, I ignored him and drained the rest of the coffee before attempting to crawl back up my bed.
“Oh, no, you don’t. Lisa is really looking forward to hanging out with you today, Reagan. I’m paying for everything. I even bought your ticket for tonight and everything.”
“Ticket…” It took a few seconds for my brain to catch up with where I was and when it was. I flicked my gaze back to Russ and shook my head. “Nope. Sorry. There’s no way.”
“You get one chance at a ten-year reunion, Reagan. I’m not letting you throw it away. You got here just in time. It was meant to be.” He narrowed his eyes. “And if you won’t give in to good reasoning, I’ll just let you know now that the girls wake up at the crack of dawn every day. They really love their Aunt Reagan and I would love to sleep in a little longer.”
I glared up at him. “Are you threatening me with your children?”
“I’m not not threatening you with them.”
“That’s low. Even for you.” I stood up and shoved past him. “I’m not going.”
“Fine. I’ll just tell Lisa that you don’t want to hang out with her. I’ll tell the girls to just come straight down here from now on. And I’ll tell Marcus Leary that you couldn’t make the reunion because you’re battling a debilitating case of athlete’s foot.”
I spun around and faced off with Russ. He was half a foot taller than me, but I figured with frustration and months of depression and anger, I could probably take him. “You wouldn’t.”
“Wouldn’t I?”
“Russ! He’s still the self-appointed local tabloid columnist. Mom used to send me his ranting posts weekly. If I end up in one of his posts, I’ll murder you.”
“You could just come to the reunion. Have a few drinks, cut loose on the dance floor, have a good time. You may even see an old friend that you want to reconnect with now that you’re back. I demand you come tonight, or I’ll have no choice but to ruin your reputation and sleep.”
“You’re a child, you know that?”
“Is that a yes?”
I squeezed my eyes shut as I nodded. With any luck, the people I wanted to avoid wouldn’t be there. If anything, the ten years I’d spent away from Lunar, New Mexico had taught me how to pretend like nothing bad was happening around me. Only positive things for me.
“You just made me the happiest big brother ever.” He pulled me into a tight hug and immediately shoved a wet finger into my ear. “I missed you.”
I shoved him away and wiped at my ear. “Get out. You’re disgusting.”
“Hurry up. Lisa is probably already ready and waiting in the car. She’s excited for a chance to dress up.”
I kicked his knee from behind as he took a step up the stairs and his leg collapsed forward. When he glared at me, I just grinned. “Tell her I’ll be up soon.”
“Pest.”
“Jerk.”
“Little bottle baby.”
“Big titty baby.”
He snorted and then left me to change, but with no time to orient myself. Just the morning before, I’d woken up in a loft apartment in LA with one of the most beautiful views I’d ever seen. How the mighty had fallen.
2.
***Reagan***
Lisa James, originally Fuller, was a Southern belle from an even tinier town in Georgia. She’d been dragged to Lunar with her family as a twenty-one-year-old, recently graduated and ready to find her place in the world. Her family came looking for the rumored alien sightings and the world’s largest potato chip, and Lisa had just been looking for a way back to normal life. Her parents had found the potato chip, but no aliens. Lisa found my brother and never left.
She was five feet of Souther
Unfortunately, she had a reputation around Lunar and she attracted attention everywhere she went. People watched her to see what she’d do next, and I didn’t blame them. I just wished they’d look anywhere else when I was the person walking with her. I’d snuck into town under the cover of night and I wasn’t exactly ready to make my big entrance back into Lunar life.
Lisa sat across from me at the two-seater metal table we were sharing outside of Landings, one of the two dueling local diners. Her hair was especially big that morning, but it still wasn’t enough to hide me from prying eyes. Landings was winning the competition that day, it seems, because the tables, inside and out, were full.
Reading my mind, Lisa smiled, flashing perfect white teeth that she’d hopefully pass down to her kids. Russ and I had both gone through years of braces. “Landings posted on their Facebook that drinks are free with the purchase of a meal today. Kevin’s uncle knows a guy who knows a guy who happened to find a Coca-Cola truck turned over, if you know what I mean. So, Kevin can afford to offer free drinks for months, from what I hear.”
Even full of anxiety, I grinned at that. More than once, I’d reaped the rewards of a turned-over truck when I was growing up. My favorite had been the time a blackberry pie filling truck had met its untimely demise. Mom had made us blackberry cobbler all summer long. It’d been heaven.
“How was the bed last night?” Lisa winked at the passing waitress, gaining her attention. “Hey, will you go ahead and bring us a platter of pancakes with that new strawberry syrup Kevin got? With bacon. Sausage?”
I bit back a laugh and shook my head. “Bacon’s fine with me.”
“Oh, and can we get the Lunar omelet to share? With biscuits, of course. And that muscadine jelly. I’ll take a water to drink. And a Coke.” Lisa turned sweet eyes on me and smiled. “Anything else?”
The waitress didn’t seem shocked by the amount of food Lisa had just ordered and I had a moment of culture shock. I definitely wasn’t in LA anymore. As a chef, I couldn’t say I was sad to be in a place where people loved to eat. “Coffee, please. Just like a large pitcher of it.”
After the teen girl was off with our order, Lisa looked back at me and raised her eyebrows, waiting for an answer to a question I didn’t even remember. When I didn’t jump in fast enough, she went on for me. “The bed?”
“Oh! It was fine. Honestly, Lisa, you don’t need to stress about it. I know that I’m crashing and that I was unexpected. Even still, you put together a great setup for me.”
“Oh, please. Great? It’s a mattress in the basement of the house you grew up in. You deserve your own space. I’m going to make sure Russ gets all of his crap out of the den and we’ll set you up in there.”
“No way. The basement is fine. Plus, it has the private entrance, so I can come and go without bothering you guys. When I start my new job, I’ll be leaving the house at ungodly hours.”
She subtly looked around and, ignoring all the people glancing at us, leaned closer. “Russ didn’t tell me what happened in LA. Even when I threatened to stop having sex with him. Probably because he knows that I’d never be able to hold out.”
I faked a gag, focusing on the part of her words that didn’t send heat creeping up my neck. “No sex talk about my brother. That’s the rule.”
“So, you’re not going to tell me, either?”
I met her gaze and cursed her plainly expressive eyes. She was hurt that she wasn’t in the loop. I sank my teeth into my bottom lip and pushed out a loud exhale through my nose. “I found out that Ben was married. His wife confronted me in front of everyone at work. It was humiliating and it hurt. Then, I got fired. The other partners didn’t think it would be wise to keep me around because I was the source of a lot of stress for another of the partners. I lost my cushy personal chef gig and my boyfriend in a matter of hours. And let me tell you… If you think Lunar is a small world with fast gossips, it’s got nothing on the food scene in LA.”
Lisa opened her mouth to respond but our waitress cut her off. She put our drinks in front of us and dropped off a basket of hot, buttered biscuits. My mouth instantly watered, despite the fact that I hadn’t been hungry in a week.
As soon as we were alone, Lisa exploded. “That asshole! Does Russ know? We can get some people together and pay that schmuck a visit! And to think I baked that butt-munch a pie! I’ll kill him.”
Her fury soothed a part of me that nothing else had been able to since I’d found out about Ben. Seeing someone feel that angry for me allowed me to let go of some of my own anger. I found myself smiling as I watched her hair bounce around as she struggled to stay still in her seat.
“Why are you smiling? Let’s figure out who we’re going to take to handle this jerk.”
“This might be the first time I’ve felt a true moment of peace in the two weeks since I found out. It feels good to not be the only person so mad. It almost felt like no one else thought it was a big deal. Men cheat, so what? I should’ve known I could depend on you to show up for me.”
Tears filled her eyes and she didn’t hesitate to leave her seat and hurry around to me. Wrapping me in her arms, she pressed my head into her boobs and sighed. “I’m here for you, Reagan. Anything you need.”
I hugged her back and tried not to notice everyone staring after she sat back down. “Get me out of going tonight?”
She dabbed at her eyes and grabbed a biscuit, tearing it open viciously. “Not a chance. You need to drink and forget yourself for a night. You also need to show up in a sexy dress and remind yourself that you’ve got it going on. No hiding in the basement while everyone else has a good time.”
I groaned. “When you put it like that…”
She loaded her biscuit with jelly and waved it at me. “Exactly. I called Marjorie over at MJ’s and she’s got just the dress for you. You’re going to be the hottest thing to walk through the doors of Lunar High tonight.”
“MJ’s? Doesn’t she just sell—”
“Old ladies' burial dresses? No.” She sent me a wicked grin. “MJ went to Italy, met a man who rocked her world, and now she only sells dresses that would make my mother scream in Southern Baptist horror.”
Somehow, I got more nervous. Still, I found myself stuffing a biscuit into my face. It seemed that Lunar was giving me my appetite back, if not threatening to steal my sanity.
“We’re also getting waxes after this. Eat up. You’re going to need your energy!”
3.
***Reagan***
After spending most of the day being dragged around Lunar and being reintroduced to places I hadn’t seen in a decade, I should’ve been exhausted. I’d been plucked, waxed, styled, and forced to parade around in six-heels until I didn’t walk like a newborn deer. I’d visited memory lane with a tornado known as Lisa, and instead of spending the day reminiscing and thinking about things that could’ve left me feeling worse about myself, I blew through without even touching those sad thoughts. Lisa never allowed it.
I never had a chance to slow down and think. The first moment I had to myself to remember that I maybe should feel a little panic about my ten-year reunion, I was standing under a balloon archway in the high school gym. My eyes trailed over the crowd mulling around candlelit tables and to the wall on the other side. A giant sign welcomed everyone to the reunion and under it, I could see eight by ten photographs.
“Please don’t tell me those are yearbook photos.”
Lisa linked her arm through mine, probably afraid I’d tuck tail and run. “Oh, I believe they are. I desperately need to see them all. I’ve seen Russ’, of course, but I never saw yours. Oh, gosh. Were the three stooges as hot back then as they are now?”
Russ growled under his breath and stole his wife from me. “Do not call my friends hot, wife. It’s awful for me to hear, but if they hear it, I’ll never live it down.”
