The Fight In Us: A Brother's Best Friend College Romance (The Four Book 4) by Becca Steele (little readers .txt) 📕

tone, stepping forwards. Internally rolling my eyes, I ignored their dick-measuring contest, my gaze drifting to the girl he’d arrived with.

Lena Drummond. My best friend Cassius’ younger sister. All dressed in black, as usual, her long blonde hair loose and poker straight. Something flashed in her blue eyes as they met mine, but it was gone before I could read it, and her face defaulted to its usual unsmiling expression.

Wait. She’d turned up with James Granville. A weird sensation twisted my stomach, something I didn’t quite understand. The words came out before I had a chance to think about them. “Lena? What’re you doing with Granville?” She held my gaze for a moment, and it looked like she was trying to read something on my face. What, I had no fucking clue. When I remained standing there, waiting for her to explain, she breathed out heavily and rolled her eyes.

“He gave me a lift. Get over it. I’m here—that has to count for something.” Before I could say anything in reply, she turned on her heel and disappeared into the crowds.

“Who was that?” Winter asked me curiously.

“Lena Drummond. Cassius’ sister. She’s seventeen and…mad at the world? Or something? I don’t know. She’s moody.”

“Right.” She sighed. “Thanks for your insightful comments, West.”

I grinned at her, grabbing my drink from the bar and lifting it to my lips. “Pleasure.”

Downing my pint, I tuned out James and Caiden as I scanned the crowd. I caught a flash of blonde hair out of the corner of my eye, and my heart sped up.

What the fuck?

I was interrupted from my thoughts by Winter threading her arm through mine. She smiled up at me. “Shall we go and mingle?”

Yes. I stared in the direction of the blonde head, all the way over the other side of the room, but gave a groan. Couldn’t seem too eager. “We’d better. Come on.”

By the time we’d made it to the far side of the room, Lena had disappeared.

Hours later, the party was still going strong, but I’d escaped to the relative peace of the study with Cassius and our housemate, Zayde Lowry, who was also my brother’s best mate. Cass had dragged a girl in with him, and while I’d normally do the same, I wasn’t feeling it tonight for some reason.

“Wanna play?” I suggested to Zayde, already heading over to the dartboard and pulling down a handful of darts.

“Only if we make it interesting.”

“Play for money?”

Zayde nodded, and I stepped back from the board. “You go first.”

We’d been playing for a while, and it was a fucking miracle, but Zayde was off his game. I was in the lead. This shit needed to be documented, because I doubted it would happen again.

Just when I’d taken my phone out to take a photo of the scoreboard, there was a series of knocks on the door.

“Who’s that?”

“How the fuck would I know?” my brother muttered in reply to my pointless question, all sighing and sulky, stomping over to the door to open it. He seriously needed to get laid or something. His brooding anger was on a hair trigger, even more so since Winter had shown up in our lives.

Lena appeared in the room, and I forgot all about the game as I took her in. Dropping her phone to the sofa next to Cassius, she glanced around the room. “Can someone take me home?”

Cassius said something that I didn’t hear as I stood rooted to the spot, staring at her, trying to work out what the fuck I was feeling when I looked at this girl. I needed another drink. Lucky for my dart game, but unlucky for me, I’d only had one beer back at the beginning of the night.

“—He can’t take me home since he’s had a drink. Mum and Dad left ages ago, and I just tried to get an Uber, but they can’t come for another forty-five minutes,” Lena was saying when my brain finally decided to tune back into the conversation.

I was already moving towards her. “I’ll take you.”

“No, I’ll take her.” Zayde appeared next to me, his tone threaded with ice.

I gritted my teeth. “I already offered.”

He turned the full force of his icy gaze on me. “I’m taking her.”

I glared right back at him, refusing to be the one to break our stand-off.

The stand-off ended with Lena’s words. “Sorry, West, but Z has a bike.” She stared at me with an unreadable expression on her face, before she twisted the knife by adding, “And I need to feel the power between my legs, if you know what I’m saying.”

Then they were gone. Unreasonable jealousy and anger raged inside of me, and I didn’t even know why.

“What was all that about, West?” My brother gave me a curious look.

“Nothing.” Stalking back over to the dartboard, I grabbed a handful of darts, launching them at the board.

I couldn’t shake the haze of anger. “I’m out of here.” I threw the final dart, uncaring, and it clattered to the floor.

I needed a drink. Now.

THREE

PRESENT DAY

I glanced up at my brother, Cassius, as we headed into the bowling alley with our friends Winter and Caiden. “Where’s West?” My voice was casual. “I thought he was coming bowling.”

“He is.” Cassius scanned the large open space. Colourful lights played over the lanes, and music pumped from the speakers, accompanied by the sounds of falling pins. “There.”

I followed his line of sight to see Weston propped up against the bar, openly flirting with a gorgeous girl with short, jet-black hair who was waiting to be served. She laughed at something he said, placing her hand on his arm, and I pushed down the unwanted spike of jealousy at her actions.

Weston wasn’t mine.

And I had to remember that.

I’d perfected the art of pretending over the years. Pretending I only saw Weston as a friend. Pretending that he didn’t affect me. Pretending it didn’t cut me up inside every time another new conquest ended up