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

He huffed. “We’ll have to agree to disagree. Anyway, I’m happy for you both. How’s Cass taken the news? Or haven’t you told him yet?” Caiden addressed the question to me, but it was Weston who answered.

“I told him on the way over. He took it well. I think.” He looked like he was about to say something else, when his phone sounded in his pocket. “That better fucking be Xenon,” he muttered, his attention suddenly diverted to the issue that was still hanging over our heads: the dog fighting and Martin Smith.

I took his drink so he could check his phone, all of us falling silent as he read the message. “It’s not Xenon—it’s my program sending me an alert. I’ve got it automatically flagging up Martin Smith’s data. Listen to this email.”

In a low voice, he read from the screen.

“Thom. Funds transferred from AH. M.”

“Fuck.” Caiden scrubbed his hand over his face. “We’d better mention this to Dad.”

“I agree.” Weston shoved his phone back in his pocket. “If he’s using Alstone Holdings, then he needs to be stopped.”

The atmosphere turned heavy. We needed to get this guy.

“Can I have everyone’s attention?”

We were pulled from our thoughts by the sound of my dad tapping a glass, standing in the centre of the room.

“As you all know, we’re here to celebrate my son’s birthday. Cassius? Where are you?”

Cassius was standing off to the side, close to the buffet table, chatting to Kinslee. At his dad’s words, his head shot up, and a beaming smile crossed his face. He joined our dad in the centre of the room, and someone dimmed the lights. Although it was daytime, the sky was dark thanks to the heavy rain outside.

“On three. Let’s sing Happy Birthday to Cassius!”

He counted to three, and everyone began to sing as my mum entered the room with a huge birthday cake balanced in her hands, with two candles on the top. I covered my mouth to hide my smile, because my mum had put me in charge of ordering the cake.

Cassius didn’t miss a beat, blowing out the candles and grinning hugely as everyone cheered, but then his eye caught mine, and I knew that he was aware of who had chosen his cake.

I wandered over to him when everyone had gone back to mingling with each other. Weston came, too, his fingers threaded through mine, the feeling so natural it was like we’d been together for years.

“This is your doing, huh?” Cassius raised a brow, looking between me and the cake.

“Yep. Quite a good likeness, isn’t it?”

Weston snorted with amusement. “It looks like…if a cartoon version of Cass was run over by Z’s bike and half his face is melting off.”

“Then the bakery did their job,” I said in satisfaction. I’d asked them to give me a badly decorated Nailed It! version of my brother’s likeness—and they’d done it perfectly.

“Tastes fucking amazing,” Cassius told me through a mouthful of cake. “Great job, sis.”

“You’re welcome.”

My cousin called to him, and he headed away, leaving me with Weston next to the cake. He stared down at it, still grinning, then pulled his phone from his pocket. “Let’s commemorate our relationship status with a selfie of you with this cake.”

THIRTY-NINE

I checked my phone with a grin. The selfie I’d taken with Lena yesterday hadn’t gone unnoticed. It seemed like most people were fans of me and Lena being together. In the photo I was trying (and failing) to feed her a piece of Cassius’ birthday cake, and she was laughing as I took the photo, dropping bits of cake all over the floor. Now everyone knew she was mine.

We’d celebrated all night, wrapped up in each other, until I’d eventually left her bed in the early hours of the morning. She had school, and I had lectures in the morning, plus an essay that I wasn’t even close to finishing.

Fuck, I wanted to wake up with her. She only had a couple of months left at school, and then we’d have the whole summer. I couldn’t fucking wait. And after the summer, she’d be starting at Alstone College.

I made it through my morning lectures on autopilot, my mind turning from my girlfriend to Martin Smith. Caiden and I had arranged a meeting with our dad later in the day, and maybe we’d get lucky. Maybe.

Heading into the packed cafeteria at lunchtime, I spotted my boys with Winter and Kinslee at our favourite table in front of the windows. After grabbing a sandwich and a bottle of water, I made my way over to them, taking the seat opposite my brother, who had Winter perched on his lap.

“Ready for later?” I spoke around a mouthful of bread, and Winter pulled a face at me.

“What is it with you and Cassius and your gross eating habits?”

I shrugged. Swallowing, I uncapped my bottle of water and took a swig, before glancing over at my brother. “Did you hear from Dad?”

“Yeah. All sorted,” he assured me.

Nodding, I grinned at him. I had confidence in us, in what we’d planned to do. Now my dad was involved, it was actually a weight off my mind. Thanks to his help, we were going to be able to access information that we wouldn’t have had a chance to get hold of before.

“Looking good, Z.”

My gaze swung away from my brother to see Portia standing at our table, then flicked to Winter in time to see her baring her teeth. Blanking Portia, she pointedly turned away, and Cade wrapped his arms more tightly around her, kissing her neck.

Zayde, meanwhile, acted like he hadn’t even heard her. She was beautiful, there was no doubt about it, but there was no love lost between them. Between her and any of us, for that matter.

Before Portia could respond, her attention went to someone behind me, and her eyes narrowed, a vindictive gleam coming into them. “You’re not welcome here,” she called.

The whole cafeteria seemed