My older brother was a total asshole.

I mean, sure, he was also my pseudo-dad (weird family dynamic, don't ask), but that didn't give him the right to tell me who I could and couldn't date, especially at eighteen years old. I was a full blown adult!

I mean, to be fair, he'd been telling me I wasn't allowed to date the guy since we started going out a year and a half ago, but it wasn't like I was going to let that stop me.

"I don't like this guy, El. I've told you this over and over again. I'm just looking out for what's best for you!"

"You always use that as an excuse, Eli! I know you think you're protecting me but you're really just holding me back! I'm not the little kid that you rescued anymore, I'm all grown up! You did your job! I just want to live my life now."

My brother sighed and raked his hands through his hair that was a few shades darker than my own, exasperated with me, no doubt. Thankfully there was no one else around to witness this shit show that was my immature argument with him, because even I could admit that yelling to someone that you were an 'adult' most likely meant that you still had some growing to do, but I couldn't think of anything else that could get my point across to him.

I wished V was there. She would've told him to back off and give me some breathing room, maybe tell him to pay more attention to their three year old little girl, Evie, than me, the already grown kid that they'd taken in.

"You're barely eighteen. That's definitely still a kid in my book. I know you think I'm being unfair but one day you'll see that I was right in keeping you away from him."

"You can't control me forever. I'm in college now, and I will see who I want to see, whether you like it or not."

Eli took a few calming breaths while Evie squealed at a toy that went off beside her foot, laughing and clapping along to the tune of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.

"I'm not trying to control you, Elodie. I don't think I'd ever try to do that, especially not after watching what V's father did to her, but I'm watching out for you because no one else is going to. I know how guys think, and at that age-"

"What, they only want one thing? You think I don't know that, just by being a girl, or by the way I grew up? I know a lot more about the world than I wish I did."

Guilt flared across my brother's face, and for a moment I felt bad about what I'd said. If it weren't for him and his wife, I'd still be in that situation, with an abusive father and a neglectful mother and-

No. I had Eli, and V and Evie and I wasn't there anymore, laying on the ground while he stood above me with a belt dripping with anger and malice that begged to kiss my skin one more time while painting me purple and yellow and blue.

Almost as soon as the horror flashed through my eyes, I returned back to reality, Eli walking close to me but I held my hands up to keep him at bay, the memories too much to relive when someone was close.

I had never really healed, despite the therapy and the medications and the deep breathing, distractions, mindfulness, bullshit bullshit bullshit. It was all bullshit that did nothing to help me, but I didn't have to tell them that. They knew, but they didn't know how else to help me.

So I turned to basketball to help me cope, but even then I wasn't good enough to make my college's team, and I refused to allow Eli to pay for my school. He'd done enough for me, and I wanted to make it on my own merit.

"I'm sorry, that was...I went too far. You know I probably wouldn't be here if it weren't for you and V fighting so hard to get custody of me. I just don't want you to think that I'm naive about the world just because of my age. I've got more life experience than most people ten years older than me just because of my childhood. So I want you to trust that I know what I'm doing in my love life."

He cringed when I said 'love life', but he didn't try to argue. Not anymore.

"Fine. I'll stop telling you to dump him. But I want to have him over for dinner, I've only met him twice and I want him to know that I'll skin him alive if he even looks at you wrong."

A sardonic slip of laughter fell out of my mouth at his words and I nodded in agreement.

"I think we can both agree that I'd beat you to it, but I'll let you think you're stronger than me for now. You know, for the sake of your fragile male ego."

"Fragile? Little girl, I'll have you know I'm a professional basketball player."

"Yeah, and? I'm a blue belt in Krav Maga."

Eli bent down to pick up Evie who'd begun vigorously slamming the toy she'd previously been loving against the ground when the music stopped playing and swung her around on his hip, bouncing her up and down so she'd smile, those dark curls framing her face and making her beautiful brown eyes stand out against the creamy complexion of her skin.

"Yeah, a year ago. You quit, remember?"

I did remember. It wasn't something I'd likely ever forget.

I could still feel the wind whipping my face as I stood atop the bridge, water rushing below me, and I threw my belt off my waist and chucked it into the murky depths below, the urge to follow it down into the current almost so all consuming that I had almost done just that, but the sound of Evie's laughter reverberated in my head and I remembered what all I had to live for. What I couldn't leave behind.

And so I'd stepped off the ledge and walked back home, throwing my disheveled hair up into a ponytail and wiping away the tears and mascara tracks that had slipped down my face.

No, it was something I'd remember until my last breath.

"I could still beat your ass, though," I teased just as V pushed through the front door, her keys rattling against the bar top while simultaneously running towards her husband and her three year old.

"Mommy!"

"Hi, baby!"

V's outfit clung to her swollen frame, four months pregnant with their second baby and yet she still looked like a superstar because, well, technically she was one.

"How was work?"

"Long. Annoying. They want me to record a song that I didn't write because they think it'll be a good 'dance track'. I don't know, the lyrics just suck."

"I'm sorry, baby. Maybe write your own dance track?"

I rolled my eyes and faux gagged as they embraced each other, their lingering kiss almost insufferable.

My relationship with Ben was simple and sweet, but nothing close to what V had with Eli. I was starting to think that love was one in a million, but that didn't keep me from trying to get there with Ben, even with our relationship's difficulties.

In all honesty, sometimes I forgot I wasn't single when it felt that way so often.

And then my world went topsy turvy when the door opened once more, and my brother's best friend, Matthew Thornberry strolled through as if he owned the place, which, sometimes it seemed like he did.

"Wow, don't all get up at once. I'm only one man, I can't handle all this praise."

V rolled her eyes while Eli clasped his best friend on the shoulder, but me? I did what I had always done in his presence. I retreated, whether that was inside of myself or to another part of the house, I couldn't stand to be in his presence, in the orbit that pulled me closer towards him inadvertently when he didn't have a damn clue.

But it was too late, however, as I realized one second after his verdant eyes locked onto mine that he wasn't going to ignore me this time.

"Little Ellie, it's been a while. Please tell me you're giving this guy as much shit as-"

"Whoa dude, language!"

I scowled at Eli for a few seconds before I realized that he was only reprimanding him because Evie had recently taken to saying 'bitch' and 'shit' for laughs when she saw the kind of reaction it garnered from the adults in the room.

"Sorry man, not used to talking 'baby'."

"It's all good. We were actually just talking about Elodie going to school next week."

We were? I thought we'd been talking about how he'd tried to keep me from seeing my boyfriend, but that wasn't as good a story as talking about me going to college.

"Oh really? You're already headed off to college? You going to be playing there?"

I gritted my teeth at the stinging reminder, Matthew's towering height more intimidating than the sculpted body crowding me close to the bar in the kitchen, the heat radiating from his body something I still couldn't ignore, no matter how hard I tried.

"No, I didn't make their team. I guess I spent too much time on other things than basketball."

"Or someone," Eli quipped, and I whirled on him.

"I thought we discussed this already?"

"Oh we discussed it. Doesn't mean I'm happy about it."

"Okay, I'm lost," Matthew interjected, sparkling green eyes filled with mirth and amusement for the uncomfortable situation he'd seemingly created.

"It's nothing-" I started, but then V butted in.

"Eli doesn't like the guy Elodie is dating. I don't see why-he's been perfectly nice the times we've met him."

Matthew squinted his eyes, tilting his head as he tried to recollect his memories to see if he'd been present for one of those meetings. He hadn't been.

I held my breath as he leaned close to me, his arm brushing against mine and I had to hold back the fluttering eyelids and swoon that was building up within me, but of course he didn't notice what his proximity did to me. He never did.

"Who is he? I can look him up, see what he's about, who he hangs out with, that kind of stuff."

I didn't know what Matthew did for his 'day job' aside from practicing with Eli and their team, solidifying their status as the 'dynamic duo' in basketball stardom, but apparently stalking was one of those things.

"No no no, I already have one overprotective male figure intimidating him, I don't need another one."

Not to mention how awkward it would be for my forever longtime crush to meet my boyfriend. Yeah, that was definitely not happening.

"Well, when are we meeting him?"

I wanted to tell Matthew the fifth of never, but I didn't want to be rude. It was almost physically impossible to be rude to someone so gorgeous. It wasn't fair that he had gotten to see me in my awkward kid phases when the moment I met him it was almost like he had already been full grown. Talk about unfair.

"He's supposed to be coming over for dinner tomorrow night." I didn't tell them that we'd be going out to the movies that night, just in case they tried to block me at the door and force him inside. Poor Ben.

"Great. I'll bring the lie detector, and you bring the boy. This is going to be fun."

"Matthew. If you embarrass me-"

"Don't worry little Shepherd. I'll be on my best behavior."

That was what I was worried about, especially as he winked at me. He actually winked at me!

I could've died happy right then and there, if it weren't for the incoming text on my phone from Ben.

We need to talk.