Songbird by Maya Banks Read Free Book Online

his breath and tugged one of his hands free of his pocket. “I know you think I’m a cold son of a bitch.”
    Taggert made a sound of surprise.
    “I mean with Emily. I let you comfort her. I made her some soup then split.”
    Taggert raised an eyebrow in acknowledgement but didn’t say anything as he stared back at his brother.
    “You know what I regret?” Greer looked down at one scuffed boot for a moment before he refocused on the hillside, looking beyond the neat graves to the mountains in the distance. “That day that Emily came to see us. I could tell she was upset about something. But all I wanted to do was take her in my arms, haul her up to my bedroom and make love to her. I felt like a first-class jerk. She was young. I’d sworn to never act on my feelings beyond friendship. I had this idea that I was being noble and self-sacrificing.” He snorted. “What a crock of bullshit. I gave her that pompous speech about how she was mistaking friendship for something else and then I proceeded to really patronize her by saying I’d always love her but she was too mixed-up about her feelings to possibly know her mind.”
    He shook his head bitterly.
    “Even now, all I can think of is taking her to bed and showing her just how much I love her. She’s hurt, she’s grieving, and I can’t get close to her without wanting to make love to her. How big of a bastard does that make me?”
    “Christ, if you’re asking my blessing,” Taggert said in disgust.
    Greer clenched his fingers into fists and turned on Taggert. “Fuck you. I’m not asking you for any goddamn favors.”
    “Look, I’m sorry,” Taggert said wearily. “This is one big goddamn mess. I don’t have the answers. I never did or we wouldn’t be standing here over Sean’s grave arguing and feeling like the two biggest dumbasses this side of the Mississippi.”
    “Agreed,” Greer clipped out. “Fuck me but I don’t know what to do.”
    Taggert toed a line in the soil with the tip of his boot then kicked up a clump of the grass. “Seems to me like you ought to at least talk to Emily. Let her know your feelings and all that bullshit. Jesus, this is a hell of a conversation to be having with my younger brother. You know what I mean, though. Talk to her, for fuck’s sake. We’ve got a second chance here. Let’s not blow it.”
    “She loved Sean,” Greer said quietly. He turned to stare at Taggert, needing his confidence. “What if what she felt for us was girlish infatuation, what we feared she felt at the time? Or what if her love died when we pushed her away? She and Sean were happy. I don’t believe for a minute he was some substitute for what she couldn’t have.”
    “She loved…loves us all,” Taggert said. “It seems simple enough now, though back then it sounded so farfetched.”
    “Or maybe we just want to believe it now.”
    “Look, believe what you want to believe,” Taggert said impatiently. “I’m not going to try and convince you. I get that you’re worried. I get that you’re having second thoughts now that she’s here and we’re not talking about abstracts and possibilities. But if you love her—if you want her—how the fuck can you stand by and do nothing?”
    “You make it sound so simple.”
    “It is simple. Pull your head out of your ass, for God’s sake.”
    Greer chuckled, suddenly feeling a little lighter. “You do have a way with words, Tagg.”
    “Well Christ, you’re getting positively moody on me.”
    “Okay, okay, I get it. I’m a dumbass.”
    For a moment, his gaze flickered back to Sean’s grave, and a spasm of pain squeezed his heart.
    “I miss him, man,” he said softly.
    Taggert followed his gaze to the headstone, his expression sad. “I miss him too. He was too young to die.”

Chapter Seven
    Emily woke in darkness, her senses more alert than they’d been in a long time. For a moment she just lay there, staring up at the ceiling, tears crowding her eyes. How easily they came now