He looked down at the sand again. Melanie's mouth was open in shock. He had finally come clean, almost.
"What are you saying, Alex? What's unbearable?"
He mumbled something into the sand and Melanie came up onto her knees.
"Say it louder Alex. I can't hear you."
"It's love." He whispered. "I love you." He lifted his eyes to meet hers and they were filled with courage now. "I love you and I want to spend the rest of my life with you." Their gaze met and Melanie was lost. Here was the love she had waited for her whole life, and it was huge, hot, rippling with desire, and struggling to hold itself back from taking her right there and then on the sand.
A slow clapping noise made her glance away from her lover.
"Well done, big brother." Sebastian was grinning as he gave his slow applause. "Are you done?"
Alex nodded and then looked back down to the sand.
"Okay," Sebastian said, "I've got to admit he's good. He's my big brother for God's sake and I love him -- I always will. But it wouldn't be fair to any of us if I didn't speak my mind."
"Will you be speaking as Sebastian now or are you still pretending to be me?" Alex said in a low voice.
Sebastian felt his face go hot but his embarrassment was covered by the shadows. If Alex wanted to play dirty, then he could do that too. It was always the only way he could ever beat his brother at anything.
"I'm Sebastian." He said.
Alex snorted contemptuously and Melanie breathed a sigh of relief. Some truth at last. She had to admit he was beautiful, even for a liar. "I was born just seven minutes after Alex but it might as well have been seven years. Alex has always been ten steps ahead of me in everything."
"That's not true Sebastian, and you know it."
"I let you speak, didn't I?"
"I wasn't lying."
"Let him go, Alex. You had your turn. If you have any problem with what he says you can address it later."
The men nodded and Sebastian continued. Melanie waited to hear what he would have to say about his crude comments at the check-in desk, impersonating his brother on the airplane, about lying to her while she had amnesia, fooling her into getting naked for him, and then nearly fooling her into sex on the sand an hour ago.
"There's one big, big, big difference between me and my brother." Melanie waited to hear, her mouth half opened, staring at the little brother who was so obviously hot with unrestrained desire for her.