Free Leveling The Field (Gamers #4) by Megan Erickson

and it was completely appropriate for preteens. “You want to give this to Sydney to try?” he asked.
    Chloe’s head nodded from her seat on the floor. “Sure.”
    “Graphics are good. I could probably count the scales on my guy’s back—Oh!” He winced as the tip of his tail was severed by an enemy’s sword. “Shit! Oh well, that’s not going to leave a mark because…” He paused as his tail regenerated, and he grinned. “Ta-da! I’m basically a fucking starfish. You can’t kill me by severing limbs!” He snorted. “Amateur.”
    He stopped when he realized Chloe wasn’t playing anymore. She had twisted at the waist and was watching him with an amused glint in her eyes.
    “What’s that look for?”
    “Because you can take the E-Rad out from in front of the camera, but you can’t keep the vocal gamer out of E-Rad.”
    He didn’t like where this was going, and his palms began to sweat. “I was just making conversation.”
    “No, you weren’t. You were commentating as if I wasn’t even here. If I closed my eyes, it would be like it was—” She stopped talking when he abruptly shut down everything with one click from his master control. Chloe’s face dropped. “Ethan—”
    He met her gaze, and he knew his expression was blank, because if he dropped an ounce of control, he’d sneer at her. And his sister didn’t deserve that. So with every muscle tight in order to focus on neutrality, he said, “As soon as you open your eyes, you’ll see nothing is like it was. Nothing.”
    He stood up, hating to see the devastated look on his sister’s face, but not wanting to talk about this. He made his way to the kitchen and pulled a beer out of the fridge. “Want one?” He held one out to Chloe, who had followed him into the kitchen.
    She shook her head. “My eyes are open, Ethan. You’re the one who refuses to see anything but your own misery.”
    He whirled to face her. “Why am I not allowed to be like this? Can’t I handle everything the way I want to? On my own terms?”
    She pursed her lips and dropped her eyes, shuffling her feet in her leopard print flats. “I’m sorry I brought it up, but I worry about you.”
    “You don’t need to worry.”
    She glanced up and braced herself on the counter. “You can’t just say that and expect me to go, ‘oh, okay, well then, everything’s peachy.’ Not while you hole yourself up in this house, work your ass off, and don’t date.”
    “I don’t need a wife to be happy.”
    She threw up her hands. “I never said you did. But you used to love to socialize. You loved women and dating and…” She let her voice trail off then bit her lip. “You used to love it all. And now, I’m not sure what you love anymore.”
    Her words were slicing and dicing, when he hadn’t thought there was much left to hurt. He gulped his beer. After he swallowed, he said. “I love you .”
    She took a step closer. “I know you do. It’s who you don’t love that worries me.” He didn’t meet her eyes, choosing to focus on peeling the label off his beer bottle. She sighed. “You don’t love yourself, and there’s nothing I can do to change that.”
    He didn’t know what to say to that, because they both knew she was right. There was no point in confirming.
    When he didn’t respond, she grabbed her purse. “I have to go.”
    He nodded.
    She stood in front of him until he finally looked up. Her cheeks were flushed and her eyes a little wet. She smiled sadly. “I love you, and I think I’m a pretty good judge of character, don’t you think?”
    When the only answer was his silence, she squeezed his arm and left.
    He stood there for a long moment, until the rest of his beer was lukewarm and he had to pour it down the drain. He had a lot of issues, but drinking too heavily was not one of them, thank God.
    Chloe had been right—he used to love to date. He loved women and they loved him. Before the accident, he’d managed to stay friends with a lot of his