“Over to the right,” Claire says through a stretch.
We’re both balancing on top of the red leather barstools, and although we’re limber from years of ballet, we’re still having a hard time hanging the banner over the top of the bar.
“Why are we doing this?” I ask, reaching up higher on my tiptoes. “Shouldn’t those mammoth-sized hockey players do this instead?”
Claire hooks her side of the banner and squeals with excitement just before almost toppling over onto the bar.
“Damnit, Claire! Get down.” Theo rushes over and scoops her up mid-fall, holding her to his chest. His brown hair is still damp from his post-game shower, and he’s peering down at her disapprovingly.
“Oh, relax. I’m fine!” She pats his chest, and I laugh under my breath.
I’m still stretching on a barstool before I decide to just climb on top of the bar for a second to hook the left side. As soon as I have it hooked, I brush my hands together and nod at our handiwork.
“You gonna pay me for hanging this?” I point to the black sign while looking at Claire’s boss.
She snorts. “I’ll give you free fries.”
I gesture to the sign again before putting my hands on my hips. “Everyone gets free fries tonight!”
Her eyes scan the sign, and she reads it out loud. “Hockey night. Free fries when the Wolves win.” She shrugs and acts surprised by the sign she made. “Darn. You’re right.”
I huff out a laugh. “Plus, I can’t even have fries. But it’s fine. I’m happy to help.”
Angie’s eyebrows furrow. “What? Why?”
I look away uncomfortably. “I have diabetes. I have to watch my carb intake.”
Angie stares up at me from down below. The Bex is starting to fill up with rowdy fans. I know the rest of the team is going to show up soon. “What? Since when?”
Claire comes over and places her head on her boss’s shoulder. “It’s a new diagnosis. Remember when I told you that a customer fainted a little while back, and the EMTs had to come?”
Angie looks at me with shock for a quick second before sending me a comforting smile. She’s just one of those women that has a natural motherly touch. She’s warm and kind to not just Claire, but me too. “You know, my father had diabetes. He had some ICU admissions at one point, so you make sure you take care of yourself, Taytum.”
I force a smile.
“That’s what she has me for,” Claire adds.
“Okay, now get down from there before I get the health department called on me.”
I laugh and start to climb down from the bar just as Claire heads back to the booth. The bell over the door chimes, and I lock onto Ford walking in beside my brother. They’re both freshly put together with fully dried hair, unlike Theo who had rushed over here to be with Claire.
Snow falls off the tip of Ford’s nose, and he shakes off the lingering flakes on top of his wide shoulders. My stomach fills with nerves, and it’s so unexpected I almost fall. I wince when I hit my glucose monitor on the barstool. I quickly cover it with my hand.
Shit, that hurt.
My brother rushes over. “What the hell were you doing on top of the bar? Are you okay?”
I turn away. “I’m fine.” I slowly lift my sleeve to make sure the device is still attached, and although there’s some redness around the site, it’s still fine, and there aren’t any alarms going off, so I’m good.
I pull my sleeve back down and turn and jump when I see Ford standing beside my brother with his strong brow furrowed as he stares at my arm.
“Will you two relax?” I brush past them, mainly to avoid Ford.
It was all fun and games when I was Belle and he was Walker, but that time is over.
I clear my throat when I scoot into the booth beside Claire. Theo pulls her onto his lap to make room for me, and since it’s par for the course, Ford and Emory make their way to the other side, right in front of me.
Ford shows Emory something on his phone, and I watch my brother’s shoulders drop. They fist bump, and I watch them closely. Our table fills up quickly with some more hockey players and puck bunnies, along with some of my sorority sisters, and then several heaping plates of french fries are placed in the middle.
Everyone reaches forward to take bites in between talking about the game and the after-party at Rush’s. Angie comes back to our table and places a plate in front of me—and no one else. “Here.” I stare at a personal pizza that’s topped with leafy green vegetables. “It’s thin crust, so hardly any carbs. I used to make it for my dad.”
We share a quick smile, but hers disappears before she slaps Ford’s hand with her waitressing notepad. “Hands off.”
“Angie,” he chides. “I am your best customer. Come on!”
She tips her chin toward me. “Well, I like her better, and she’s prettier than you.”
Ford throws his hands up but finishes with a nod. “I’ll accept that.”
I pull my plate in closer and stick my tongue out at Ford. He zeroes in on my mouth, and I swear, time stops. We’re both frozen, whereas everyone else is carrying on with their fry grabbing and conversations. A swallow rolls down his neck with a little flare of his eye, and it’s obvious that we’re both thinking about what happened last night.
I cross my legs under the table, push away the thought of his hands roaming all over my body and the way he took me captive with the world’s hottest kiss, and go back to eating my pizza.
“You going to Rush’s?” Claire asks.
“No,” Emory answers for me, and I glare at him from across the table. Ford is buried in his phone beside him, which is unusual. Emory looks to Ford’s phone for a second too long and then moves his attention back to me. “She’s going to go home.”
“Why are you like this?” I ask the same question I’ve been asking him since the moment I grew boobs. He has yet to answer me.
Emory looks at my arm. “Have you checked your monitor since you hit it?”
I look around the table, thankful no one is really paying attention. “Yes…” Emory and Ford catch eyes, and I scrutinize their shared look.
“Okay…” I push myself back into the booth. “What are y’all up to?”
I refuse to let last night deter me from staring across the table at Ford. If one of them is going to break, it’ll be him. “Ford?”
His jaw flexes, and he glances away.
“I hate you both.” I nudge Claire with my elbow and climb out of the booth. The crowd parts, and I can’t even be bothered with saying goodbye to anyone because I’m too in my head about Emory’s and Ford’s side glances.
They’re up to something, or they’re keeping something from me.
My phone buzzes, and I expect it to be Claire, but I groan the second I see the name Walker.
Walker: If you don’t come back, I’m eating your pizza.
I send him a middle-finger emoji and change his name back to Ford.
Ford: Get back in here.
Me: I’m going home.
Ford: You’re walking? After dark? Wearing those tight jeans? Not a chance.
Me: I’ll come back in when you tell me what you and Emory are keeping from me.
I nibble on my lower lip and wait for his response.
Ford: He found out about last night.
I drop my phone like it’s on fire. My heart falls to the snowy ground and lands right beside my phone. I turn and peer through the foggy Bex window. There’s no way. Emory would kill Ford, even if Ford told him it meant nothing.
After sweeping my phone off the ground, I quickly type a message.
Me: Tell me the truth, or I’ll make sure Emory actually does find out about last night.
Excitement pulls me backward, and my hand is on The Bex’s door as a pleased grin curves onto my face. I walk into the bustling restaurant and slowly make it to our table. Ford peeks at me from above his phone with a scowl on his face, and I’m back to feeling like myself almost instantaneously.
It’s always rewarding getting a rise out of him.
I slide into the booth, all while keeping Ford’s attention. I shift to Emory when Claire leans in to whisper in my ear, “Are you okay?”
I nod.
She whispers again, “The air is tense. What’s going on?”
“I’ll fill you in later, but play along,” I whisper back.
“What are you two whispering about?” Theo asks, pulling Claire closer to him.
“Oh, just this new bar I found last night.”
Emory snaps to attention. “What?”
I feign excitement. “Yeah! It’s a few towns over in between here and Wilder U. It’s western themed. It was a great excuse to wear my cowgirl boots.”
Nola pouts. “You went without me? I want to go.”
I smile at my sorority sister. “I’ll take you. We’ll invite the rest of the girls too.”
Ford is rapidly texting, and I know I’ll feel another vibration against my leg in a moment.
“Wait,” Emory says. “Who did you go there with?”
I shrug sheepishly. “Just this guy named Walker. He was a great kisser.”
Ford chokes on his water and kicks me at the same time. Emory ignores him and asks me who Walker is, but I can’t stop watching Ford squirm. My phone vibrates for the third time in the last thirty seconds, and I finally put him out of his misery and read the messages.
Ford: You won’t tell him because you know I won’t help you anymore.
Ford: I have something that I think will help, but first you need to fix your monitor.
Ford: Will you knock it off?
Ford: Seriously, Taytum?
Ford: And thanks, but I already knew I was a great kisser.
A tiny smile falls to my mouth, and I want to push his buttons even more, but there’s a notification at the top of my screen from my glucose tracker. Damnit.
“Come on.” Ford nudges his head to the door.
“Go,” Emory agrees, dropping the interrogation about me going to the bar with some guy. Wait, what?
I play stupid, because there is obviously something going on that I’m unaware of that they are aware of. “Go where?” I ask.
“Go fix your monitor. It needs to be re-synced.”
“How do you–” I snap a glare at Ford and quickly run through the last few seconds of them sharing looks and looking down at Ford’s phone. “You didn’t!”
I quickly reach across the table for Ford’s phone, but he’s quicker than me. His fast reflexes drive me wild, and when he dips out of the booth, I’m following after him faster than I can even shout his name.
Snow pelts me in the face with the door chime following my chase. I don’t get a chance to rush after Ford’s footsteps because he grabs onto my waist in a swift manner and pulls me to the side of the building out of sight. My back is against the bricks, and my hands are trapped by my sides.
“Exerting yourself when you could be in a diabetic crisis isn’t smart, Taytum.” Ford clicks his tongue a few times, and I’d bite it if I could. “Re-sync your monitor.”
I tug on my arms. “Did you seriously download and login on the app? How do you even know my password? When did you do that?”
His mouth is so insanely hot now that I know how it feels against mine. I hate that his grin twists my insides with desire instead of irritation. “I know everything about you. It isn’t hard to guess your password, and I did it when you were sleeping.”
A sarcastic laugh fills the space between us. “You stayed in my room all night, didn’t you?” I ask.
Ford looks away, almost like he feels bad. There’s a teeny-tiny slip in my anger with the thought. He can be overprotective, irritating, and borderline obsessive, but God, he can be so thoughtful too.
“That’s why you weren’t playing your best tonight, isn’t it? You stayed up all night to watch me.”
And here I thought it was because he couldn’t stop thinking about our kiss–silly me to think I was running circles in his mind like he was in mine.
Ford pins me with a look, and there’s something unreadable trapped behind the blue hue. “Partly.”
The snowflakes that fall in between us do nothing to cool my flushed skin. Before, there was a playful hint in his tone, but now, there’s something else. Something heavy and so damn enticing.
“And the other part?” I blink at the sound of my raspy voice. My chest rises and falls too quickly, and I pray he doesn’t notice. I’m focused on his tight grip against my wrists and the small space separating us. It’s too similar to last night in the bar bathroom when his hands drifted over my curves like he couldn’t have stopped himself from touching me even if he wanted to.
Ford angles his head to the dark sky, and his jaw is sharper than a knife. “Don’t make me say it.”
My lips part when he peers down at me.
“Because once I say it out loud, I can’t take it back.”
I’m following his movements like my life depends on it, and when he peels his fingers from my wrist, he snakes an arm around my lower back, and instinctively, I arch. My chest brushes against his, and we lock eyes.
The snow makes everything quiet.
Silence surrounds us.
My heart races when Ford bounces his eyes back and forth between mine, and I’ve never felt so desirable from a single look.
The chime on the door carries to where we are, and Ford flies from my body quicker than I can take a breath. He looks like I’ve slapped him, and I feel like he’s slapped me.
Shit. What are we doing?
Ford’s hollow cheeks fill with air, and he grips the back of his neck. “After you fix your monitor, I’ll show you what else I’ve downloaded on my phone to help you find a date…” His sentence trails, and I barely hear him when he says, “or someone to fuck.”
He takes another step backward and adds to his sentence, “Someone who isn’t me.”
I blush but can’t fathom a response because he’s right. Maybe if I can find someone to curb my insane pining, then I can stop wishing my brother’s best friend would put me out of my misery and do the deed himself.
