Hating Him Wanting Him : A Contemporary Romance Collection

by Summer Brooks

  Everyone laughed again and Evan’s father lifted his champagne flute and shrugged his shoulders. Conner clicked the button again and a picture of Evan and I from the trip we took to the mountains not long after that fateful day I was trapped in my father’s house came up on the screen. Everyone let out a collective sigh and Evan gripped my hand tightly in his lap.

  Conner smiled and lifted his glass. “I have to be honest, I never thought there would be a day that Evan met a woman that out-shadowed him. We are more than grateful to you for taking this man off our hands. The two of you make a couple that everyone else hopes they can be. Congratulations on your marriage, I love you both, and I wish you the best in everything that you do together.”

  “Salute,” the crowd said in unison, lifting their glasses.

  We took a sip of our champagne and Evan kissed me on the cheek, beaming at me from ear to ear. Lily stepped up to the front dressed in the simple, long, satin bridesmaid’s gown that she had picked out when heading up the maid of honor duties for the wedding. I had to admit, it was absolutely gorgeous, but not nearly as gorgeous as the dress that she designed for me and I had custom-made. It was strapless and hugged tightly to my curves until it reached right below my hips and then dropped straight down to the floor. The train had been bunched up and pinned to the back but during the ceremony dragged three feet behind me. It was a crisp white satin material with a shimmering lace overlay, and small sparkling crystals covered the buttons up the back. On my feet, I wore those same neon pink heels that I had worn in California to give myself, what Lily called, “a little bit of swag.”

  Lily lifted her glass to the crowd. “While I know you’re all wishing that I would click this little button and embarrassing pictures of my best friend would pop up on the screen, any of you that know her know that those pictures don’t exist. Even as a child she was meticulous and calm. And to be completely honest, anything that could be used against her was destroyed a long time ago. That’s what best friends are for.”

  A chuckle moved over the crowd. Lily’s eyes glimmered as she stared over at us with a smile on her face. “Mia you have been the most loyal friend to me. You have watched me fumble my way through life, making a complete mess, and leaving a disaster in my wake since we were young faced freshman in college. I always thought that you would be up here before me, at least for three of my weddings before you actually took the vows…”

  I laughed loudly, shaking my head. Lily shrugged. She snickered at the crowd which was giggling. “Hey I’m honest. But seriously, you had so many goals and aspirations and you’ve met every single one of them. But this was not on there. I always told you the best things in life were never the things that you planned for. And while at the beginning of your relationship there were a couple times that I offered my bodyguard service to take down Evan, I’m really glad that I never had to use them because the two of you are absolutely perfect for each other. I could stand here and go on and on but I’m not really the teary-eyed kind of person. So in conclusion, Evan I want you to remember something. Mia promised me long ago, that I would always be her roommate so you better get the spare room cleaned up.”

  As the crowd laughed and clapped Lily held her glass up high. “To the beautiful couple, may you have a long beautiful relationship and create many, many babies that you never ask me to babysit.”

  “Salute,” the crowd cheered.

  I winked at Lily from across the room and took a sip of my champagne. The music was instrumental and low in the background and I looked out over this amazingly beautiful party that had been constructed in our honor. It was held at the country house ballroom where my father had completely renovated the place, including upgrading the stables for me and purchasing a couple of horses so that I could ride anytime I wanted to. The tables were spread out across the low-lit room, draped in white linens with large bouquets of flowers standing four feet tall in the middle of each table. The whole room was covered in candles giving it an evening saffron glow.

  But I would have to say, the best part about it all was the table right in front of me. My mother and Evan’s mother sat next to each other, leaning in toward each other and talking excitedly. My father and Evan’s father did the same, looking as if they hadn’t had a fight in their entire lives. After Evan had spoken to my father about us, and he left us to work it out, he himself made his way over to Mister Lagrange’s home.

  He hadn’t realized until my happiness was on the line what him and Evan’s father had done. So, they sat down and they worked it out. There was a lot of talking to do and a lot of whiskey to drink while they did it, but from what I was told, by the end of it, they had secured a friendship that I was pretty sure could never be broken again.

  Evan squeezed my hand, bringing me out of my daze and nodded over toward our wedding planner. She tapped her wrist and pointed at the cake. The cake, a masterpiece in itself created by Miss Beverly and the chef at my father’s estate. I had never seen a culinary confection as huge as this thing was. It was seven tiers of toffee red velvet cake covered in a smooth white fondant with ribbons of teal and gray candies winding down to the bottom. It had a sparkling sheen to it that looked like crystals in the candlelight.

  We headed over to the cake and everybody watched with amusement as we cut it together and then struggled to avoid each other’s face smashing. Luckily, Evan feared Lily’s wrath if he messed up my makeup, so he very gently set a piece between my lips and dotted my nose with some of the icing. We kissed and everybody cooed as flashes from cameras flickered all around us.

  The MC for the evening stood up on the stage in front of the orchestra. “One of the most interesting things that I found when planning this wedding with both families was the lengths that Mia’s father wanted to go to make this a memorable experience. This was one of the coolest.”

  He looked up at the ceiling as it clicked and clanked sliding back to reveal the beautiful night sky above us. There were gasps and whispers and my father sat proudly, smiling at me from across the room. The MC came back over the mic. “Now, I would like to present to you, for the first time as husband and wife, Evan and Mia Lagrange.”

  Everyone clapped as he took my hand and twirled me out onto the dance floor. I giggled knowing that my two left feet could possibly take me down at any moment. But there really wasn’t anything to worry about, and I knew that because Evan always had me. From the moment we made things official, he never let me hit the floor, and that dance was no exception. He pulled me close and held my hand in his as the music began to play. Overhead whistles of silver shooting fireworks whizzed across the sky, leaving sparkling trails of glimmering lights above us.

  Evan looked deeply in my eyes and my heart skipped a beat just like it did the first time he kissed me. “I couldn’t imagine finding anyone more perfect and more in tune to me in this world. I love you Mia, and I always will. And this is just the beginning of our amazing future together.”

  A tear trickled down my cheek, a tear of happiness. “I couldn’t agree with you more. I think we both finally got the happy ending that we deserved.”

  Evan shook his head whispering into my ear. “It’s only the beginning.”

  Perfectly Wrong

  Blurb

  Yes, I’ve broken the girl code.

  I slept with my best friend’s ex.

  He’s a football star. Rich as sin.

  And my sworn enemy from high school.

  Bryant is perfectly wrong for me.

  He has a big mouth.

  And a bigger… you know what!

  But we’re college roommates now.

  Oh, the hatred and those rough nights.

  He spins my world around.

  And I let him take control of me.

  On one condition.

  We remain each other’s secret.

  No one is supposed to find out about us.

  We have too much on the line.

  His career.

  My friendship.

  Our future.<
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  But every lie has a way of coming out.

  So, who’s gonna end up paying the price for this one?

  1

  Mia

  I was so tired I could just nap the day away, but that would be a mistake — I had so much to do. So much to pack.

  Today was the day: I was finally going to Florida. Somehow, after the year of hell I’d gone through… everything ended up alright. Community college, working part-time, helping my family move back into our house after the fire, dealing with life after high school. It all worked out.

  So why was I so sad? I should be excited.

  Unable to help myself, I yawned. Last night I went out with Regina, one last celebration of our time together here. Even though I applied for the same school she did, I got accepted to Florida again — this time with a scholarship.

  Regina took it pretty well. “Well, we all know traveling and learning to be the most kick-ass journalist ever is your destiny, Mia,” she said, prodding her boyfriend to buy us a tray of shots.

  “You’re such a naughty girl,” I teased my best friend. There was no ambiguity for me here: Regina was my best friend.

  Not Samantha.

  I couldn’t possibly think that way, not after finding out what she did.

  How could Samantha date that asshole, Bryant Howard? It didn’t make sense to me. Sure, they were two kids from the same high school in Indianapolis, hundreds of miles away from their new life. But it wasn’t as if Samantha had been desperate for attention there. She was hot. She could have been with anyone. In fact, from the phone calls we had almost every night before I found out about her and Bryant, I knew that she did hook up with lots of different guys.

  It blew my mind, and it broke my heart.

  Whatever.

  “Here’s to kicking ass,” I said, raising a tequila shot. Regina and I downed ours and went straight to the dance floor.

  Excitement kept me from being hungover, but not even adrenaline could stop me from being tired. I felt exhausted from all the worrying and fussing over everything. I was worse than my mom when it came to this.

  My paranoia was that I somehow forgot something important I needed to pack. Or that I was taking the wrong sort of wardrobe.

  My brother even stood at the doorway, laughing as I unpacked and repacked for probably the third time today. “Mia, what’s gotten into you? If you forget something, I’ll just send it to you.”

  “What if I need it right now?”

  “Then you can pack again one more time, that’s it.”

  For all of his fourteen years of age, Eugene was quite the old soul. I loved him, and I knew I was going to miss him. He was about to walk away when I jumped off my bed and rushed to tackle him with a hug.

  “Hey! Get off! Jesus, Mia!” Eugene said, trying to fling me off him, but even I could tell he was grinning.

  I tickled my little brother. “I’m gonna miss you. Can you skip baseball and come with me to the airport?”

  “Uh, no, baseball’s way more important,” he joked. “Fine. Only because I wouldn’t want Mom to start lecturing you about… I don’t know. Staying safe.”

  We both cringed. I didn’t need to confide in my kid brother about my sex life, but I wasn’t really planning on going to college to get laid. Miraculously, I had lasted through high school as a virgin, and I didn’t mind it at all. I had better things to focus on than horny boys trying to get in my pants.

  Then again, it didn’t help that horny boys didn’t try to get in my pants because Bryant Howard kept putting me down as a mega-nerd.

  “Check out the nerd’s new glasses,” I remembered one particularly painful moment of bullying. I had spent a whole day shopping for the right pair of frames, something that would be a chic step up from my admittedly geeky pair from before. Samantha and Regina had pooled a bunch of money together so I could get these fancy Japanese designer frames from Masunaga. We traveled to Chicago because that was the closest city that sold something as fancy as that… and when I got back to school, any good feeling I had about my new glasses were ruined the moment Bryant opened his cruel mouth.

  At least with these glasses I can see him coming at me from a mile away, I thought to myself. I should’ve seen Samantha’s betrayal first, though.

  I sighed. Anxiety and idleness meant I ended up repacking all over again. I just wanted to be horizontal, lying in bed until it was time to drive to the airport, but the flight was hours away. My open bags covered my bed, anyway, and I couldn’t be bothered to push them away and make space for my small frame to lie down.

  “Whatever!” I exclaimed to my ceiling.

  Was I really feeling this way about my future college life just because I found out that Samantha was dating Bryant? That sucked, yes, but surely after all we had gone through, I could forgive Sam, right? Or at least be the best possible friend while she… did whatever with Bryant?

  Now that I thought about it, there was no reason I couldn’t just find a new set of friends, anyway. After all, my journalism department wasn’t even in the same faculty as Sam’s music production course. I knew I wanted to major as soon as I could, and my planned path involved making it clear to everyone that I was serious about my future in journalism.

  In the weeks since I had been accepted to Florida, I read extensively about the various newspapers and media outlets interested in taking on freelancers. I reached out to editors and producers, introduced myself, offered to take on internships if the opportunity came up. I even got replies.

  I was going to keep myself busy.

  There was no way I could even find the time, let alone the energy, to be bothered by some jerk who used to say nasty things about me. Nerd with glasses — so what? I even wore contact lenses now, sometimes.

  Regina was the one who recommended I try them. “Mia, you have gorgeous eyes. They’re, like, so blue. Ocean blue. The kind broody singer-songwriters make indie folk rock songs about.”

  My parents exhaled in relief when my acceptance letter arrived, reading that this time I did get a scholarship. Florida was my main choice this time around, and I tailored my essay accordingly. I was so grateful that at least I could get a full-ride to a college I cared about.

  Of course, I was actually going to have to study — my scholarship depended on me performing every semester, keeping a good GPA and showing active initiative with extracurricular activities too.

  Part of this made me start to think about Bryant again. The wannabe macho man that was the high school bully and star quarterback also had a scholarship, which was probably the only thing in common between us. But his was an athletic scholarship, and it didn’t strike me as fair that he could just laze around and not even focus on his studies so long as he showed academic potential.

  I felt like my year made me earn the spot I had in that college. As for him, a quick browse on his Instagram shortly after I found out about Sam dating him told me he wasn’t even a starter for the Florida University Renegades.

  So why was he even there?

  “Mia, do you need any help?”

  I looked up, expecting my brother again, but it was my mom instead. She was still wearing her gardening gloves. Ever since we’d moved back in, she had poured a lot of her spare time into reviving our formerly lush garden, most of which had been ruined by the fire.

  I still had nightmares when I thought about the fire. My dreams literally burned down that night.

  “Sure, mom,” I smiled, tilting my head to gesture that she could come in.

  Mom took her gloves off and put them down on my study desk. “Eugene just complained that you were unpacking all over again.”

  “He’s such a busybody. How’s he going to handle himself when his big sister’s away?” I joked back. “Anyway, I have all these bags, I just want to be sure one last time that I have everything.”

  “Take a picture or something, Mia! Don’t be silly.”

  “Okay, okay, thanks, Mom.”

  She got on her knees and started tak
ing some of my clothes, rolling them far more efficiently than I did. My mom was a queen when it came to making efficient use of space. I never knew how she did it — growing up, our family vacations felt like incredible feats of wardrobe shrinking.

  “Dad’s going to be home soon. I figure rather than go to the airport so quickly, you could just relax and calm down for a couple of hours, then we could have lunch before your flight?” she offered. “Remember our little family ritual during summer breaks?”

  “Everyone buys Chicken McNuggets combos and we pool all the nuggets and fries together and eat them all,” I grinned. “Okay. That sounds nice.”

  “Family rituals matter. Just because you’re all the way in Florida doesn’t mean we’re going to forget you. So I hope this means you’re not going to forget us either,” Mom said.

  I could tell this was a speech she had rehearsed, and I knew the best thing would be to not get defensive, to just let her make her point. Moms can be moms.

  “I hear you,” I said, nodding, letting her continue.

  “You know, your father and I are really proud of you, Mia. You took the bad news from last year really well, and even though I could tell the old Mia would have really hated going to community college when you were definitely smart enough to go anywhere you wanted, I’m proud to say my daughter adapted to the circumstances and just… did a really great job.”

  I smiled. “Thanks, Mom.”

  “This school is going to be really good for you. And you’ll be reunited with Sam, are you excited?”

  On one level, I was excited, though mostly I was dreading it. But I wasn’t going to tell my mom that. I hadn’t told her that Sam was dating Bryant. Mom had had to deal with so much of the messy drama that came from being bullied by that jerk all throughout my school life, and I loved that she had also grown to hate him by proxy.