by Piper Rayne
I stand and take her hand. “This means nothing. It’s just my friends’ dumb way of finding fun in their life.”
“I’m excited. It’s been a long time, Seth Andrews. I’m sure there’s a lot I don’t know about you.”
“And me you. But just between us, what is your favorite sexual position?”
“There are some things you just have to find out on your own.”
I stop as she walks out the door. Was that an invitation? Would I entertain sleeping with her?
Hell yeah, I would.
But that’s just asking for trouble, so it’s never going to happen.
Chapter Fifteen
Evan
Where did that come from? Now he probably thinks I want to sleep with him.
I really need a best friend I can confess things to. I love Elsie, but with nine years between us, there’s a lot I keep to myself.
We walk out of Seth’s room, and though I’m embarrassed by the words that came out of my mouth, I’m even more embarrassed that I broke down in there. At least he didn’t try to wipe my tears away. I must have sounded pathetic.
There’s pizza on the counter, more beer bottles lying around, and we’re joined by Ethan, Blanca, Sierra, and Adrian.
“We figured you’d need some other couples to play against, and since I’m the host”—Rian points at herself and smiles—“Dylan and I are out.”
“Which sucks. Knox can be the host or let Jax,” Dylan says.
“Yeah, if I didn’t live here, I wouldn’t be here,” Jax says.
“I’ll do it if you want to play so bad, Phillips,” Knox says and takes the notecards from Rian.
She doesn’t look very happy, but she pulls over two more chairs and adds them to the contestant line.
“Congratulations, boss,” Adrian says to me.
Adrian doesn’t work for me anymore, but I realize when I see him that he was the first person I admitted my disdain for what I do for a living to.
“They’re not really engaged,” Sierra tells him. “It’s fake.”
“I can still say congratulations.” He nods at me with a great big smile. It’s weird seeing him dressed up, since he was always in uniform at the shop. “Not to mention I just returned from Sandsal and you know how much I don’t like to socialize on my first night back.” He waggles his eyebrows at Sierra.
She pats his leg. “Relax. We’ll be home in no time. And you’re home for good, right?”
Everyone claps and says “finally.” Envy hits me at how invested they all are in each other’s lives. Seth is lucky. I’m not sure he knows how lucky he is to have this group of friends.
“Okay, you new lovebirds have a seat.” Knox signals to the two vacant chairs. “You each have a whiteboard. We’ll ask a question, and whoever has the whiteboard will write the answer and keep it covered. After that, their partner will answer. If you get it right, Jax will score you.”
“No, I won’t.” Jax tips back a water bottle before chewing on a bite of pizza.
“You have to, man, Dylan is a contestant now,” Knox says.
Blanca raises her hand.
“Blanc, just ask. This isn’t grade school,” Knox says.
“What are we playing for? Just bragging rights?” Her face is screwed up as if that’s not enough.
“Welcome to my fiancée’s life, where everything is a competition. Another thing to thank her three brothers for.” Ethan rolls his eyes and grabs his beer off the table.
“I’m game. What did you have in mind?” Dylan leans forward, rubbing his hands together.
“We do have the bachelor/bachelorette trip coming up and we haven’t picked the destination yet,” Ethan says.
“That should be your decision,” Rian says.
Blanca and Ethan share a look and shrug.
“We really don’t care. We just want to get out of town. I mean, not to mention, we’ve been together the longest,” Blanca says.
Ethan laughs as though none of us have a chance of beating them.
“Then it’s settled. Winner picks where the bachelor/ bachelorette getaway will be. So if someone chooses Vegas…” Seth says, and I’m fairly sure I’m missing something.
“You want to play that way? You and your fake fiancée think you’re going to beat me and my real fiancé?” Blanca stands.
Ethan tugs her back down by pulling her sweatshirt. “It’s just a fun game to help our friends out.”
“Let’s go, Mancini,” Seth says.
I turn and face him. He’s got conviction, and I kind of want to lean in and say that he might want to tone down the bravado. We might feel like we know one another, but we really don’t.
“We’re going to wipe the floor with your ass, Andrews,” Blanca says. Ethan blows out a breath, but Blanca smacks his leg. “It’s go-time.”
Ethan sits up straighter, but there’s no enthusiasm in his movements or his face. I stifle a chuckle.
“Things are getting exciting here at Lovebirds Uncovered,” Knox says in a voice like a game show host might use.
“You titled it like a police show,” Jax says.
Knox ignores him and continues. “This one is for the men to guess.”
Seth stretches out his fingers then cracks his knuckles.
“Women, please write down on your boards what you wear to bed,” Knox says.
Blanca bends over laughing, pointing her dry erase marker at Seth. “You’re screwed.”
Seth glances at me, worry in his features. He’s never going to guess this one. I write down my answer and tip my board so he can’t see.
Once we’re all done, Knox says, “Dylan, let’s hear your answer first.”
“A silk shorts and tank top set.” He’s confident.
Rian blushes as she turns her board over.
“And that’s one point for you guys,” Knox says, looking toward Jax—who blows out a breath but picks up the pen and marks a slash under Dylan and Rian. “Next up is Sierra and Adrian.”
Adrian looks at Sierra. “Nothing.”
And sure enough, Sierra turns her board around and it says ‘nothing.’ Adrian winks at her.
“Okay, Blanca and Ethan.” Knox points.
The longer we have to wait to answer, the more worried I feel. I mean, if we lose, will Seth blame me? Whatever this trip is, it sounds like there have been disagreements already.
“Easy. My boxers and T-shirts,” Ethan says.
Blanca turns her board around with a smug expression at Seth.
“So far everyone’s got it right,” Knox says. “Let’s see if our new couple, who have never spent the night together, can at least make an educated guess.”
Seth looks at me one more time and I bite my lip because he’s never going to get this.
“I’m going with pants and a T-shirt combo.” He looks at me. “It’s either that or nothing, but I’m good with my answer.”
I slowly turn my board around. Seth jumps up, putting his fist in the air.
“Lucky guess,” Blanca says. “Ask some harder questions, Whelan,” she says to Knox.
Man, she’s feisty and competitive.
“I’m not sure my parents are going to ask me what Seth wears to bed. I think they might actually think I’m a virgin.”
Everyone laughs and I find myself laughing too.
Seth kisses my cheek and whispers, “That’s one, baby.”
His scent wafts my way, and I’m reminded of the kiss we shared when he picked out my fake engagement ring. A part of me wants to turn my head to feel the press of his lips to mine again and enjoy the way he tastes—but that’s not going to happen, so I push those thoughts from my mind and concentrate on the game.
The rest of the questions consist of favorite places to eat in Cliffton Heights, which I somehow get right with Seth. Knox digs deeper with questions focusing on childhood. I thought we’d be a slam dunk for the category, but Seth was bragging before we’d even answered one question. We did clean up pretty good in the “favori
tes when you were little” area.
“What was the first meal your lovebird ever made for you?” Knox asks.
Seth claims victory while my cheeks grow hot. Seth is clearly confident, and I have no idea.
“They haven’t even had a meal together!” Blanca yells.
“Wrong!” Seth makes a buzzer sound.
He jots his answer on the whiteboard and covers it up so I can’t see it. I wrack my brain to figure out which of the disasters was our first. I remember a pizza burning in the oven once. Mac and cheese spilling over. Times when we should not have been left alone to cook lunch, but our parents were working. Was it a peanut butter and jelly sandwich? Fuck. He’s so sure of the answer. I see it on his cocky face.
Knox goes around the room. Rian gets it wrong, and so does Sierra. Blanca nails it of course, which leaves me.
“You know this,” Seth says, seeing the look on my face.
“No hints,” Blanca says.
“I’m going with…” Then it dawns on me. Seth loved SpaghettiOs. I asked my mom to get them special for him and it was my first time trying them. “SpaghettiOs.”
Seth turns over his board and he’s written “burned SpaghettiOs,” but Knox accepts the answer.
“They weren’t burned,” I mumble into Seth’s chest because he’s pulled me into a bear hug.
“They were, but it’s okay. It was the thought that counted.” He lifts my feet off the floor, and I inhale the scent of him, my eyes drifting closed. I love the moment way more than I should.
“You didn’t win yet, jackass,” Blanca says.
I thought she was a sweet girl, but she’s so competitive.
“Yes please, contestants, sit down,” Knox says in an official-sounding voice.
We continue the game and end up in a lightning round with Blanca and Ethan. I’m fairly sure Dylan and Rian gave up, and Adrian couldn’t stop touching Sierra, so I think she was distracted. But they’re all couples and have nothing to prove.
Knox hands Blanca, Ethan, Seth, and me a page of questions and a pen. We each go into separate corners and fill out questions about the last movie we saw, which physical feature our lovebird likes the most, the least, etc.
Seth and I exchange a look across the room because we both know we’re sunk. We could call it now and just give it to Ethan and Blanca, but we’re into it now too. We’ll give it our best shot, even if defeat is headed our way.
After we’ve all filled it out, each of us takes our turn in the hot seat. Blanca goes five for five, Ethan four for five, so we’d have to be perfect to win.
Seth does this pretend punching in the air thing like he’s a boxer. “Give it to me, Knox.”
“Favorite physical feature?” Knox asks.
Seth’s eyes fall over me for only a moment because we’re being timed. “Um… lips.”
My cheeks heat. Is he thinking about the kiss we shared too?
“Least?”
“Hair.” He looks at me quickly. “Only because it blocks your face.”
Blanca looks at me and I can’t decipher her look—curiosity maybe.
Knox asks my favorite color and favorite movie, which thankfully, we did discuss in Seth’s bedroom.
“Last one, what frightens your lovebird the most?”
Seth looks at me, searching and I hold my breath. He’ll be five for five if he tells them what I said in his room when I was a crying mess. We can win this if he wants. I wrote the real answer on my sheet, as hard as it was, but the idea of hearing it spoken aloud in a room full of people I just met makes me feel entirely too vulnerable.
Seth’s eyes remain on me when he speaks. “Spiders.”
Knox makes the noise that Seth got it wrong.
Blanca jumps up and down in victory. “We won! Which means no strippers, no Vegas, we’re going to a cabin in Maine!” She turns to me. “I do hope you join us, Evan.”
“Oh no.” I shake my head.
“Yes, you’re his plus one,” Sierra says. “I mean, you guys can’t screw anyone else while this arrangement is going on anyway.”
Of course her mind went there. Adrian’s mouth rarely leaves her neck.
Everyone starts cleaning up the game and talking about how surprised they are that we did so well for not knowing each other. My gaze searches out Seth. As though he feels my eyes on him, he looks in my direction.
I mouth thank you and he nods. Because he could have won and gone on whatever trip he wanted to, but he didn’t out me to a room of strangers.
And just like that, the trust I had when we were nine years old returns. It’s almost as if no time passed and the twenty years apart was just a blink. Except that the small boy with long skinny legs and big feet has grown into a sexy man.
Maybe the feud was the best thing that could have happened to us, because it would’ve been a travesty if I’d never fully appreciated the man in front of me and only thought of him as my best friend.
I’m not sure what to think of him in this moment.
Chapter Sixteen
Seth
After twenty years of absence from this home, I pull my car up along the curb of the Ericksons’ house. It’s only three blocks from where I grew up, but after I turned nine, it might as well have been a thousand miles. The easiest way to get to the grocery store means going past their house, but my mom quickly learned to go a few blocks out of the way to keep everyone’s mood as chipper as she could.
Knox pulls up behind me in his cop car.
Can you blame me? Of course I called my cop roommate to be my protector in case Evan’s dad pulls a gun on me.
I walk up to his driver’s side door and Knox rolls down the window. His partner, Lucas, sits at his side.
Knox smirks. “You have us until we get a call.”
“Do you really think he’s going to go after you?” Lucas asks.
My heart beats as though I snorted a line of coke five minutes ago, confirming that I am in fact scared shitless that Mr. Erickson might have a weapon with my name on it. I wouldn’t even put it past him to tackle me. His picture still lines the wall of Cliffton Heights High for his stellar linebacker skills.
“Yeah, I do,” I say. “The man hates our family, hates me, and I’m about to surprise him by asking him for his daughter’s hand in marriage when he doesn’t even know we’re dating.”
Knox glances at his partner. “Seth’s family owns Andrews Bagel Company, but the man in that house owns The Bagel Place.”
“Oh, shit. Let’s call in a break, I wanna see this.” Lucas moves to press on his radio, but Knox shakes his head.
“Nah, Seth here is a big boy. Aren’t you?” Knox looks at me.
A lesser man would say hell no. But if I’m going to be the person Mr. Erickson would want his daughter to marry, I better man up. “I’m cool. Just stick around for, like, five minutes.”
Knox chuckles. “Sure thing.”
I nod, wishing I looked as intimidating as Knox does.
Knox and Lucas laugh while I round the back of their squad car and up the Ericksons’ walkway. Maybe no one is home and I’ll get to live to see another day. Sadly though, I hear people inside after I ring the doorbell.
“No, Eli!” a deep voice booms with authority.
I clench my hands to stop them from shaking. As my stomach grows more twisted and bile rises up my throat, the door creaks open little by little, feeling as though it happens in slow motion, until Vic Erickson’s large frame takes up the entire space. I gulp down the dry lump lodged in my throat.
“Who are you?” Eli asks, peeking around his dad.
“Hi, Eli,” I say.
“He knows my name,” he says to his dad, who has yet to actually say anything.
But Mr. Erickson’s eyes say a lot. Like “get off my fucking porch.”
“I know this is unexpected, Mr. Erickson,” I croak out. “May I come in?”
He widens his stance, crossing his arms. “What do you want?”
“I recognize him. Who
is he?” Eli asks.
“I’d really like to come in and talk to you. It’s important and has to do with Evan.”
Mr. Erickson’s head tilts and he studies me for a moment. The only thing I have on my side is that Mr. and Mrs. Erickson have never been outright mean to me—and I imagine neither have my parents to their children—but what I’m about to do might be the end of that.
He steps aside and opens the door wider. “Eli, this is Seth. Seth Andrews.”
Eli’s only twelve, so he came along eight years after the epic feud. He might have no idea that the last name Andrews is most likely treated like a curse word in the house I’m now standing in.
It might sound weird, but the house smells the same as it did when I was young. The further I venture into the Ericksons’ house, the more the memories swarm me and pull me back to when I was young. When Mr. Erickson would ask me about my peewee football team and try to explain the game of football to me when all I wanted to do was go on a bike ride with Evan. He used to treat me like a son. It isn’t until this moment that I realize I miss it.
When I reach their living room and sit on the couch, I feel as if I’m nine years old and making polite conversation, waiting for Evan to barrel down the stairs with her eyes wide and tell me our adventure for the day. Usually something she read in a book or a magazine. Our summer days when we had the freedom to travel around town on our bikes and explore Cliffton Heights, discovering places that felt like our own secret hideouts.
“Sit,” Mr. Erickson says.
Eli sits next to me, looking at me as if he’s memorizing my face. “Your parents own Andrews Bagel?”
I nod.
“How do you know my name?”
I’m not sure how to answer, so I say simply, “Evan told me.”
His eyes widen. “Evan? You’re her friend?”
I nod again.
“Eli, go on upstairs. This will only take a moment.” Mr. Erickson sits across from me in one of the same chairs they owned twenty years ago.
As Eli whines and Mr. Erickson’s voice grows sterner with his son, I case the surroundings. Sure enough, other than new pictures of the family, everything here is almost identical as it was all those years ago. Even her grandmother’s urn still sits prominently on the mantel of the fireplace. Evan confided in me how horribly creepy it felt to her to sleep in the house the first night it was here.
