I frowned. “I don’t know why you’re so shocked. You know my reputation. Your mom wants an ‘in’. How do you think this would happen?” I made a show of looking her up and down. “Think about it. I would have to like you. I would have to keep you around. I would have to develop feelings for you. All that would have to happen before we’d think about inviting your mom over—” I saw that she was speculative. That didn’t make sense, and I paused, thinking about a different angle. When it hit, I had to laugh.

“What?”

“Shit.” I shook my head. “No. Your mom wasn’t going to wait around for that to happen. She was going to wait for us to screw a few times and then what? You’d pretend to get pregnant? Your mom would sue us for money?” Seeing the surprise in her eyes, I watched as it turned to being suspicious and realized she hadn’t thought about that either. Then it clicked and a storm filled her gaze. I smirked and shook my head. “Your mom is a piece of work.”

She muttered, “I was just hoping to hang out. None of that crap.”

I began to look around, but Kate was gone. No. I saw her. She was grinding against a different guy. When she saw me looking, she gave me a smug smirk, but I didn’t care. She could do whatever she wanted and thanks to this girl’s appearance, I was in a certain mood now. Feeling the old restlessness and anger in me, it was all boiling together. I needed to get laid or I’d end up getting in a fight. As if sensing my mood, Logan lifted his head from Tate’s neck and frowned at me. I narrowed my eyes at him, but turned away when he began to lift his girlfriend off of his lap.

As he approached us, he looked her up and down, throwing an arm around my shoulder. “Who’s this, brother?”

I shrugged his arm off. “Sarah Cast.”

“Hey guys.”

I tensed when Tate came over to the group. Her tone was friendly, but she was trying to dissect the girl with her eyes. Logan cast me a questionable look. He had felt me stiffen next to him, but he didn’t say anything.

Logan frowned, leaning back against the counter beside me. Tate laughed softly. “What’s going on?”

I said to Tate, “Why’d you come over here? We were fine.” Tate had been doing that shit a lot lately. If a girl was talking to me, she came over. The only time she didn’t was if it was Kate. Those two had started to pretend they were friends. They weren’t. They only thought they were fooling the other.

“Mason.”

Tate’s head reared back. “Fuck, Mason. Do you always have to be an ass**le?”

“Yes. Why do you always have to poke your nose where it’s not needed?”

“My boyfriend is over here.” She gestured to Logan. “Excuse me if I wanted to know what was going on. He left me over there for you.”

“Yeah,” I shot back at her. “He left you over there for a reason. He didn’t bring you with him.” Then I remembered the girl was still there and said to her, “Go. None of it’s going to happen, even if you’re interested. I’m not anymore.”

She hurried off. Then Tate started, “Mason.”

I rounded on her. “You’re not wanted here.”

She looked at Logan. “That’s your brother.”

He started to say something and didn’t. Instead, he lifted his shoulders up and let them fall. “You’re butting in, Tate.”

“You always butt in. Butt out.” I glared at her. “Go away.”

“Logan.” She pointed at me. “Are you going to let him talk to me like that? Really?”

He started again, but I cut him off this time. “I didn’t come to you. You came to me. Go. Away.”

“Unfuckingbelievable,” she hissed out, and left, shoving through the crowd. They scattered at the sight of Tate, her jaw clenched, her eyes enraged, as she passed through without hitting anyone. Like a flock of birds, they moved back together in her wake and turned back to watch us.

I looked at Logan. “Your girlfriend’s pissed.”

“Uh yeah. With good reason.” He shook his head, but he didn’t seem too concerned. “Why do you talk to her like that? It’s been getting worse lately.”

Because she’d been more of a whore lately. I hadn’t told him about the times when I was in the gym at home and she would come in to use the treadmill. The speed was so low, she barely moved. She just watched me, but there were others. She would come in my room when he was sleeping; there were times when she would ask if I would make food for her; or if I was in the pool, she would come out to race laps. My friendliness waned the more frequent those occasions happened and it had turned into hostility when I saw her outside my bedroom door the other night. She waited, listened through the door, and lifted her hand to turn the knob. I watched from down the hallway when I was coming back from the kitchen. Kate was in my room, and when she said something on the phone, Tate hurried away. She went back to Logan’s room and shut the door, but her whole demeanor had been guilty. Her shoulders tightened. She never looked around. She fled.

She was a migraine waiting to happen. I had no idea how to stop it from coming. Logan wouldn’t believe me, not unless I had proof. He loved her.

“She’s not my girlfriend. She doesn’t have to involve herself when I’m around,” I said

Logan let out a short laugh. “Are you kidding? She practically lives with us.”