Playing with Fire

 

Hi. It’s Grace Shaw. Any chance of landing a last-minute role in the play? ☺

 

Finally, West spat it out. “Look, I’m fucking sorry, okay? Jesus Christ.” He growled as if I’d showered him with wordless accusations. “Regardless, I think maybe it’s for the best if we don’t mess around anymore.”

I didn’t even look up from my phone.

He’d spent the entire week ignoring me, only to give me a half-assed apology, stuffed into a clichéd breakup line?

“Messin’ with you again was never on the menu,” I lied, my eyes still on my phone.

“Fine. Okay. Good.”

He nodded to himself. For the first time since I’d met him, he looked a little out of sorts. Kind of pitiful, actually. He offered me his pinky, blocking my view to my phone.

“Truce?”

I turned around, giving him my back and not bothering to take his pinky in mine.

A cold war was still a war.

West

 

The week after Mom’s visit slithered like a slimy sci-fi monster out of a sewer.

As soon as Mother got back to Maine, she resumed her hourly phone calls, sending me two emails a day on average. She apologized a thousand times. For blindsiding me, tossing Grace’s cap, asking too many questions, and sending too many emails. She owned up to everything that went down between us ever since I was seventeen. Tried to explain. None of it mattered. The damage had been done. I kept sending money, but I dodged her calls.

Things went from bad to worse. Before I’d seen her face, I could pretend we were okay. But after the dinner blowup, there was no denying whatever had been left of my family was dead at the root. Rotting, sullied, and irreparable.

The cherry on the shit cake was the Texas situation.

The girl, not the state.

Though damn, the state got real hot, real fast.

I’d screwed up with Grace, not only on the day I’d kicked her out, but in the days after, when I couldn’t look at her face. I was so embarrassed.

By the time I gathered the courage to talk to her, it was too late. She treated me like I was air. She’d gotten so good at ignoring me that week, sometimes I questioned my own existence.

Then I put on my big boy pants, owned up to my behavior, and apologized.

And what did she do? Looked the other way.

On our third shift working together since the disastrous dinner, Karma had finally reared its spiked dildo and decided to shove it up my ass—lube-less.

I was minding my own business, flipping fish on the grill, low-key envying them for the state of their nothingness, when I heard something dropping on the gravel by the window.

“Oh, hey,” Grace’s voice purred.

I didn’t turn around to see who the customer was, still locked in my fort of quiet rage.

“Hi,” Easton answered back.

“Do you want to speak to West?” she asked.

“Nope. Here for you.”

My head flew up and I turned over my shoulder, my guard rising twelve feet. East was there, fresh out of the shower after football practice. His blond, damp hair stuck out in different directions on purpose. He wore a sleeveless surfer shirt that showed off his bulky arms.

What the hell was he doing here?

East met my eyes behind Grace’s shoulder. He gave me half a shrug, as if to say, You said it was cool if I hit that. Remember?

I turned back to the grill, drawing a breath.

“Me?” Texas asked.

“Yeah.”

“Okay, what’s up?”

“I realized I forgot to do something when I gave you a ride home the other day.”

Pick up some loyalty from the closest drug store, jackass?

“And what was that?” Grace asked, her voice turning suspicious. I liked that she didn’t fall at his feet. She was immune to the charms of men in general.

“I forgot to ask for your number.”

Motherfucker …

“Why would you need my number?”

I couldn’t help but grin to myself. She wasn’t one of his teenybopper star-fuckers. Faith in humanity: partly restored.

“So I can ask you out.”

“Ask me out?”

Ask her out?

“Yeah. Been meaning to do it for a few weeks now, but Coach has been on our case like a drill sergeant. Scrimmages, you see. Thought maybe you’d wanna grab a bite or something? Go to the movies? There’s a new Kate Hudson film coming out this weekend.”

“And you like Kate Hudson films because …?” She left the question hanging in the air. My back was still to them. I was torn between wanting to snicker at her indifference to East’s persistent flirting and bashing my best friend’s (scratch that—ex-best friend’s) head against the gravel.

“I don’t like Kate Hudson films, Grace. But I do like you. And you’re a woman. And women tend to like her, for whatever reason. That clear enough?” East asked.

I swung my head again, glaring at him. He didn’t look at me anymore. His eyes were focused on Texas. What was the shithead trying to prove, exactly? That he could date someone I was interested in? That I liked her?

Even if I did, I didn’t date, and he damn well knew that.

Grace drummed her fingers over the toppings bar. “Wouldn’t it pose an issue for your roommate, seein’ as we work together?”

“No. I asked him. Three times, actually.”

“And he doesn’t mind?” She didn’t sound surprised.

Turn around and look at me, goddammit. Then you’d see I’d rather see my balls eaten by a tiger than watch you go out with someone who isn’t me.

“Yeah. Ask him yourself.”

“No need, we’re not really on speakin’ terms at the moment.” She paused. “I accept.”

Aw. Bet it hurt. Too bad he hadn’t listened when I told him that she didn—

Hold on.

She accepts?

I opened my mouth to say something, but nothing came out. I had no argument against what was happening here and no grounds to stop them from dating. Technically, I had told Easton I wasn’t interested in Grace. And, also technically, they were both single. I had no pull on either of them.

And that drove me nuts.

They exchanged numbers while I quietly fumed. Then he had the audacity to stick around and chitchat. Ten minutes into his riveting story about how Reign almost sprained his ankle victory dancing after a touchdown a few weeks ago, I sauntered to the window, parking my elbows on the sill, shoving Grace aside.