"Right next to me," Travis says, without thinking twice, making everyone stop talking. "I mean eventually, that is."
Willow laughs. "Shit, you should have seen the look on your face." She points at Quinn, who just glares at her.
"Listen," I say and they all look at me. "We might as well get this over with. I don’t want to hear anyone’s bullshit. It’s two friends that have…" I think of the word.
"Rekindled," Hazel says for me.
"Yes." I point at her.
"Two friends that rekindled their friendship." I look up at Travis, who stares at me.
"So, friends that do benefits," Willow says. "I never had that." Quinn turns to look at her and shakes his head.
"Never going to have that either," he mumbles, and Amelia comes to me with a glass for me and beer for Travis.
"Nice to see you," she says, handing him his beer as he nods at her. "If you fuck up, I’m going to let them shoot you."
"Good to know," he says, taking a pull of his beer, and I can’t imagine what it must be like for him. I mean, I went to his wedding, but I wasn’t the one who dumped him. I don’t even think I would have had the balls to go if the roles were reversed.
"Okay, are we done?" I ask, taking a sip of spiked sweet tea, then looking up at Travis and smiling. He lets go of my hand and puts it around my shoulders, pulling me to him and kissing my head.
"All good, baby," he says softly, and I’m about to say something when I hear: "What the fuck is this?" my cousin, Chelsea, says from behind me, and I turn to see her standing there with her hand on her hip.
"Okay, maybe I should have warned them that you were here," I mumble, and he just shrugs, not caring.
"Didn’t you go to his wedding last week?" she asks, shocked, as she looks from me to Travis.
"There was no wedding," Travis reports.
"Oh my God," Mayson, her husband, says from behind her. "I told you going to that wedding was bad luck."
I put up my hand. "Okay, one." Closing my hand and putting up a finger. "I didn’t have anything to do with the wedding not taking place." I look at all of them. "And two, I’m not bad luck."
"You aren’t bad luck." Travis bends to tell me in my ear. "You are the best luck."
"I just threw up a little," Quinn says, putting a hand in front of my mouth. "Good to know you're still a lovesick puppy."
"Eww,” Reed says. "Remember when he sent her flowers every single day of winter break with poems?"
"It wasn’t poems," Travis says, defending himself. "It was lines from her favorite romance books."
"That makes it even worse,” Quinn says, and Willow shakes her head.
"What? Like, you wouldn’t send me flowers?" she asks Quinn, who side-eyes her, bringing his beer to his mouth.
"He wouldn’t bring you flowers," I say. "He would plant you a whole fucking field full of them."
"Gross,” Reed says and that has all of us rolling our lips.
"Didn’t you leave a rose in her car for two years when you got back together?" Quinn points at him. "And you kept doing those stupid Facebook posts about love and her. I’m surprised they didn’t block you with all the times I had you reported." We all laugh and Travis walks over to sit on a stool and motions with his head to come to him.
I walk to him while Mayson sits next to him on the stool. "So, besides not getting married, what else have you been up to?" he says, and we all laugh as Travis opens his legs for me to step between. His hand goes to my hip and it feels like old times; the guys joking with each other while the girls just gab.
Travis bends and kisses my shoulder and I look at him from the side. "You okay?" I ask, putting my hand on his cheek.
"Never better," he says with a smile and I lean to him and kiss him. "Never better." I smile at him but the reality of it is that eventually he’s going to leave and we are going to be back to square one. I take a sip of sweet tea while my head yells at me that it’ll be fine, yet my heart stops feeling the fullness that it felt all day.
Chapter 21
Travis
"I’ll be back." I smile at her and can tell something is wrong. She tries to avoid looking at me and I want to drag her out of the bar and ask her. But instead, I sit down and try to get her family to like me again. I mean, I don’t know if it’s going to help. I also don’t know if they will ever forgive me for what I did to her, but that they didn’t take me out in the back and beat the shit out of me is a start.
I bring the beer to my lips as I look over and see her coming back from the bathroom. She smiles and laughs at something that Amelia just said when a guy steps in front of her. My insides burn the minute he leans down and kisses her on her cheek. She smiles at him as they joke, my hand squeezing the bottle in my hand harder and harder. She nods her head at him and steps away and I watch him watch her. The nerves fill my body, and when she gets back to me, she smiles. "Friend of yours?" I motion with my head toward the guy, knowing that it’s fucking dumb.
"I don’t think you can call it that," she says, grabbing her drink. "Acquaintances is a better word for it." She takes a sip. "Don’t forget you were with someone."
"I didn’t expect you to wait for me," I answer her honestly and it’s the truth, but to see in front of me that she had a whole life, it’s going to sting and I’m going to have to live with it. "Give me a kiss," I say and she laughs.
"So everyone can know I’m off-limits?" She shakes her head and leans in to kiss me. "Does that make you feel better?" she asks, and I look up at the guy to see that he was watching her.
"Little bit," I say, kissing her again. "Little bit."
She puts her drink down and steps between my legs. "If you want." She wraps her arms around my neck. My hand is gripping her hip and pulling her even closer to me. "We can leave here and I can show you all the ways that I’ve missed you."
"We are right here,” Reed says next to me. "Like, we can hear you." His face grimaces.
I get up. "This has been fun but," I say, putting my hand around her shoulder. "She looks tired."
"I mean, if she is going to look as tired as she did last Monday, you have a lot of work you have to do," Hazel says, snickering. "She was exhausted."
Willow gasps. "Is that why you couldn’t walk properly?"
"Good night, everyone." Harlow lifts her hand and slips it into mine. "It’s been fun." She pulls me away from the group.
We step out into the darkness and I look up at the stars in the sky. "You know what we’ve never done?" She looks at me and I just watch her. "We’ve never had sex in a hammock."
"There is a reason for that," I say. "And it has to do with breaking my dick."
"Ugh, fine," she says. "Definitely don’t want to break that." She smiles at me and I can’t help but bend down and kiss her. My tongue slides into her mouth as I taste the sweetness from the tea. "You keep kissing me like this and we are having sex in the back seat."
"I’m going to have to take a rain check on that." I open the door for her. "Your brothers didn’t shoot me, but chances are if they find you riding me in the back seat of my car in a parking lot." I look around. "Fuck, I’d shoot myself in the foot." My hand goes to her hip and then moves under her silky shirt, finding her lace bra. "Next time, wear a dress and I’ll finger-fuck you all the way home."