Bianca gives Casey a syrupy sweet smile. “I have to go catch a ride home with my brother, but I can bring you some of the bars tomorrow if you want.”
Casey nods. “Yeah, thanks.”
The moment Bianca turns away, her smile changes to a menacing smirk.
That girl is definitely brewing something in her cauldron.
Chapter 29
Sawyer
“I have to give it back,” Dylan says, clenching the steering wheel of the new car Jace got her for her birthday.
I place my hand on her forehead. Poor girl must have a fever and be suffering from delirium.
“You must not be feeling okay. Because this car is awesome.”
“It is awesome. It’s too awesome.” Panic swirls in her eyes when she turns her head to look at me. “It’s too much. I can’t accept it.”
I want to point out that she hasn’t had a car since I met her, and Jace went through a lot of trouble to get her the perfect birthday present, so it would hurt his feelings if she made him take it back—but like any good best friend, I decide to tackle the root of the problem first.
“Why?” A horrible thought hits me. “Do you want to break up with him?”
She looks at me like I’m crazy. “No. Of course not. I love him.” She closes her eyes. “So damn much.”
In that case, fixing this temporary freak out of hers will be easy.
“Then what’s the problem?”
“I don’t know…I guess there’s a small part of me that keeps waiting for the other shoe to drop.” She groans. “Ugh, that sounds so stupid.”
“Well, at least you realize it.”
“I’m just scared that maybe things are too perfect between us now.”
“Isn’t that what you wanted?”
“Yeah, but now that I have it, I’m petrified something bad is going to happen and fuck it all up.”
It doesn’t surprise me. Finding your mom dead on the kitchen floor when you’re eight, being abandoned by your dad for a new family, and finding out a boy you were friends with had a secret crush on you and killed himself the night he caught you hooking up with his older brother would make anyone skeptical about having a happily ever after.
However, that was all in the past.
Because she’s my best friend and I love her, I tell her the honest truth. “You’re creating your own drama.”
She looks insulted. “How do you figure that?”
“Because you’re focusing on everything that might go wrong instead of enjoying everything that is going right. You’re literally creating drama out of thin air.”
“Fuck.” She scrunches her face. “Dammit. You’re right.”
“I know.” I rest my head on her shoulder. “You deserve good things, Dylan. And even if that shoe does end up dropping at some point, we both know you and Jace will get through it.”
“I know.” She sighs. “God, I feel like an asshole now.” She squeezes my hand. “Thanks for talking me off the ledge.”
“It’s what best friends do.”
“Speaking of best friends, is there anything you want to tell me?”
Oh, crap.
“Like?”
Shifting in her seat, she gives me a pointed look. “How about the fact you’re dating Cole Covington?”
Relief flows through me. For a moment I thought Oakley told her about the Adderall.
“Oh. That?” I wave a hand. “Trust me, it’s nothing.”
“You’re dating the asshole who called you fat and publicly denied hooking up with you so he could stay with Casey’s bitch ass, and it’s nothing?”
Well, when she puts it that way.
“Sorry, let me rephrase—it’s not what you think. We’re not really dating. It’s fake.”
She looks even more confused. “Why in the world would you fake date Cole?”
I draw in a deep breath. “Because Cole said he could get any girl he wanted, but his teammate Cortland said he couldn’t. One thing led to another and Cole ended up agreeing to Cortland’s stupid bet to date me for six months.”
I leave out the part about taking my virginity because poor Dylan looks like she’s about to have a coronary.
“What the actual fuck—”
“I know it sounds bad.”
“No, bad is Cole hooking up with you but telling people he didn’t because he’s a superficial assmunch. This shit is fucked, Sawyer. He’s blatantly using you to win a dumb bet.”
“Technically, yes. But he told me about it.” I don’t mention that it was only after I confronted him with the truth. “He could have lied and kept me in the dark, but he didn’t. Besides, I’m using him too.”
She quirks an eyebrow. “Using him how?”
“If he wins the bet—which he will because I’m in on it—he has to donate ten-thousand dollars to my church.” I shrug. “It’s really nothing more than a business deal.”
She stares at me for a few moments before she speaks.
“You hit me with a best friend reality check a minute ago, and I feel it’s only right to return the favor.” Her forehead wrinkles. “This is a bad idea. I know you hate talking about it, and you’re just going to play it off like it wasn’t that serious—but I know how much you liked him, Sawyer.” Her hands frame my face. “I also know how much he hurt you. And I don’t care how much money he’s offering you to go along with it, you don’t owe him jack shit.”
“You’re right,” I tell her. “I did like Cole and he did hurt me, but that experience showed me the type of person he really is. Now that I know, I won’t be fooled again and what’s happening is just business. Nothing more, nothing less. Trust me, Dylan. I’m not the kind of girl to place her hand on the stove after I’ve already been burned by it.”
Liar, liar pants on fire.
“I hope so, because if he burns you again…I’m going to cut his dick off and feed it to him.” She frowns. “And there’s a good chance he might not survive the blood loss, which would undoubtedly make Jace very upset with me, so I really hope for everyone’s sake, Cole doesn’t fuck up.”
Laughing, I lean my forehead against hers. “You’re crazy, you know that?”
“When it comes to the people I love? Hell yeah, I am.”
And that’s just one of the reasons I love her so much.
“Hate to break it to you, man, but I think your girlfriend’s gonna dump you for Sawyer,” a voice that sounds a whole lot like Oakley’s declares.
We turn our heads to see three sets of eyeballs peering at us through Dylan’s windshield.
My stomach flips when the piercing green ones lock on me.
“Why is Cole here?” I whisper, turning back to Dylan.
“No idea. Jace only mentioned he was picking up Oakley.” She makes a face. “Then again, it’s Cole’s birthday today too, so—”
“It is not his birthday.”
Her eyes widen. “You know about that?”
“If you two aren’t going to make out, can you at least have the decency to lift your shirts and give us some titty on titty action?” Cole shouts. “After all, it is my birthday.”