Total pages in book: 111
Estimated words: 111038 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 555(@200wpm)___ 444(@250wpm)___ 370(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 111038 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 555(@200wpm)___ 444(@250wpm)___ 370(@300wpm)
I eyed her, putting the receipt in my pocket. “Who are you?”
“Ava, but Aspen wouldn’t know me. I’ve just been here when she picked up her pizza.”
Oh. Well. Then I was fine with this Ava girl.
“Yeah. She’s cool.”
Ava handed the order to the guys in the back and returned. She cocked her head to the side. “Are you her boyfriend or something?”
Zeke barked out a laugh.
Her eyes grew noticeably unfriendly.
He just laughed harder.
From the side, I heard a voice. “Ava, it’s cool.”
Ava looked. I looked.
Bren, my brother’s girlfriend, stood glaring at us. “He actually cares about her.” She raised her chin, her eyes cold. “And he better be good to her, or I’ll slice him.”
I smirked back, noting Cross behind her. “Keep your woman in check, brother. She’s showing her fangs. If she keeps at it, I’m going to think she’s jealous. Wouldn’t want to start thinking she wants to be me or have my hands—”
I was interrupted by a fist across my face.
And that’s why I’d said it.
Maybe I’d started to get the itch when Aspen said her favorite pizza place was in Roussou. Maybe the idea had begun to form then and grew as we drove. Or maybe it was just always there, nestled under my chest, waiting to come out every time I saw him.
Either way, I welcomed his punch.
I loved it.
He hit me, and I reacted, wrapping an arm around his waist. I dragged him outside, the doors bursting open, and then it was on.
There was yelling around us.
At first there were hands trying to drag us away, but this was more than a school rivalry. We were brothers, and we hated each other, and I think this was something we needed to do.
After a bit, a circle formed around us. Bren and their friends held Zeke back.
Cross and I were trading punches.
I was relishing this moment.
He hit me. I hit him.
He threw an uppercut, so did I.
After the sixth punch, he realized what I was doing, and he started to falter.
I was grinning like a madman, and I loved even that. I rushed him, tackling him to the ground.
He didn’t know anything about me. He didn’t know who’d tucked me in when I was younger. He didn’t know I played soccer like a goddamn badass. He didn’t know where I was going to college or that I felt almost as much loyalty to Zeke as he and his friends did to each other. He didn’t know any of that shit.
And he didn’t deserve to know.
I was done with him, and even though the sky was starting to spin and I tasted more blood than I wanted to, it was time to knock his ass out.
I twisted, prepared to take out his knee when I heard a sudden yell, “Hell no, you don’t!”
That’s when I felt a shove from behind. I went down, and when I looked up, some guy was there—some big motherfucker, and he reared back.
Well, fuck.
Then I saw nothing.
ASPEN
They should’ve been back by now. It was almost nine. I paced.
I was a mess, and I didn’t like this. The pizzeria was not that far. After calling Blaise’s phone twenty times, he finally answered.
“Oh my God! Where are you?” I shouted.
I shouldn’t shout. I needed to calm down.
I heard a voice, but it wasn’t his. “Who is this?”
“Who are you, and where is my boyfriend?” I demanded.
The person on the other end sighed. He sounded older. “Your boyfriend got into a fight with his brother.”
“His brother?”
“Yeah. Look, you’re not going to lose it if you come here, are you? We don’t want another fight to break out. We’re having a hard time keeping him and his brother apart.”
What?! “Where?”
He told me the address, and I wrote it down. “Okay. I’ll be there soon.”
“Hey, uh—maybe bring a new shirt for him or something. There’s a lot of blood.”
My stomach clenched. I swayed on my feet, but new shirt. Got it. Check. The blood? I’d think on that later. “I will.”
I hung up, and I didn’t think about where I was going, or who I was going to see. Those would’ve been my normal concerns. I wasn’t alarmed as my GPS took me out of Fallen Crest and toward Roussou. The pizzeria was in Roussou. I’d expected that.
But I didn’t expect to find myself parking in front of a bounty hunting office.
I looked over the vehicles parked outside, clenching Blaise’s marijuana shirt, which I’d started to sleep in. It was the only one he left at my house.
I lingered on a distinct Hummer.
Oh, crap, crappier, crappiest.
Maybe it was a different Hummer. I really, really hoped so, because I knew he’d recently gotten a new Hummer.
And this one looked new. It looked brand new.
Was it…?
I quelled my nerves and walked past it, ignoring the Massachusetts license plate. I was trying to tell myself it wasn’t him, but then I walked inside.