I just laugh. “You can’t argue with what I said, and we both know it. At least I know you’re not lying to yourself.”
“You actually think you have a chance with Harper now? Now that I’m out of the picture, you want to try for my sloppy seconds? That’s flattering and pathetic.”
“He’s always been jealous of you, baby. He wants to be everything you are,” Kenzie says.
Laughing again, I shake my head. Sure, I’ve envied that he had Harper, but that’s it. There’s nothing else I’ve ever felt envious about when it comes to Asher. “Yeah, okay.”
“Good luck with her,” Asher says. “But the truth is, she’ll never go for a guy like you.”
“What the hell does that mean?”
Kenzie flips her hair over her shoulder, and I can’t believe she dyed it blonde like Harper’s. It looks terrible on her, but if she wants to steal Asher, she had to do something drastic. If only she’d chosen better… like a boob job.
“It means you’re nothing,” Kenzie says. “The only reason Asher’s been friends with you this long is that he’s never seen you as competition. For anything.”
“And you still aren’t,” Asher adds.
“You might want to rethink that frame of thought, bud,” I say, glaring at him.
He licks his lips, smirks, and shrugs. “I guess we’ll see, won’t we? Let’s go, babe.”
All I want to do is punch him, but I won’t. Not only would it look bad to hit the ex of the woman I’m madly in love with, but I would never do that to her sister. Still, the thought lingers in my mind for days.
Harper stumbles toward me, nearly falling. I catch her just in time, thrilled to feel her warmth against me. “Whoa, don’t hurt yourself now.”
“Any chance… you could give me a ride home?” Harper slurs slightly.
“Are you okay?”
She swallows hard, leaning more heavily against me. “I’m drunker than I’ve been since my twenty-first birthday. Why Gina’s friends think they should do shots at their age, I have no idea. I can’t hang anymore.”
“Could you ever?” I ask, laughing.
Harper has never been able to hold her liquor. I remember the first time we drank together at the gazebo when we were seventeen. She took three shots of tequila and ended up throwing up in the bushes. On her twenty-first birthday, she nearly peed her pants in the bathroom because “taking them off was too much work.”
“No, not really,” she giggles.
Yes, she needs water and sleep. I guide her outside and help her into my pickup. “What’s Gina going to do now that you’re gone?”
“Her friends are drunk enough that they won’t notice she isn’t tossing them back. And if they do, Lance will have to help her. Any more alcohol, and I’ll need my stomach pumped.”
As I buckle her in, I linger just a moment longer at her waist before walking to the driver’s side. I climb in, relieved to let her lean over and rest her head on my shoulder.
“I’ll go back after I drop you off to get your equipment,” I promise.
“So nice,” she mumbles. “And such big hands.”
“Hands?”
She giggles and reaches for mine, her fingers small and delicate against my own. A shiver runs through me as she intertwines our fingers. “You know what they say about big hands.”
“Long fingers?”
“Well, longfinger,” she clarifies. “Not plural.”
Is she implying what I think she is? “Is that right? Are you asking to see?”
Her tongue glides over her lips. “Gina and Mom think I should accept if you offer me pity sex.”
