She glances down to the table I just left. “Well, that twat is a great tipper.”
“And a rich boy piece of shit,” I call over my shoulder as I run out into the constant Pacific Northwest drizzle.
“Can you just wait?” I yell after him and his stupid long legs that are already halfway down the block where his vintage Toyota Land Cruiser is parked.
He doesn’t respond.
“Bennett!” I try again. “Just let me finish.” He’s reaching his car now, and I run across the street, darting out in front of a passing vehicle that responds with their horn.
That gets his attention, and he yanks me toward him as the back tire hits a puddle and splashes across the hem of my jeans. “Are you trying to get yourself killed?” he asks as I backpedal until I’m pressed against his driver’s side door.
The rainwater from the car is seeping into my thin T-shirt and the back of my bra.
With his rearview mirror on one side and his fist braced against the doorframe on my other side, I’m hemmed in, and I think he’s gotten even taller since the last time I saw him. He’s hunched over so that even the rain can’t find me.
“Why me?” he asks. “Why does it have to be me? You could ask any random person on campus.”
A single rain droplet rolls off a rebellious curl above his ear and down the sharp line of his jaw until it disappears somewhere along the vein trailing the side of his throat. He’s not just the haughty spoiled boy anymore. No, in this moment, he’s absolutely predatory, and as he leans further over me, my head inadvertently tilts back to accommodate him.
“B-because you’re the only person I know at Wexley.”
His lips are less than an inch from mine, his gaze pinning me in place and then flickering down to my mouth. My silly little brain wants to know what would happen if I just closed the gap. If I let him kiss me.
But I can’t. I’m willing to humble myself enough to ask him for help, but I won’t stoop so low as to kiss him and let this potential marriage begin as anything more than what it is.
I shrink back against the car door as much as I can. I need spacebetween us and I say the one thing I know will work. “Because you fucking owe me, Bennett Andrew Graves.”
His jaw twitches and space exhales between us as he steps back. With one little wave of his hand, he shoos me out of the way and then gets in his car.
“You can meet me at the courthouse tomorrow morning for the marriage license,” I tell him. “Ten o’clock. And if you’re not there, I guess I’ll have your answer.”
With his gaze trained on the road ahead, he nods once and then shuts his door, leaving me in the rain.
CHAPTER 2
Bennett
TWO WEEKS LATER
“This is a great fucking town house.” I plop down next to a slouched Tex on the worn leather couch he hauled up here from Oklahoma in the bed of his truck.
“Yeah,” he says as he organizes the eco-friendly reusable moving totes he rented for the move so that they can be returned. “Too bad you’re not going to be living in it.”
My other would-be roommate, who is my cousin and sometimes best friend, Julian, lies on the island of our kitchen, hands held over his abdomen, feigning exhaustion as though he just carried each of his boxes up one by one instead of having a white-glove service move and unpack for him while he watched Tex wrestle with the freight elevator.
“At least you can always count on a Graves to pay their bills, so Auntie Sydney is still paying the mortgage while this idiotic motherfucker runs off and secretly gets married.” Julian sighs. “It’s like the first thing they teach rich kids with trust funds: Don’t get married without a prenup.”
“I’ve got to uphold my mantle as the Graves family fuckup,” I tell him. “Besides I couldn’t pay Clover to sully her hands with my money.”
“Well, she’s more than happy to use you for housing benefits.”
Tex scratches his chin. “He’s not wrong.”
“The real concern,” Julian announces, “is that the fuckability of this household has just dropped dangerously low.” He turns to Tex with a wink. “Not that I don’t still consider you highly fuckable, Tex.”
“I got drunk and let you kiss me on the lipsonetime after we won a game of strip table tennis.” Tex throws his head back, but it doesn’t hide the ruddy color of his cheeks.
“It was more like a headbutt than a kiss,” I say in his defense even though I have always thought the two of them would actually make a pretty good couple.
