Lucas shrugged, still not looking at me. “Maybe tell her the truth about why you were a dick back in college?”
It wasn’t like I hadn’t considered it but telling Kate the truth was even more frightening to me than telling Ward. I shifted uncomfortably atop Lucas’ ridiculously cushy club chair.
“I sort of did, already. But the whole truth could seriously backfire,” I finally mumbled.
Lucas looked over at me at last. His expression was unimpressed, and his voice was dry. “If telling the truth was easy, everyone would do it. I have faith in you though. You could do it if you tried.”
He was right, of course. He was almost always right, and he knew it. That was the frustrating thing about Lucas. Of the three of us, Lucas was by far the smartest. He was easily smarter than Ward and I combined, which was saying something, because despite being dumb jocks, neither one of us was actually dumb. Ward was good at practically everything he attempted, and although I lacked verbal skills given my down-home upbringing, I’d gotten a perfect score on the math section of the SAT.
“Is that all your advice for me?” I pushed, hoping he had something better than telling the truth. I wasn’t sure I could handle that just yet. “Because I could use something a bit more… useable.”
He yawned condescendingly before answering and I resisted the urge to snap at him. “You could give up on Kate and date someone else. You know, someone who is not related to Ward? I could even introduce you to a few perfectly nice women, if you’re interested. This town is full of them.”
I’m sure the look on my face told Lucas that I had no interest in that. He blinked at me. He’d just realized something, and it surprised him.
“Were you always this into her?” he asked, his screwed hazel eyes narrowing. He didn’t wait for me to answer, it must have been all over my stupid face. “Shit, you really are an idiot,” he continued, “I’m not helping you. Not this time. I shouldn’t have helped the first time. Either go tell her the truth or leave her alone. She deserves that much.”
I paused. Lucas. Sardonic, sarcastic Lucas had just given me some tough love. Being direct wasn’t really Lucas’ general MO. He tended to find other ways to make his meaning known. Even Ward, who was probably the most difficult roommate ever when it came to food stealing, had never earned himself an ultimatum from Lucas. And one time he’d literally eaten Lucas’ birthday cake—the German chocolate cake his mom made and mailed to Texas, and that she’d conspired with me to surprise Lucas with. He’d simply smiled and then gotten even. That was Lucas’ way.
“Well this has been a fun and informative visit,” I said, setting my beer down on the coffee table and rolling my eyes.
“Because I want you to tell people the truth? What kind of friend would I be if I didn’t?”
My reply was instant. “The same kind you were six years ago.”
Lucas had no reply to my reference to my first date with Kate back in college. He shifted uncomfortably for a moment. He obviously felt guilty, too. “Say, what are we doing for Ward’s bachelor party? I’m guessing you’re going to veto The Usual.”
The change of subjects was welcome. Anything to avoid talking about our goddamn feelings any more than absolutely necessary.
‘The Usual’ used to refer to a night spent down in the seedier clubbing district downtown on sixth street. Lucas, Ward, and our larger group of friends had spent many a Friday night doing The Usual, and I think I was still nursing a mild hangover all these years later. There were still certain drinks that I couldn’t touch because of The Usual. I’d never drink another shot of Jägermeister for as long as I lived.
“Do you really want to do shots? Aren’t we a bit old for that?” The median age in most of those clubs was all of about twenty-two.
“I’m not,” Lucas replied. “And speak for yourself. I’m still young and cool.” He looked like he actually believed that.
“You’re older than I am!” By a couple of months, but it still counted. I was the youngest of our trio, and they never let me forget it before I could legally buy alcohol and was forced to mooch off of them. Now that we were all old enough to acknowledge that being young was a good thing, I had no intention of letting Lucas forget.
He merely shrugged his shoulders at the reminder. “If partying on dirty sixth street is out, then what do you want to do?”
I hadn’t really given the bachelor party a ton of thought. Most of my mental effort recently had been spent on thinking about Kate. Inspiration came to me spontaneously.
“How about a party barge?”
Lucas raised an eyebrow. “That could be promising.” I could see the wheels beginning to turn in his head as he considered the idea. Party barges on the lake were rarely a bad choice.
“Oh wait, doesn’t Ward still have that boat?” I vaguely remembered him purchasing a small fishing boat a few years ago.
“I think so, but he never uses it. We’d definitely want to rent something bigger anyway.”
I nodded. “I want to get something big enough to put a band on.” And secretly, I definitely wanted to get one that had a slide.
“How about a stripper that pops out of a cake?” Lucas was obviously kidding, but I felt it was worth mentioning Ward’s ground rules for the party anyway. Just in case Lucas got any ideas.
“Ward said that Emma said no strippers are allowed.”
Lucas smirked. “Why am I not surprised. Can a man be whipped before he’s even married?”
“You don’t even like strippers,” I countered. “Isn’t the industry exploitative or something?” Lucas had taken a few women’s studies classes in college. I think the initial plan had been to pick up the cute feminists, but they’d indoctrinated him rather than the other way around. The funny thing was that feminist Lucas got a lot more action after his conversion than before, so it was really a win-win.
“It definitely can be,” Lucas said, warming to the topic. “But it’s more complicated than just that. Stripping reinforces the sexual objectification of women even if the strip club itself is a feminist enterprise. That’s not why I don’t like strip clubs though.”
“Me either,” I agreed. I didn’t know jack shit about feminism, but I knew the entire thing made me uncomfortable. The older I got, the more uncomfortable strippers made me. What had seemed fun at twenty-one now seemed creepy, seedy, and gross. “I just hate the idea that a woman would only give me the time of day because I have money she wants. It’s not sexy. It makes me feel dirty.” If there was one thing being a professional athlete had taught me, it’s that a certain type of beautiful, manipulative woman is never far away.
“And speaking of dirty, strip clubs are always really sticky. Like, the whole place is just a sticky, glittery mess. I just don’t want to think about why that would be.”
We exchanged a disgusted look until the mention of glitter just made me remember Kate again. This meeting with Lucas may have been productive from a best man perspective, but I was no closer to figuring out what to do about Kate. If only I hadn’t been such an idiot back in college.
10
Cole
Six years earlier…
When I got home from the gym, I found Lucas exactly where I’d left him two and a half hours before: in front of his computer. I would have thought that he hadn’t moved a single muscle, except that the cereal bowls sitting next to him on the desk had multiplied. There had been only one before, and now there were three. Lucas shoveled the last bite of Lucky Charms into his mouth and waved his spoon at me in greeting. Couldn’t the man reuse a damn bowl? He was the reason we always had so much dishwashing to do.
“How’s the weather out there?” he asked, peering out the window and then wincing away like the pasty vampire he was. “It looks hot, and I need to go to the post office.”
I smirked. I’d been meaning to buy him a parasol and a fan like a proper Southern Belle. Lucas and Ward both burned like babies. Whatever my racial makeup was—and it was a true mystery, since I was adopted and just looked p
ermanently tan—it was a lot slower to sunburn than those two. Ward was used to the long summers of Texas and learned to love sunscreen, but Lucas had grown up in California and hadn’t adjusted well. He turned lobster red almost every weekend.
“It’s really nice out there,” I lied. It was so hot that I was ‘sweating like a whore in church’ from just a five-minute walk. “Not too humid or anything.” I’d been in drier steam rooms. “There’s even a nice breeze.” There wasn’t.
“Why do you look so weird then?” Lucas asked. He looked suspicious.
Did I look weird? Well, I felt weird. The prettiest girl I’d ever met just asked me out. That didn’t exactly happen every day.
“Ward’s little sister just asked me out on a date.” I felt like I needed to tell someone immediately, since the idea was so unbelievable, and so wonderful, that I needed to prove it was true.
Lucas set his spoon down into his cereal bowl with a little clink. “Katie?”
“Kate,” I corrected, grinning like an idiot.
Lucas giggled. “What did you say?” Then he paused. “Oh no. You idiot. Did you say yes? Are you really that dumb? Ward’s gonna’ kill you and make it look like an accident.”
“Hey, I’m not a bad guy,” I argued, “and Kate is eighteen. She’s an adult.” I’d kept careful tabs on her age over the years. In fact, I’d had every intention of tracking her down on campus myself. She’d just beaten me to it.
“Both of those things are totally irrelevant.”
“Look, I know Ward is protective of his sister, but—”
Lucas made a dismissive noise. “But nothing. Let me walk you through this from Ward’s point of view. Pretend that Kate is your little sister. You two grew up in a trailer park, with an overworked single mom and an asshole absent father. Are you with me so far?”
“Yes, but—”
“Hush,” Lucas said, continuing, “now Kate is your only sister, and she’s a couple of years younger than you. She had a really tough time when you went to college because the only person who had the time and interest to look out for her disappeared. You were really worried she wouldn’t even get into college, but she managed to get a sports scholarship. You know that she needs to get an education, or she’ll end up just like your mom, pregnant at twenty with some asshole’s baby. Still with me?”
I’d fallen silent at this point, stunned by how well Lucas seemed to have Ward pegged. Did he have me this thoroughly psychoanalyzed, too? I nodded at him in astonishment.
“Now your sweet, virginal little sister has come to college and the first guy she’s gonna’ go out with is your friend Cole. Is that a problem?”
“No,” I argued, “because Cole is a decent human being and Kate is an adult.”
Lucas shook his head. “Cole is an extremely spoiled rich kid that might go on to play in the NFL next year but is definitely going to graduate and leave next year. He has a trust fund and a future that will lead him far away from Kate. Meanwhile, she will be left heartbroken, deflowered, and possibly with herpes.”
“I do not have herpes.” That was just plain old rude.
“Ward doesn’t know that.”
“Ward doesn’t know about my trust fund either.” I tried to keep my family money to myself. Apparently, Lucas had figured it out. He probably hacked into my email or something. Maybe while he was freaking profiling me and Ward like some kind of science project.
“Wrong. Ward does know about your trust fund. He told me about it.”
“What?” I was learning so many new, disturbing things today.
“Your mom told him when the toilet overflowed that one time you were home for the weekend and we weren’t sure how we’d pay for the plumber.” Thanks mom. Now my friends think I’m a spoiled brat.
I rolled my eyes at him and received a grimace in return. “You’re getting me distracted. Who cares about my trust fund?! Why would I break her heart?” I countered. “Why can’t we just go out on a date and see what happens?”
“Remember, in this scenario, Kate is your virginal little angel of a sister. Stop seeing it from your perspective.” His hazel eyes were bright. He was actually enjoying this conversation.
Virginal little angel of a kid sister? That was pretty much the last way I wanted to think of Kate. Based on some unkind things the girls at her school had posted to her Facebook page (I checked her Facebook on the walk home), I was also fairly certain the ship had sailed on her virginity sometime back in high school. Nevertheless, Lucas was still wrong.
“If Kate were my sister, I feel like I’d want her to do what made her happy.”
“But what if what made her happy temporarily was falling for some dumb, rich jock who was just bound to abandon her? What if you knew from personal experience how much it sucked to see a single mom struggling to put food on the table because a guy split on her? What if you knew that your sister only pretended to be tough as nails? What if you were the one person that looked out for your sister when you were kids, and feel guilty that you haven’t been around as much? Wouldn’t you want to spare her from that pain even more? And wouldn’t you be extremely angry at your friend—whom you’ve known to sleep around more than once before—for even going near her?”
Reality came crashing into me when I saw his frown. Lucas was right. All roads led to Ward ending me. I might be bigger by a little bit, but he was faster and more motivated. It was well known that Ward adored his little sister, despite the fact that she irritated him in a typical little sister way.
I was an idiot. A doomed idiot.
“I’m picking her up at eight on Friday. You have to help me. I have to, I guess, fake my own death or something.” My voice was desperate, and conflicted. It didn’t look like Lucas picked up on the conflict. He seemed too amused by the desperation.
“I have to do what?” Lucas’ giggle turned into a full-blown laugh. “No way. I want no part of this.” He shook his head emphatically. “I remember the whole glitter thing.”
Ward had threatened me with an actual tire iron for ruining his sister’s dress (after Ward, Lucas and I finally figured out what had happened, that is). I’d never driven down I-35 faster than when I went to Plano to apologize to Kate. Ward, when angry, was absolutely terrifying and twice as cunning. Underneath his dumb tough guy act was an even tougher, not-as-dumb reality.
“Come on. You have to help me figure this out,” I pleaded. “I have to figure out some sort of a plan.”
“Nope. I’m too smart to get involved with this. Ward is going to fucking murder you.” Lucas looked like he was already picking out the flowers that he would lay on my grave. Maybe some nice daisies like the ones I gave to Kate would look nice. I swallowed hard.
“Why exactly am I going to murder Cole?” The voice in the hallway was light and pleasant, but it made my blood run cold. Ward was home? I wasn’t remotely ready to talk to him. Had he been listening from the other room?
Lucas returned to laughing, and I huffed at him in frustration. Lucas could have warned me that Ward had come home. But no. It was much funnier for him this way. Lucas was having a literal laughter fit in his desk chair. I kicked the back of his chair repeatedly until he shut up and glared at me.
There was no lying to Ward now that he was staring at me from two feet away. Just like before the start of a game, adrenaline spiked in my bloodstream and time seemed to slow down. I took a deep breath and turned to face him. Ward looked vaguely amused.
“Oh, um, it’s about your sister,” I ventured carefully.
The smile disappeared. “Come again?” he asked.
“Your sister.” I repeated. My voice had no inflection. I kept my face as neutral as possible.
Ward frowned deeply. “Kate?”
“What? Do you have another one lurking around?” Lucas asked, peering around himself like a second Williams sister might appear and threaten his wellbeing with her sexiness. I nodded in answer, and Ward ignored Lucas’ question. Ward’s attention was entirely on me. It felt like
a physical weight on my chest.
“What about Kate?” Ward asked cautiously. “Have you seen her? Is she ok?”
In the next two seconds, my life flashed before my eyes. I’d never been so sure that I was about to be beaten up in that moment, including the time I backed up over my Uncle Jimmy’s favorite dog’s tail (after an amputation, Rattail the coonhound was rechristened Stumpy and recovered just fine). Lucas was silent, and his gaze shot between us, back and forth, like he was watching a particularly riveting table tennis match.
“Yeah. She’s fine. Uh, I saw her today on campus,” I stuttered. Did I dare to tell him the truth? Maybe it would be better? Maybe he would be understanding? That could happen, right?
“Why would that make me want to kill you?” Ward seemed genuinely, and rightfully, confused by our conversation. My words flowed out of me in an unthinking rush, spurred on by horniness and stupidity.
“Well anyway I saw her today. She was wearing this super tight, strapless pink dress and it was really…” I trailed off when his eyes narrowed, and his shoulders tensed. His hands balled into fists, and my hands, which were tracing the outline of an hourglass, dropped to my sides like they’d been turned into lead. Bad move, dumbass. I shrugged and tried to look casual, although I was suddenly afraid he might charge me. He wasn’t a linebacker, but I could bet it would still hurt. “It’s not my fault!” I protested when he continued to glare.
The tense seconds dragged by as Ward stared at me. His left eye twitched in a way that would have looked somewhat comical if it didn’t also look vaguely psychotic. “Let’s just pretend this conversation never happened,” he finally grumbled, looking at me with could only be conveyed as a clear and unambiguous warning. He picked up his water bottle and left, sending a final, parting glare at me. “I don’t want to hear you talking like that about Kate ever again.” Then he glared at Lucas. “You either.”
Lucas spread his hands in innocence and his eyes went wide. “What? Me? I didn’t even do anything. I was just sitting here minding my own business!”
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