Wick did win his game. I watched it on television, definitely not in the mood to head down to the stadium in person and by myself with all the rumors flying around about me and all the history I had of attending them to support Topher.But watching it alone was kind of depressing. Even though it was nice to see how well my roommate played, I just had no one to brag to about him, because Wick kicked ass. He seriously did. My hands grew sore from the amount of times I high-fived myself after he intercepted the ball, broke up a pass, or made an awesome tackle. It would’ve been nice to share that with someone. But alas, I made do on my own.Sadly, Topher had an on game as well. He was mentioned by the sportscasters just as often as Wick was. Bleh.To get over that bit of nastiness, I made Wick some spaghetti for supper to celebrate, even though if I really wanted to be honest with myself, it was probably mostly an apology meal for what I’d done to him with the bra and the socks and all.

As Charlie read off the directions to the spook house we were going to, Darcy plugged her phone into the console and typed in the address, making a map pop up on Wick’s navigation screen.All the while, Izzy leaned in toward me and commentated.“Watch this,” she murmured discreetly. “Next, Darcy will bring up a whole playlist of songs she picked out just for this trip.”A second later, Darcy announced, “And… Now for the playlist,” as she tapped buttons on the screen of her phone. “Exactly two hours of eclectic awesomeness.”Izzy and I exchanged secret grins before the song “Shotgun” began to play. On the other side of me, Charlie nodded her head to the beat, tapped her fingers against her knee, and sang along with George Ezra.While Wick concentrated on getting out of the town and onto a stretch of nothing but highway, Darcy twisted in her seat to talk to me. “So, you dated Topher Nicholl, huh? What was that like?”“Darce,” Wick warned, shooting her a hard glance.“What?” his si

We hit two more spook houses before the night was over. On the trip back to the apartment, the interior of Wick’s truck grew quiet, making me think everyone was getting tired and were ready to drop off.But as soon as he found a parking spot a block from our place, the sisters perked back to life.“Can we drink?” Charlie begged Darcy as we piled out of the truck. “Please, please, please. You let us last year.”“Last year,” Darcy started with a wince. “Was a mistake.”“Oh, come on,” Izzy started in too. “This is the only time Charlie and I get to have a little alcohol.”Their oldest sister sent them a pleasant smirk. “Not true. You can have as much as you please when you both turn twenty-one.”Abandoning her, they turned to their brother. “Wick,” they pleaded, tugging on his arm as we approached the complex.He held up a finger. “One drink.”“Wick,” Darcy cried as the other two cheered and raced on ahead of us.He shrugged. “What’s the harm? They’re going to be inside the rest

“So, let me get this straight,” Cannon said next to me, switching his stretch by alternating his bent leg to straight, then reaching for the opposite toe. “The girl doesn’t even kiss you, but almost kisses you, and you run out to buy her a damn kitten?”I scowled at him. Practice was about to start any minute, and we were doing warm-up exercises on the sidelines of the football field before it did.“I didn’t buy it,” I muttered. “They were just giving them away. She’d always wanted a kitten, and this is honestly the first place she’s ever lived where she could get one. Her mom’s allergic, so she couldn’t have one growing up, then there was no way they would’ve allowed one in the dorms when she moved to college. So…” I shrugged. “It just made sense.”“It just made sense,” Cannon repeated, nodding as if he totally agreed, only to sniff a moment later, and say, “Shit. What’re you going to give her when she actually does kiss you? A damn car?”Jesus. I was going to strangle him. And no

Gripping my knees for dear life, I sat in the corner chair in the front room of Wick’s and my apartment with a snoozing Bingley on my lap—her heat soaking through my jeans with a comfort I didn’t deserve—and watched the door fly open, admitting yet another one of Wick’s friends.“I just heard,” J.J. McCannon announced, going straight to Wick, who was pacing the floor in front of me. “What the fuck happened? Why didn’t anyone call me sooner?”Wick held up a hand to get him to back off. J.J. paused, frowned in confusion, and then glanced at his other friends, silently asking for an explanation. But they just shook their heads, not even sure how to start. So his attention veered back to Wick, who hadn’t stopped walking around the room since another one of his friends had dragged him home.I guess Zack Polansky—the other friend who’d dragged him home—had been at Topher’s party when everything had gone down. He’d been the only person able to pull Wick off Topher after Wick had attacked h