Chapter 3

Chapter Three

LETTIE

" N ick is taking me to the adventure park tomorrow. Let's all go."

Dane stands, closes his eyes, and lets out a deep breath. "Lettie, can you wait to scream until I've hit the ball?"

I hop up on the pool table, swinging my feet. "You've never been good at pool. Reed will kick your ass anyway. Go with us." His lips press into a flatline.

I pull on his t-shirt, and he's so close, I wrap my arms around his waist, and my head hits his hard chest. His arms are slow to come around my back. I love the way Dane smells—fresh and woodsy. Why don't other guys smell like that? Nick doesn't, and they both play basketball for the Stallions.

"I can't. Dad has a fundraiser tomorrow." He tries to push out of the hug. To everyone else, it seems normal, but Dane is upset about something.

"Come on, Greathouse. Hannah's coming." Nick lifts his brow, and I refrain from a full-blown eye roll. "You need to have some fun."

"I'll call my dad. I'm not promising."

I bounce off the pool table, pecking Dane on the cheek, twice. "You know how much I love amusement parks. Remember when we went on senior skip day? God, we had so much fun."

"I do. I also remember you throwing up after riding the Turbine Twister." He raises both eyebrows.

"Yeah, yeah. Never going to let me live that one down, are you? Call your dad. You know how happy he'll be if you go on a date."

"It's not a date."

"Nick and me. You and Hannah. Sounds like a double date. Please."

His eyes dip down to mine. "I'm not interested in dating. But I'll ask if I can get out of the fundraiser. Someone has to take care of you."

There's a hint of frustration cloaking his eyes. I've looked into those eyes a million times through good times and bad, like when my parents would claim to Granny and Paps that they were clean so I would move into a dilapidated trailer with my parents on the back of the property. But two days later, they would shoot up drugs in front of me, pass out, and Child Protective Services would take me right back to my grandparents, and they went back to jail for endangering the life of a minor.

Dane walks out onto the basement patio, leaning against the wooden post with one foot crossed over the other while making the call.

Nick strides towards me and puts his hands on my shoulders, squeezing. "He's wound pretty tight. It seems you're the only one who can unwind him."

"We know each other inside and out. I just know how to push the right buttons."

He lifts a questioning brow. Nick and I have been hanging out the past few weeks. I'm sure he's wondering what everyone else wonders—have Dane and I ever had sex? I thought we might kiss a few times, but neither of us could ever pull the trigger, which reminds me of a time when we came close.

Dane and I had gone to our senior prom together as friends to satisfy his parents. Dane the Great couldn't go alone. He wouldn't ask another girl, so it was up to me to swoop in and save him.

Prom night he destroyed me. We danced to slow songs as our bodies connected. His head dipped, and I pressed onto my toes to get closer. Dane's lips hovered over mine, and I thought it was the moment Dane would be mine. Not as a best friend but as a boyfriend.

The tension was thick, and I felt his needy gaze on my lips. Then out of nowhere, he pushed me away and left me standing in a sea of our friends, yet I was all alone.

Angry, I grabbed Jacoby Smith. His eyes lit up, and he slipped his arms around my waist. I didn't need Dane the Great. Jacoby played all the sports and was more developed than Dane.

As the d ance wound down, Jacoby asked if he could take me home, and I agreed. Maybe we would go to Lookout Landing, but before we could leave, I had to find Dane and tell him. We searched the gym and found no sign of Dane. I hoped we would find Dane and he would get possessive and say no, that he promised my granny that he would bring me home.

We went out to the parking lot, which was hopping as our friends made plans to go to Lookout Landing—the make-out place. Of course, I had never been.

Jacoby pointed towards Dane's car. I couldn't tell if he was in there until we got closer, and the windows were fogged over. When I pulled his door handle, Renee was giving him a blowjob. My mouth fell open seeing Dane resting his head with his lips parted. The lips that came so close to being mine. Jacoby said, "Sorry, man. Come on, Lettie."

Shocked, water filled my eyes. It was the first cut into my heart, but it wouldn't be the last.

That night was the first time I let a guy touch me—and it wasn't Dane.

"You okay?" Brooke asks.

"Yeah, just hope Dane's dad lets him go."

His dad is a state senator, and now he's running for the U.S. Senate, and his mom is a middle school principal. Nothing like my family. My parents are thieves and drug addicts. Stealing anything to support their habit, which is how my grandparents ended up as my guardians.

Granny grows vegetables, selling them at roadside stands during the summer and fall. And she's a seamstress for a local dry cleaner. Paps works in a factory and is the weekend night watchman on Dane's farm.

Our families are like night and day. But not once have Dane's parents treated me differently.

"I wish you, Reed, and Caleb could come," I say to Brooke.

Reed wraps his arm around Brooke's shoulder. "Sorry, Caleb has a camp."

"Hockey camp?" I ask.

Brooke dies laughing. "No, baseball."

Nick doesn't know any of us well, so I explain how Reed's old roommates and now next-door neighbors, own the Chicago Kodiaks professional baseball team, and his other old roommate plays professional football for the Louisville Heavyweights.

Nick looks at Reed. "You have a son who wants to play baseball?"

"Yeah, whatever makes my little guy happy," Reed says as Brooke snuggles him tighter. "We have a night by ourselves, so we're going home."

Brooke hugs me and says, "Call me when you get back from the amusement park. I want to hear who threw up and who was scared of the Screaming Demon."

"I will."

As Dane comes back inside, he runs his hand through his hair, then lets it fall hastily. "Dad says I can skip it as long as you come to the fundraiser with me."

"Of cours e." I jump up and down, hugging him.

"It's one of those fancy events you don't like." He pats my back and shirks away from me.

"I'll do anything if you go to Timber Thrills with us."

Dane quirks his lip. "Well, this time, you can throw up on Nick."

Nick waves his hands in front of him, shaking his head. "We don't know each other well enough for that," he says in jest. Or at least I think he's joking.

His teammates trample down the stairs, sounding like a herd of cattle. "We heard everyone's going to Timber Thrills tomorrow. We're in. Let's get a party bus."

Dane's jaw relaxes. "The more the merrier."

Why doesn't he want to date? He hooks up all the time.

Doesn't he?

Dane doesn't like big crowds, which no one would believe since he plays in front of twenty-five thousand at every home game. He prefers it to be in small groups and shies away from the spotlight except on the basketball court. But he's ecstatic that he won't be on a date .

But I press. "Oh my God, Hannah had to leave. I have to call her and tell her she has a date with Dane the Great."

I knock his shoulder, and he flashes me a lopsided smile that has always made my knees weak.

"We're all going together. Lettie, I don't have time for dates, flowers, and chocolate," Dane claims.

Nick lifts his drink and says, "Dude, what do you have against dating?"

"Nothing. Just keeping my eye on the prize."