AllFreeNovel
Share Us
He’d hurt her, and I didn’t get that. Fawn was so fucking nice, and she’d been through so much shit. I wasn’t lying to Wolf when I’d said how cool she’d been to me. She had managed to make another shit move not so shitty.
She’d been my friend.
Fawn: Thanks for letting me room with you. I really hope I’m not putting anyone else out.
She’d been worried about that, but I assured her she was fine. My parents proposed she stay with me because I had the only room with an extra bed. They asked Fawn, and she said she’d be cool with it if I was. I was of course. We were friends, so of course.
I smiled.
Me: You’re fine. Seriously.
Honestly, the only person she’d probably be inconveniencing was my brother. He was rooming with Prinze, but I had a feeling my sister would be in his bed. Didn’t really want to think about that, but if they got up to stuff, I could see Wolf wanting to take ownership of my extra bed.
Voices rose again, and Thatcher was pointing at Prinze this time. Thatcher snarled. “You know what? Whatever, and why the fuck have you been so cool about all this?”
“Right. Dude would usually be big mad right now.” Wells was up a little, his wool hat flipped down over his eyes. It wasn’t really cold outside. Especially in these stuffy-ass tuxes. I assumed the choice was for personal style and maybe even to help him sleep. He bunched his hands under his pits. “Probably more so than the rest of us.”
“Yeah,” I said, that curious too. Prinze was the closest to Wolf. Therefore, he’d generally be the most betrayed. Or at least would feel that way.
Prinze glanced over at Wolf, who was still gazing out of the window. Prinze frowned. “I guess I don’t see the point. Doesn’t help.”
It didn’t, but the guy was never logical. In fact, he was just as hotheaded as Wolf on his best day.
The weirder-than-shit award was being passed around tonight.
Fawn: I guess I believe you. I’ll see you when you’re done. I’ll try to stay up, and I’m sorry again.
I really wished this girl would stop apologizing. After all, she was in this mess because of me. She’d admitted she only came because she knew I’d stay in Maywood Heights. Stay with her.
I put my phone away. I did want to broach the subject of what happened with Wolf earlier, but I needed to talk with him first.
I needed answers.
I had so many questions on my lips by the time Prinze pulled up to the valet. I had to put them away (temporarily) to get out and navigate all the traffic outside the theater. A lot of people were out for tonight’s show, adults in tuxes and formal wear running after kids in sparkly gowns and tiny tuxedos. The guys and I blended in amongst them, waiting for that second Escalade to unload behind us. The fathers didn’t make us wait long and resembled mafia dons when they eased out of the darkly tinted SUV. Most of them sported black-on-black like Thatcher, calm in the chaos as they stepped onto the pavement and buttoned their jackets. Thatcher’s dad had gotten out first, and since I was closest to him, he shook my hand.
“Bru.”
“Mr. Reed.”
“Enough with the Mr. Reed stuff,” he stated, genuinely grinning at me. Mr. Reed and I had always been cool. Thatcher and Wells were in the same year as me, so I spent a lot of time over at both the guys’ houses senior year. Mr. Reed clasped my shoulder. “Call me Knight. You’re family, boy.”
I watched a few mouths part at that, my brother’s included. Wolf had been more discreet about it, but Thatcher wasn’t. Thatch’s head cocked. “But you make us call you ‘sir.’”
Mr. Reed shot a look over at his son, and instantly, Thatcher stiffened.
Thatcher’s throat flicked. “I mean, Dad. Sir. Dad-sir?”
This appeared to be acceptable to Mr. Reed because he nodded, and Wells barked a laugh so hard I thought he’d get a look too. He did get Mr. Reed staring coolly at the hat on his head. He tipped his chin at it, and right away, Wells ripped it off his head.
Mr. Reed eyed my friends. “That’s because none of you boys are Bruno Sloane-Mallick,” Mr. Reed boasted, and the other fathers had made their way over at that point. My own dad was included in that number. Ramses got my shoulder and grinned at me just as hard.
“Never do have to worry about Bru,” he said, the pride swelling in his eyes. Almost instantly, I shifted in my shoes, my hands in my pockets.
“So true. Some of you boys could learn a thing or two from him.” This came from Jax, Wells’s dad. The guy had taken up real estate between his son and Thatcher. He studied them both. “We’ve never had to be out here for him.”
“Or hop a red-eye,” LJ stated, Dorian’s god-dad. LJ didn’t have any children, but he was here on these outings just like the other dads. He and the fathers were all childhood friends, and he showed up just like they did. “And I have to say. That’s getting kind of old.”
From what I’d heard, LJ and his wife, Billie, had planned to come out for Christmas with the rest of the Legacy families, but not this early. I’d heard some of the moms say the pair had been on the other side of the world making real estate deals. LJ was in real estate like some of the other dads.
