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I shoot her a glance. “Briony, do you think I would have poisoned your coffee?”
“Honestly, I don’t know. It’s either that or some kind of dumb Frat Pack prank.”
“Frat Pack?”
Briony looks away. “That’s what I call all of you.”
“All of who?”
“You and Will’s other friends.”
“The Frat Pack,” I say flatly.
“Well, you have to admit, you do kind of act like total frat bros.”
“We don’t…”
My cell phone rings at that time. It’s Zander.
Whose name is saved as… Bro.
Briony pointedly looks down at it. “I’m just gonna let that one speak for itself.”
“Okay. Fine. You have a point. But why would it be a prank?”
“Because you all were always doing that stuff. You were so mean to me. Always making fun of me. Always making snide comments about what I was wearing or what I wanted to do. Will would say it all the time, that his ‘friends’—” she has air quotes thrown around the word, telling me she doesn’t consider us to be a positive thing— “would say how lame I was. And that you encouraged him to pull pranks on me to make me liven up a little.”
“Um. I don’t know about the other guys, but I never told Will to prank his girlfriend,” I say slowly.
“Oh? So changing all my underwear to thongs wasn’t your idea?”
I almost drive off the road. The vision of Briony and thongs is just… yeah. I shift in my seat and do my best not to look at her. “No. That was not my idea.”
“Hmm. Well. Whatever,” she flaps a hand at me. “That’s what happened. So yes. The coffee seems suspicious to me.”
“It’s just coffee,” I say slowly.
“Maybe. Maybe not,” she says. She puts it in the cup holder.
And she never picks it up again.
As the morning goes on, I watch Briony closely. I’m half stunned by her story. I definitely never told Will to pull any kind of pranks on her, nor did we ever really talk about her. I’m pretty sure Zander and the other guys haven’t done that either, so Will’s story feels… odd. I’m sure Briony isn’t lying, because her reaction was so genuine.
Watching her with the foxes, though, it’s clear that she’s in her element.
She’s so… good.
Patient.
Kind.
Thoughtful.
The thing I notice the most, though, is that she really gives people her full attention. Like, when Briony talks to each member of the new pack, she’s really listening to them. Her face reflects all of their emotions, but she also manages to calm them. Somehow.
It’s like they’re filled with lightning. And she’s a lightning rod, pulling all of it in, letting the storm just roll on over until there are clear skies ahead.
We get the foxes checked up. Briony makes dental appointments for some of the kids, and she shows the adults how to register them for school. Mia is watching over them.
