AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Why not?”
She shrugged, but it was the type of shrug someone would use when they did know, but they didn’t want to say anything. Why didn’t Zoey want to talk to me? It had been a million years since we’d chatted, but I remembered the last day we ever spoke in excruciating detail. If I had to wager a guess, I’d say that she did, too.
“I think you do know,” I told her. Fuck, she was beautiful. She had soft, pouty lips. She had big, beautiful eyes. She had a little pointy nose that I just wanted to bop with my finger.
“Fine,” she said. Her eyes sparkled with irritation. She was probably trying to look pissed, but she just looked adorable. I was filled with the urge to spin her around and spank that cute little ass of hers until she begged me for more, but I held myself together. We were in public, after all.
“Fine?”
“I’ll tell you,” she said. “I don’t want to talk to you because you punched my boyfriend.”
“Eric?” I laughed coldly. So that had been it. Of course, it had been. “He was hardly your boyfriend. I did you a favor.”
“You did,” she agreed. “And I never forgot it.”
“So, what’s the problem?” I asked.
“The problem? The problem is that it was wildly embarrassing to have a huge crush on someone and to find out in front of your brother’s best friend that he was a lying piece of shit.”
“So, you haven’t talked to me in years bec
ause of embarrassment?”
Surely there had to be more to the story than that. Like, there really, totally, completely had to be more to the story. I just wasn’t buying the idea that it had been enough to keep us apart.
“That’s part of it,” she said.
“What’s the other part?”
“No,” Zoey shook her head. “That’s all you get to know.”
“That’s not fair,” I told her quietly.
“Life isn’t fair,” she snapped. She looked away, and when she turned back to me, I was surprised to see her eyes brimming with tears. “Not everything is fair,” she told me.
“Give me a chance,” I said. We were still standing outside of the hotel. Cars were coming and going, but we were standing to the side of the doors out of the way. People were loading and unloading, coming and going, but Zoey and I were suddenly trapped in our own little world.
“Why?”
“I’ll make it worth your while.”
“How?”
“Do you like gambling?” I asked her.
She considered this for a moment. I knew for a fact that Zoey Lane never turned down a bet. How did I know this? Because my best friend’s girlfriend, Lauren, had done a pretty good job getting to know Zoey. Lauren was a sweetheart, but she also loved to talk, and it wasn’t hard to get her going when the topic was something she cared about. In this case, Zoey. She’d been the one who had told me that Zoey loved gambling and betting and playing cards.
Well, this was a different kind of wager entirely, and it was one I knew sweet Zoey wasn’t going to be able to resist. I knew a lot more about Zoey than I should have, and I knew that Zoey was the type of person who liked to have fun. Even when we were kids, she’d always been curious, and that wasn’t going to be something she would have lost with age.
“Why?” She asked.
“I have an idea.”
“Okay,” she said slowly, still looking at me.
“Let’s go inside and I’ll tell you all about it,” I said. “It’s chilly, and you’re going to freeze to death in that dress.”
“So, you like the dress?” Zoey asked. She looked slightly hopeful. Maybe Zoey wasn’t as disappointed to see me as she made me think. Had she known I would be here tonight? Had she dressed like that because she wanted to show off for me a little bit? Part of me hoped so. My cock hardened. It definitely hoped so.
