AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Whereas loving Valen felt like something I had no control over, something that I could never deny or even fully stop doing.
“Oh, come on, Lu,” he said shaking his head at me as he rested his arm on the bar, kind of blocking off the rest of it, somehow making a busy bar feel almost intimate. “We were always friends. Maybe only ever… friends.”
I knew that insinuation.
I’d started dating Jase when I was still underage. And he was a little older. We’d never “gone all the way.” So we were almost like friends who made out a lot.
He’d never pressured me either.
First, because he was a good guy.
Second, because, well, his mom would have castrated him herself if she found out he was that type of guy. And his uncles would have held him down. His grandmother would have provided the knife.
I’d loved his family.
His big, loud, crazy family.
To an extent, I think I was just as intothemas I was into him.
“Kissing friends,” I clarified as I took my drink, reaching for the silly pink umbrella with a smile.
Jase had given me my first drink.
He’d stolen the keys to Chaz’s and snuck me in through the back one day, making me sit at the bar like I was twenty-one, and order my first drink from him.
But I didn’t know what to order.
So he’d picked for me.
Whiskey, on the rocks.
“Because it sounds badass.” That was what he’d said. “But with an umbrella because you’re a lady too, even if you hate to admit it.”
“Just like old times,” he said, giving me a soft smile.
“Except, this time, I’m not drinking for fun,” I admitted, putting the umbrella down on the bar and draining my glass in one long gulp, leaving the sad little ice at the bottom of the cup.
“Another,” he called to the bartender who clearly knew that Jase was, you know, related to the bosses because he practically tripped over himself to refill my glass. “So, let me guess here. You drinking on a weeknight. When Valen just so happens to be back in town.”
“I heard you two beat the shit out of each other when you heard he was back,” I said, giving him a raised brow.
“Old business that needed handling,” he said, shrugging, clearly not holding any more animosity.
It had been so long.
He’d likely dated a thousand girls since then.
Ones he was more than kissing friends with.
“Come on, Lu. This is a bar. That’s a drink. You’re supposed to be spilling your guts.”
“So, you know how I like to act first and then think later?”
“One of your most admirable qualities,” he said, smirking.
He’d always liked chaos.
“Yeah, well, I decided to prospect at the club.”
