AllFreeNovel
Share Us
The headlights.
There it was—Greenhouse Guy was one of the Brady brothers. A ribbon of unease unwound in Rowan’s belly. “Oh, boy. I may have already met him,” she mumbled into her wine.
Temperance cocked a hip. “What, now?”
Dots of sweat sprung up at Rowan’s temples. “Your friend,Harry. I think he was the one trying to catch me up at the greenhouse.”
“What did he look like?”
“Tall.”
“Sixth graders are taller than me,” Temperance said. “Do better.”
“Well, hewastall, damn it. Taller than me. By a few inches. Lanky. Newish beard, light brown hair. Maybe blond. Wavy.”
Temperance’s nostrils flared and she held her breath. It was one of her tells—she was trying not to laugh. “Was this guy wearing a UCLA ball cap?”
“Are you serious? It was really dark.”
Temperance twisted her bottom lip between her thumb and forefinger. “I bet it was Harry.”
“He scared the crap out of me, T.J. He was intense.”
Laughter bubbled up, but Temperance locked it down between pressed lips. “I’m sorry. This would be funnier for you if you knew them. The Bradys are really good people, honey. Only one of them is an asshole.”
Rowan had a hard time keeping up. “Wait, what?”
Temperance muttered more to herself than in reply to Rowan. “Actually,twoof the brothers are assholes, but you’ll probably never meet Malcolm. He lives in New York and is even more socially avoidant than you are.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
Temperance blinked. “They take that game really seriously.”
“No shit.”
“Couldn’t have been that bad.”
“I tried to knee him in the balls, T.J.”
Temperance’s eyes widened. “Ooh. In that case, it’s too bad it wasn’t Duncan.”
“The big guy, right? The only Brady you haven’t introduced me to tonight.”
Temperance frowned and evaded by sipping her drink. Slim arms wrapped around Rowan’s waist, and a chin propped on her shoulder from behind. Already on edge, Rowan startled and sloshed wine over the rim of her glass. The embrace ended as quickly as it began, and a luminous tawny-skinned brunette slid in front of her.
“Frankie. You spilled my wine. This is an act of aggression,” Rowan said.
“You’re being uncharacteristically social tonight. Who are you, and what have you done with Rowan?” Frankie Moreau’s voice was a husky alto, rich as the bourbon in the glass she held.
“I’ve been reveling in the adulation of the masses for my Team Tag tactics,” Rowan said. “And offending old ladies by talking about plant sperm.”
“As one does.” Temperance crunched more ice.
“That’s my girl.” Frankie smiled, then pointed at Rowan’s glass. “You spilled your own wine.”
With no sense of fashion and a lack of social graces, Rowan always felt like a hulking mess around Frankie. She was a photographer and former model, always effortlessly immaculate. Her sleek dark hair slanted in a bob that framed her exquisite face, and she never had flyaways or broke out in situationally inappropriate sweats. Frankie’s physical perfection was paired with a sweet personality and playful intelligence that made her impossible not to love.
Temperance and Frankie had been friends since they’d matched as undergraduates in random roommate assignments. Rowan was a year older than them, and she’d been a senior when her living situation had drastically and desperately changed. She’d answered the first “roommate wanted” ad she came across in the university paper, and moved in with them the next day, carrying a single suitcase of clothes, a rolling tote full of books, and a shitload of emotional baggage.
