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“Would—”
“Okay, we get it!” Clark said quickly. “You both drink yourselves stupid.”
Everyone froze in surprise. Clark was usually the sweetest one of us. He reddened at the sudden attention.
“Sorry. I’m just cranky. We’ve been working on the house, and I joined the historic neighborhood preservation board, and school just started back up. I’m a bit frazzled.”
Hunter squeezed Clark’s neck, massaging gently. “You push yourself too hard, angel. I told you we could take a break from the house renovations.”
“Toby loves working on the house though.”
Hunter chuckled. “He does. It might be the death of all of us if he keeps insisting on restoring it to its original grandeur.”
Everyone’s attention had shifted to Hunter and Clark, which was good by me. Wes and I had fallen into our brotherly bickering like it was second nature, but I couldn’t forget all the things we were hiding.
The day had passed in a haze of hangover misery and Wes tiptoeing around me like one wrong word might shatter me. I guess I’d given him fair cause for concern with my behavior last night. I’d screwed the pooch on that one. Instead of moving on, I’d shown him I couldn’t even go out for a night on my own without needing him to swoop in to rescue me.
On the upside, I was pretty sure he wouldn’t be making any moves on me. No more dream jerkoff sessions, which frankly, had done nothing to satisfy me and everything to make me think about what I couldn’t have.
On the downside, I was pretty sure he wouldn’t be making any moves on me, which was depressing as fuck, because regardless of what a bad idea it was, Ilikedhis moves.
By the time we’d headed out for trivia, I was mostly recovered from the hangover but strung tight from pretending all day. First around Andi, and now around our closest friends. When would it end?
“Beck, what about you?”
“Hmm?” I realized I’d lost track of the conversation.
Clark was looking at me hopefully. “Would you want to help out too?”
“Sure, of course,” I said, having no idea what I was agreeing to. “Just tell me when and where.”
He gave me a strange look. “Okay, like I said, I’m not sure when yet we’ll start the next project, but it helps so much when you all pitch in. Pizza and beer will be on us.”
“Sounds good,” I said gamely.
Wes nudged me. “You don’t even know what you said yes to, do you?”
“Of course I do,” I lied.
Wes snorted, clearly not buying what I was selling. But then, that was nothing new. No one knew me better.
“Okay, fine, I’m clueless,” I muttered under my breath. “Did I agree to sell a kidney?”
He chuckled. “Nah, just some labor of love at Ball-Sack.”
I choked on my beer, sputtering a laugh, at his phrasing. Hunter and Clark’s house was on the corner of Ball and Sack streets, soof coursemost people in town called it the Ball-Sack neighborhood. Granvillians were never afraid of a good sexual innuendo.
“Asshole,” I grumbled. “You did that on purpose.”
“Well, it’s better than the scowl you’ve been rocking all night. If you don’t relax, someone’s going to stage an intervention.”
I glanced across the table, and sure enough, Laurie was watching intently. Shit. I plastered a grin on my face and pretended to be extremely interested in my loaded fries.
The conversation moved on to the next trivia question displayed on television screens around the bar. It was a picture of some sort of monument overseas, and I had no idea what it was, but Clark was already scribbling the answer on the sheet of paper.
“I’ll take it,” I said, needing a minute to myself. “I want to hit the bathroom anyway.”
Clark handed me the slip, and I walked it across the room to the trivia host who ran the game. I went into the bathroom and splashed my face with water.
