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“Next time, she’ll be sticking around,” Wells declares, searing me with a gaze suggesting it’s been decided as his hand glides over my lower back. “For good. Right, Ivy?”
A tingle runs up my spine from his touch, my breaths accelerating and my mind racing to grasp what he said.No grains. Let the sand be sticky, please. Yes. That was it. Sticking around. “It’s under consideration.”
My words act as some sort of beacon for Liam. He finallyemerges from his relaxed pose on the molding of the library entry to amble toward the rest of us. That devilish grin still frolics on his face, his dirty-blond hair a mess in an I-look-this-good-rolling-out-of-your-bed seductive kind of way. His hazel eyes are crinkled at the corners, and as he nears, a whiff of nicotine wafts over me—a smell I detest. Celeste has always found it sexy, but I can’t for the life of me understand why. Being a doctor’s daughter cements certain things. Other than the lingering blanket of smoke, Liam is all sex appeal and nothing but trouble.
He stops right before me, beer in hand, his teeth snagging his lower lip as though I were his missing pretzels. “Staying, like moving in?”
“Yes,” Wells barks, tugging on my hip possessively. “She’ll be here asmy…guest.”
Guest?Okay. We’re not sharing our possible engagement with Liam then.
Liam stretches his arm out, squeezing Wells’s shoulder, but never averting his fixed scrutiny from me. “Since we all live here, it seems as though she’ll bemyguest too. Right, Chief?”
Ty smacks Liam’s chest. “So, Liam, this is Ivanna Kingston. Ivy, meet Liam Graves, otherwise known as the pot stirrer.”
“Hey.” Liam laughs as though Ty nailed it and he’s not at all ashamed. “I keep things fun around here. Wells and Gage are far too serious.” His eyes bounce in mockery. “What about you, Ivy? You like to have a good time, don’t you?” He winks, and although he’s kind of a dick, I like him.
A laugh spills out of me while I take in the three of them—all lean and fit and at least six-two or six-three, Liam being the tallest by a hair over Wells. And their charisma, although each different, is as lofty as their height.
“Yeah, I’m not opposed to fun.”
His lips twist in doubt. “That outfit certainly camouflages your fun side—”
Before Liam can continue commenting on my attire or soobviously dragging his gaze up and down my body, I cut him off. “I dressed to meet Wells tonight, confident he’d be the picture of class. If I’d known I would be hanging with some frat boys”—I gesture to his black T-shirt, relaxed jeans, and the Modelo in his hand—“I would’ve worn my vintage Pearl Jam tee and cutoff jean shorts, fully prepared for keg stands.” I shrug. “Next time.”
Ty howls with a clap while Wells chuckles quietly beside me, his fingers lightly nudging my hip.
Liam nods to both of them. “I like her. She can stay.” He turns toward me. “But now, you owe me a keg stand,High Society.”
Ty tugs me away from Wells, wryly quipping, “How about something to drink,seatedat a kitchen stool?” He tows me out of the library, Wells and Liam staying behind. “You did good,” he says as we halt at the island. “Liam’s a shark, and if he smells fear, he goes for the kill. He’ll keep trying to ruffle you, but you’ve already impressed him.”
An odd sense of pride fills me. These men are far more enthralling than the boys in college and more put together, but some things never change.
I drop onto a stool, brushing my fingertips across the smooth granite countertop. “He came off a bit more like a wild boar, but thanks, Ty. I bet it’s a trip living here with both of them. You seem far less … intense.”
He tilts his head, a heaviness briefly coasting over his features. “We all have our demons, Ivy. I just appease mine with a smile.”
The weight of that hits me. “I know the feeling.”
“I’m sure you do,” he replies with a wistful roll of his lips, which seems wholly misplaced and comforting, all at once. Like he can see how much I hurt from the loss of my father—his essence anyway—without me ever showing it. Like we share a secret somehow even though we don’t.
He offers me a vast selection of drinks and snacks, ultimately pouring me a glass of the lemonade I settle on due to the hour driveI have in store. While waiting for Wells and Liam, we bond over our common hobby of people-watching.
“If we’re ever in a crowd together, I’ve got a game for us,” I say. “Match a person to a movie character as quickly as possible.”
He leans forward on the island, sipping a Kraken Black Label Rum and Coke, his brown eyes narrowed. “Are the matches judged by accuracy or humor?”
“Hmm. We need a sliding scale—too many variables, but humor is always favorable.” On the wordfavorable, Liam swaggers in. I jerk my head in his direction and lower my voice. “Humorous but possibly kind of accurate—Brad Pitt’s character, Tyler Durden, inFight Club. But an equally funny choice is Kevin Bacon’s character, Ren, inFootloose.”
Ty smacks the counter with a cackle. “Fucking perfect.”
Propping his weight on the counter beside my stool, Liam speaks low in my ear. “What’d I miss in here?”
“Nothing much.” I grin. “Do you dance?”
Liam winks, beaming like he’s won something, but his eyes shift between Ty’s howling and my barely contained laughter. He straightens, deciding not to answer.
Astute.
