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Her attention remains on the ceiling as she expels a long sigh. “I can’t blame him entirely.”
“What the hell do you mean by that?” I lurch up. Not a good idea.
She glances at me, her dark eyes glistening. “Just that he isn’t exactly in an easy position.”
“I’m not getting you, ’Ris.”
Iris shrugs, then hugs the throw pillow to her chest. “He’s hot. He’s the captain of the lacrosse team. A lot of girls throw themselves at him. And I don’t know...” Another shrug. “How would I react to the same temptation?”
My mouth opens and closes as I try to speak. Is she serious?
“Iris, unless they’re naked and landing on his dick when they throw themselves at him, Henry has no excuse screwing them when he’s supposed to be committed to you.”
The couch creaks as she turns to look at me. Her mouth is a flat line of protest. “Are you saying that if you constantly had guys hitting on you, you’d ignore them for Drew?”
Again, is she serious? Has she seen Drew? Nothing compares.
“Yeah, I’d ignore them.”
Dark eyes bore into me. “And you think he’d do the same? That he isn’t tempted on a constant basis?”
An afternoon’s worth of junk food threatens to rise up my throat. I want to say that Drew would never do that. My whole soul cries it. But my jaw seems to have locked.
Iris’s voice is low yet clear. “I mean, he’s a star, way more than Henry ever could be. He’s got his own Wiki page, TikTok and Instagram fan accounts devoted to him. He’s his own character is a football video game, for crying out loud. He’s met the freaking president. Of the United States. Did you know that?”
Dully, I shake my head.
“His last girlfriend was like a beauty queen.”
Seriously? Now she’s just being cruel. Does she think I want to know that Drew had a fucking beauty queen girlfriend?
An ugly too-close-to-raging-jealous feeling weighs down my gut as I glare at her. “This is the South. Any halfway pretty girl with an ambitious mama has at least one crown on her mantel.”
Iris scoffs as if I’m full of shit, and I swear to God if she tells me this old girlfriend rescued baby yaks in Tibet, I’m going to punch her.
But she simply shakes her head. “Do you have any idea how many women would kill to be in your place? How many of them are probably waiting for the opportunity to take it? Or maybe they have. As you keep pointing out, you’re just hooking up.”
My throat feels scratchy. “Why are you saying this to me?”
Her slim shoulder lifts. So nonchalant, as if, with a few well-placed reality points, she hasn’t destroyed the contentment I’ve finally managed to achieve. I want to hit her. But I just sit there as she stares at me with sad eyes.
“I’m only pointing out that you never know. You think it’s all good. You think he wants only you. But if you’re with someone like that, you never know.”
I rub the back of my arms and resist the urge to cower.
She doesn’t even see me. “Maybe it’s a good thing you’ve kept it casual. Save yourself the pain.”
twenty-three
Drew
I stand in front of shelves lined with small cast-iron casserole pots in a rainbow of colors. “What the hell do you use these for,” I ask Gray.
In the act of crouching down to inspect a much larger pumpkin-colored pot, Gray glances up. “Individual servings.”
“For who? Barbie and Ken?”
Gray snorts and stands. “Probably. I don’t know, I guess you’d use it for an appetizer. Soup, maybe?” And now the little doll pots are the center of his attention.
