Page 41 of Best Things in Life

“That’s all we really ever were. Not that I knew that then. But I do now.” She smirks. “The way you were friends with Summer.” I nod.

“I swear that’s all we ever were. May lightning strike me if it’s not true.” I put up my hands and she laughs.

“I can vouch for that,” Whiskey says, lifting a glass as if it’s toast-worthy.

“What else is going on at SPU?” I ask, promising myself I’ll call Bigs because I should be the one to make the first move. And because I need to try and repair the damage, to get our friendship back. I miss his rigid ass.

“Emily and Bane are together,” Whiskey says.

“Understatement,” Dooley says, patting Whiskey’s knee with affection and a gleam. “Gorilla blue couldn’t hold them together tighter than they are these days.”

“Kind of like you two,” I say and lift a beer to my lips as the Cheshire cat grin appears on Dooley’s face.

“How long will you be in Pittsburgh?” Whiskey asks.

“Long enough for us to look around for a place to set up a restaurant for when I graduate,” Sarina says.

“I have a five-year contract and I’m making myself the model player.”

We’ve been staying in a hotel for three weeks while pre-season camp for rookies goes on and we’re all hustling to find a place to live.

“Sarina’s moving in with me because I insisted one culinary arts program is as good as the next—kidding.”

“So no regrets about moving to Pittsburgh with this degenerate?” Whiskey says to Sarina.

“What’s there to regret?” I say, “The school is top and she has the extra bonus of sleeping with me every night.

“You mean the nights you’re home.”

“TMI,” Whiskey says, staying true to his name with a bottle of Hennessey in his lap and the perpetual grin on his face.

“Where are you going to sleep tonight?” Dools asks because for him there’s no such thing as TMI. Whiskey shakes his head and Sarina laughs.

“We’ll stay at the hotel until our new furniture is delivered in two days.”

“Fuck that—where are me and Dools going to sleep?” Whiskey says wiggling his brows.

“Now who’s guilty of TMI,” I say. I wasn’t shocked, but I was surprised when I found out Whiskey and Dooley were a couple, and then truly happy, especially for Dools because he’s been alone for a while. Plus I take full credit every chance I get because I introduced them.

“Relax,” Sarina says. “We got you a room at our hotel.” She smiles looking them over like they’re the oddest couple that ever walked hand-in-hand. And they are kind of. In a Mutt and Jeff way if Mutt was a wicked witty intellectual and Jeff was a hunky wiseass puck slinger.

I slide my hands under her and rise from the box where I’m perched with her on top of my lap.

“Speaking of hotel rooms. It’s about time we call it a night and get back there, don’t you think?” She laughs and with her arms slung around my neck, she kisses me, a deep moaning kiss, and I devour her, sucking her lips into my mouth and nibbling the exotic taste of her.

She talks into my mouth the way she always does, forgetting we’re not alone.

“Baby I want you—” I clamp down on her tongue, tangling it with mine and she sighs.

Walking to the door, I lift my head and nod for Whiskey and Dools to follow as they snicker.

At the hotel they disappear into their rooms and I carry Sarina through the door of our room.

“This is getting to be a thing—you carrying me around,” she says, kissing my jaw, licking my lips until I nip at her and drop her on the bed. She bounces and laughs and I jump on top of her, feeling like a kid with the keys to Disneyland. We roll together, hands caressing, laughing and staring at each other.

“Is this really our life, Nate?” she says, calming her laughs.

“I think it is. Together at last—as someone once said.” She rolls her eyes as she slides her hands under my t-shirt, up over my six-pack abs making me dizzy with lust.