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The deep sound was weirdly familiar.

Trevor turned, and I heard him chuckle softly but I couldn’t hear anything else but the deep thumping of my heart when I saw my best friend, the love of my life (even if he didn’t know it) standing right behind Trevor looking like the hottest, tatted-up, seriously pissed off baseball player I’d ever seen.

FOUR

ADAM

Trevor fucking Grant. I’d known it was him who had been sniffing around after Callie’s night class. Now he was there, talking to my girl, asking her to go out with him?

“Speak of the devil.” Trevor grinned like a Cheshire cat as he leaned against the check-in counter, crossing one leg over the other like he was in no hurry of leaving. “Good game yesterday,” he noted with respect. My jaw clenched.

I wanted to punch the guy, shout at him to stay away from my girl because there was no way he was good enough, but I couldn’t. She wasn’t mine. And the worst part? Trevor Grant was a nice guy. A good one. And because of it, I couldn’t just punch him and tell him to stay the hell away from my ladybug.

“Thanks,” I mumbled before tearing my eyes off him and letting them land on Callie. I’d just been in her damn room two nights before, watching her sleep, but had to act like I hadn’t been stalking her sweet ass like she belonged to me for the last year.

“Callie.” Her name sounded rough on my tongue.

“Adam,” she said quietly. My cock went from semi hard to full length in a beat.

“You think we could talk?” I asked quietly, my eyes locked on hers. It had been too damn long since those hazel pools had looked into my soul like this, over six months since I had accidentally bumped into her and Roxie at the movie theater.

“I’m kinda busy.”

“I was trying to convince her into giving me a chance,” the asshole chimed in, and I swear it was a challenge not to snarl at him. “What do you think, Adam? Could you put in a good word for me?” A good word? My eyes left hers and caught his blue ones.

“A good word for what?” My brows furrowed. Something dark and ugly wrapped its way around my gut before it started to slide up my throat. This motherfucker thinks he deserves a chance with my girl?

“To take her on a date.” He grinned. “I’d pick her up at five tomorrow and have her home by ten.”

“Hmm,” I grunted. He wanted five undivided hours of her time? Was he fucking kidding me? Dinner didn’t take five goddamn hours!

“I don’t need anyone to talk me into anything,” Callie cut in, and my jaw ticked. “Trevor, you’re sweet but⁠—“

“She can’t go with you,” I cut her off, too fucking pissed and panicked that someone was trying to take her out. Someone who wasn’t me.

“Why?” “Why?” the two of them asked simultaneously.

“Because,” I stated, like that was answer enough. I knew exactly how much of an asshole I sounded like. I sounded like my sperm donor. How many times had he thought because was enough of an answer?

“Because?” Callie repeated quietly. My eyes found her again, but she was looking at whoever was in the gym probably watching us.

“Because you said so?” she asked way too calmly as her gaze settled back on me. If I had been paying attention, hell, if I had an ounce of blood left to go to my brain, it would have warned me to shut the fuck up. But her hazel eyes were disarming and always rendered me speechless. Especially after so long of not being so close to her.

“Exactly,” I answered, but she laughed. My stomach sank. I knew that laugh. I had fucked up.

“I’ll go on a date with you,” she announced. My stomach, along with my heart, plummeted to my fucking feet.

“What?” I croaked. Why would she do that? To prove a point? She had just been about to turn him down!

“Great,” Trevor answered.

“But I’ll meet you there,” she added.

“What?” “What?” Now Trevor and I were repeating ourselves.

“I have some school stuff to take care of,” she said without sparing me a second glance. “How about the diner at five?”

“Diner? I was thinking the Italian place just outside town.”