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“What? No!” I yelped. “He invited—Wait. Why is that the first place your mind went?”

I heard the deep rumble of her fiancé, Pope’s voice from the other side of the line. “The hell is going on, Raven? Someone in trouble?”

“I don’t know. Maybe.”

“What do you need me to do?”

“We just might have to bail Iris out of jail.”

“I’ll get some pants on.”

Ignoring the fact that my girl had a man so amazing he wouldn’t hesitate to bail one of her besties out of jail in the middle of the night, I tried to get this conversation back on track. “Gah! Will you two knock it off? Pope doesn’t need to put on any pants.” I raked a hand through my hair and resumed my pacing. “I’m not in trouble, and I didn’t break in anywhere.”

Her heavy exhale gusted through the line. “I’m sorry, but can you blame me? You’ve been walking around with heart eyes for that guy for so long, I thought maybe you finally snapped. Also, it’s the middle of the night and you woke me from a dead sleep. Forgive me for not having all my faculties.”

“Fair enough,” I muttered with a little bit of a pout. I couldn’t really blame her for where her mind went. All my closest friends knew my crush on North bordered on obsession. Not like a creepy obsession. A non-threatening, non-criminal obsession that wouldn’t harm a soul.

“All right, let’s start over. How did you get into North Hasting’s bathroom?”

“Well . . .” I let out a deep exhale and went into the full story. How I’d walked into Toni’s by coincidence, how I found the nerve to walk up to him, and everything that came after. The hours we spent talking and laughing with each other. How, for the first time ever, I’d been able to have a conversation with the man without making a complete fool of myself. And finally, how, after a few drinks, he’d leaned in close, tucked a lock of hair behind my ear, and asked me to come back home with him.

There was a pause from her side of the call that was followed by a squeal so loud I had to pull the phone away from my ear to keep from going deaf. “Holy shit,” I heard through the ringing in my ear. “Holy shit!” she repeated more shrilly. “It’s finally happening!”

My veins were pumping with a mixture of adrenaline, nerves, and excitement. It felt like an entire swarm of bees was buzzing beneath my skin. “It is. That’s why I’m calling you,” I said, making sure to keep my voice down. I’d let my nerves get the best of me the second I stepped foot in North’s bedroom and used the excuse of needing to use his bathroom to make this call. If I took much longer who knew what he’d think was happening.

“O-kk-aay,” she dragged out, confusion laced through that one word. “What’s the problem, babe? I mean, this is what you’ve wanted since you first laid eyes on him, right?”

“Yeah, I know. But that was when it was just a figment of my imagination. Now that it’s happening, I’m freaking out.”

Lennon did a terrible job of covering her laugh with a snort, then I heard her addressing Pope. “Everything’s fine, baby. You can come back to bed. She’s not going to jail, she’s just about to get her back cracked well and good tonight.”

“Lennon!” I hissed, my cheeks flaming bright. Sure enough, my reflection showed they were a deep red with little specks of freckles all over the bridge of my nose.

“Sorry, sorry.” She didn’t bother hiding the giggles that time. “I’ll stop. What are you freaking out about?”

Giving my poor thumbnail a break, I started chewing anxiously on my bottom lip. “It’s just that . . . it’s been a long time for me, okay? And the last couple of guys I slept with weren’t all that much to write home about. I feel like I’m about to jump into the deep end here, and I don’t have the first clue how to swim.”

“Oh, Iris, honey.”

I slapped a free hand over my eyes, groaning painfully. “God, this is so humiliating.”

“No, it’s not,” she assured me. “I get it, I promise. Or don’t you remember what brought me here in the first place?”

Of course I remembered. It was how she became one of my closest friends. I was her real estate agent when she moved to Ashland for a teaching job. Of course, that was after finding her piece-of-shit husband banging a woman who’d been a bridesmaid in their wedding. It was a serious blow to her self-confidence, and Pope had a battle on his hands to get past the walls she’d put up to protect herself when she first got to town. Luckily, she eventually let him in and found the love of her life.

The same had recently happened for my friend Dakota as well. She’d found her forever love, and they were blissfully happy. I adored my friends and I wanted nothing but happiness for them, but that didn’t stop the tiny pang of envy I felt every time I witnessed their men doting on them. Which just so happened to be all the damn time.

I wanted that. And it would have been a lie to say I hadn’t pictured a certain dark-haired, light-eyed police officer in the role of my love interest a time or dozen. Truth was, I wanted that too. I wanted a forever love of my own.

But first, I wanted to have my back cracked like Lennon had mentioned.

“I’m scared I’ve been out of the game too long. Like, are there any new trendy moves out there? Something that’s maybe gone viral that I haven’t heard about?”

Lennon’s snort of laughter filled my ear. “Babe, there’s nothing new or trendy out there.”

Pope’s rasp sounded again. “That’s it. I’m gonna watch some TV ’til you’re done. I don’t need to be a part of this.” Thank the freaking Goddess, I thought as Lennon giggled.

I faintly heard their bedroom door close in the background a second before Lennon’s voice returned. “Honey, you’re making this into a much bigger thing than it needs to be.”