19. Reid
CHAPTER NINETEEN
reid
PRESENT DAY
M ikey passed around shot glasses filled with clear liquor instead of our usual Pendleton, but he didn’t tell us what it was.
As he stood waiting, I took a big whiff of the glass, squeezing my eyes shut at the burn, tears already stinging my eyes. “God, Mikey, what the fuck? Everclear?”
“It’s Colter’s bachelor party, Lawson! Lighten up and have some fun.” Mikey raised his glass. “To Carson finally tying the knot! And to the rest of us hopefully getting lucky tonight.”
I rolled my eyes. The only person who’d probably be getting lucky was Mikey. The rest of us wouldn’t leave Colter alone at his own party.
“Bottoms up, I guess.” Jake took a deep breath and took the shot, wincing as it went down. I reluctantly followed suit, as did Colter and Hayden, right before someone pounded on the front door of our rental.
“What’s going on? Did you invite people over, Mikey?” Colter’s voice teemed with confusion before shifting toward suspicion .
Mikey threw his hands up at the accusation. “No, I didn’t do anything.”
The pounding began again, more aggressively this time. “Police! Open up!”
Hayden exchanged a panicked look with me as the others froze in place, the confusion evident on their faces.
“Well, someone answer the door!” When no one moved, I pushed through them. I opened the door, and did indeed find two male law enforcement officers standing in front of me.
“Evening, officers,” I greeted them, taking long, slow breaths to keep my heart rate steady. We didn’t do anything wrong, so it would be idiotic to give them a reason to think we did by acting guilty. “How can I help you?”
“We’re looking for Colter Carson and Reid Lawson,” one of the officers, a brawny, dark-haired man who towered over me despite my height, replied, glancing over my shoulder at the group.
I made a quick sweep with my eyes over the two men. His companion was shorter, but still fairly well built.
“Colter’s right here!” Mikey shouted before Jake clamped his hand over his mouth, muttering something like, “What the fuck, Mikey?”
“I’m Reid, but what is this regarding?” I hardly had time to finish my sentence before the taller officer pulled out his hand cuffs and the shorter one entered the house.
“You’re under arrest…” he started as he moved to cuff me. “For being too damn sexy.”
What the hell?
The men walked me and a handcuffed Colter to the couch in the living room as a third walked through the doorway carrying a massive stereo on his shoulder .
“What the fuck is going on?” Colter asked over the chaos.
“We heard you two are celebrating a special occasion tonight. A bachelor party,” the man who cuffed me replied.
The second one pitched in, “We were hired to come celebrate the two grooms-to-be.”
“Hit it!” the dark-haired “officer” called as upbeat club music started playing.
“No. Fucking. Way.” Jake clamped his hand over his mouth as the men ripped off their shirts.
Clearly, I’d failed to recognize that they weren’t real officers. I was a bit too concerned with the fact they showed up at the door to notice they were missing the normal equipment that actual police officers had. Upon closer inspection, their uniforms were only a step up from what you’d get at a Halloween store.
“Michael! Did you hire fucking strippers?” Colter snapped his head in Mikey’s direction.
Jake was still laughing, his body slouched over as he clutched his stomach, and Hayden looked absolutely mortified.
“I didn’t! I swear!”
The second stripper, now down to his underwear, was about to start thrusting in front of my face when I yelled over the music, “Stop! We’re not getting married!”
The power to the music snapped off, and both of the men stopped what they were doing as the one holding the stereo quietly shuffled toward the entrance of the house.
“Huh?” the first stripper asked. “Listen, man, we were just doing what we were paid to do.”
“Who hired you?” Colter asked, impatience coating his tone .
“Some girl named Isabelle?” the second man responded.
“Fucking Isa and Ellison.” I sighed, rolling my eyes. Directing my annoyance at the intruders, I explained, “It was a prank. Colter’s getting married to a girl named Ellison, not me. Can you uncuff us, please? We’ll give you money to go away.”
The strippers nodded, uncuffing us, and Colter and I handed them twenties.
“Sorry for the misunderstanding, man.” They both grabbed their personal belongings, not bothering to take the time to redress, and beelined it out of the house, letting the door slam shut behind them.
“Someone pour me another shot of Everclear,” I groaned. “I’m going to need it.”
“Mikey’s been making eyes at that girl over there for the past thirty minutes.” Colter chuckled as he nudged me.
After the male stripper debacle, we very quickly ended up at a bar. We had already spent about two hours commiserating over the prank and playing a few rounds of pool.
Over in the corner stood a group of three people: two girls and a guy. One of the girls had dark copper hair, and the other was a blonde. At the first sight of her, my mind drifted to what Isa was up to, but I quickly pushed away those thoughts.
“Listen, I don’t care what Mikey does as long as he doesn’t drag us all into it,” I replied, raising my hands in defense .
“Oh, look. She’s coming over.” Jake pointed at the copper-haired girl.
“Hey there, sugar.” Mikey flipped his baseball cap backward when she strutted up to him.
She looked him up and down, like she was assessing him. “Hi there.” She smiled at him, batting her eyelashes a little, and I rolled my eyes.
The other guys and I were just observing, having no interest in getting dragged into whatever Mikey was about to do.
“June, B, come over here!” the redhead called.
Her friend propped her hands on her hips and shook her head when the guy left her without hesitation.
“Hey, man, I’m Brady.” The guy waved, to which we all mumbled our hellos.
“I’m Mikey, and this is Reid, Colter, Jake and Hayden.” Mikey pointed at all of us, but it was clear in the way his eyes never left her that he was more interested in the girl.
“Wait, no way, you’re that bull rider!” Brady’s eyes went wide as he realized who we were. “Man, that’s sick.”
“That’s me.” Mikey smirked as his eyes flitted to Brady for a split second, the comment obviously stroking his ego. But then he turned his attention back to the girl.
“Well, I’m Ava.” She winked when she noticed him staring at her. “And my friend over there who is being a total buzzkill ,” she raised her voice, “is Juniper. Brady’s her boyfriend.”
The blonde, Juniper, finally walked over. Without acknowledging any of us, other than a pointed glare, she grabbed her boyfriend despite his protests and they left to go sit at a closer table.
Everyone except Mikey and Ava exchanged glances with one another at Juniper’s lack of response to us .
I shrugged when Jake gave me a look that said, “ Kinda rude.”
Any thoughts of Ava’s friend went out the window when Mikey chimed in again. “So, what’s a pretty girl like you doing in a place like this?”
I almost choked on my beer at Mikey’s sad attempt at a pickup line, the other guys having a similar reaction.
“We go to school at SGU. Going to be seniors.” She tilted her head confidently, as though she was proud of the fact she was old enough to be in the bar. “Well, June is graduating in the fall, but Brady and I aren’t as smart as her.” She giggled as she tucked a strand of hair behind her ear.
“She can’t be older than twenty-one, can she?” Hayden whispered to me as I zoned out the rest of their conversation.
I rolled my eyes. “Probably not, but you know Mikey.”
Age hadn’t stopped him before. A nine-year difference was nothing to him. They were all flings anyway, a one-night rodeo, you could say.
A few moments later, Mikey pulled Ava out onto the dance floor, one of those top-twenty pop hits playing through the speakers. Jake followed him, joining the crowd of people dancing and singing at the top of their lungs.
I took a big swig, not wanting to move from my seat. We’d already played a few games of pool, but, given it was a college bar we were at and not Rudy’s, once we left to get another round of beers, the table was immediately taken by a group of college kids.
We thought coming back to our college town for the bachelor party would be fun. Relive old times, you know? But after five years of being away, the town had changed, and so did the appeal of the bars. Even Clay, Colter’s older brother, passed on coming. But I couldn’t blame him completely. He was thirty-three and had kids of his own. Just because Mikey was thirty going on twenty-one didn’t mean everyone his age still acted like they were in college.
“Why aren’t you out there on the dance floor?” I teased Hayden, elbowing him in the ribs. Even Colter had eventually followed Jake out into the crowd, no doubt an effect of the alcohol. “Aren’t these your old stomping grounds?” While we all went to college here, Goldfinch was Hayden’s hometown.
“Why aren’t you?” he shot back with a grin.
“Touché.” I pursed my lips and gave him a nod of respect. “But, hey, I haven’t even seen you talk to any of the girls here tonight.”
Now that I thought of it, I wasn’t sure if Hayden had ever really dated anyone, at least not in the past few years. He certainly never talked about girls as much as Mikey did. I chalked it all up to him being shy, though. He had always been quiet, even in college. Not much had changed since I met him all those years ago.
He shrugged. “I don’t really want anything casual like that.” He paused, as though deep in thought. “You know, I could ask you the same thing. I feel like I already know the answer, though.”
“What do you mean?” I raised an eyebrow.
“I could have sworn there was something going on between you and Isabelle at the branding.”
If you could call me getting jealous of Landon and making a fool of myself something going on between us , then yeah. But there was a key component to that. Us. What if it was one-sided?
“We’re just friends. It’s nothing. We have been since that first NFR.” I dismissed his comment. Although, it wasn’t entirely false, was it? We’d been friends, really good friends, for the past year. It wasn’t like I still had feelings for her. Pfft. Yeah, right. Right?
Hayden didn’t say anything else to push the subject, just gave me a small nod and turned his head to look forward again.
I peered around the bar to see what the other guys were doing. Jake and Mikey were still out on the dance floor, and Colter had left to take a phone call. As my eyes scanned the room, they met a pair of brown ones.
Isa?
My heart started beating faster, but I shook away the thought. No, that’s not her.
The girl who I had made eye contact with, though, was already making her way over to the bar. She was cute, with dark-blonde hair falling to her shoulders, but I didn’t have any interest in her. The only blonde I wanted was two hundred miles away.
“Excuse me?” She tilted her head as she batted her eyelashes at me. “I saw you looking at me across the room. Figured I’d come say hi.”
Hayden gave me a curious glance as I took off my hat and stood to shake her hand, but I was just being polite.
“Hi. I’m Reid.”
“Hi, Reid. I’m Reece.” She smiled as she took my hand. Her touch was soft, but there weren’t any sparks. Not like the ones I felt with Isa.
“It’s nice to meet you.” I sat back down, not looking in her direction. I didn’t want to be rude, but I really wasn’t trying to talk to this girl. It wouldn’t be fair to her anyway. Not when someone else was taking up every bit of space in my head.
“May I sit?” She gestured to the stool beside me. I nodded, and she slid in next to me. “So, what brings you to Goldfinch?” Her eyes bore into me like a hunter looking at its prey.
“I’m here for my best friend’s bachelor party.” I took a drink of my beer, trying to seem uninterested.
“Ah, I see. Not from here, then, I take it?”
“I went to college here.” I shrugged, hoping by saying I was out of college she would deem me too old, even though she looked to be around the same age as Isabelle.
“Go Miners.” She winked. God help me.
“Listen, Reece,” I started, but she was already sliding her hand up my arm.
She rolled her eyes. “I know what you’re gonna say. You seem like a nice girl, blah, blah, blah, but I’m not interested .”
“You’re right. I’m not interested,” I told her point blank, pulling my arm way from her reach.
“Shame. Well, I hope she’s worth it, because I can think of several women in this bar who would snatch you up in an instant.” She looked me up and down before she stepped away.
She is. She’s worth waiting for, even if I have to wait a whole lifetime.
I realized Hayden was sitting there the entire time, and when I looked at him, he put his hands up as if to say, “Hey, man, gotta do what you gotta do.”
I just sighed and took a long pull off my bottle.
This is going to be a long night.
“Another round?” Jake smacked his hands on the bar top.
“Nah, man, I’m done for tonight.” I shook my head, despite continued protests from the guys. I’d already had a couple beers and some shots, and I knew my limits. “Someone’s gotta make sure you idiots stay out of trouble. In fact, Colter, bud, I think this should be your last one too.”
A stupid grin appeared on his face. “All right. If you say so.” His speech was slightly slurred, but it was his bachelor party. I knew he didn’t drink as much as he used to. He knew his limits as well as I knew mine. But sometimes, for special occasions, he would drink more and, given his lower tolerance, get drunk faster. I was just glad he was a happy drunk now and not a sad one.
I waved down the bartender for some waters, passing them out to all of the guys as the bartender slid them across the bar.
“Drink up,” I ordered as my phone buzzed on the bar top. I picked it up, thinking maybe Isa was texting me, but it was just a random social media notification. When I unlocked my phone to look, though, I tried to wipe away a drop of water on my screen, accidentally opening my call log instead.
*Isa accepted call*
Hm, that’s weird.
At some point tonight, my phone must have called her from my pocket. I just assumed she answered, realized that I called her by mistake, and immediately hung up, so I brushed it off as something not to worry about. Phones butt-dial people all the time. I was just glad I didn’t accidentally call emergency services. I didn’t need another run-in with the police, even though the ones from earlier tonight weren’t even cops .
“What’re you looking at? Someone text you?” Colter asked as he looked over my shoulder.
“Nah, I just accidentally butt-dialed Isa. It’s no big deal.”
He tipped his head up in acknowledgment as Mikey walked over to the group with the girl from earlier.
“All right, fellas, Ava here and I are going to head on out,” he announced. “I’ll see you boys in the morning.” He winked as he grabbed her hand, and they walked out of the bar.
“Suppose we should get a move on too?” Jake offered.
“I don’t see why we would have to stay any longer,” I agreed. “Colt, you good to go?”
He nodded, so we paid out our tab and headed back to the rental to close out the night.