Page 34 of Cold Foot Curse

“Fine. Are you coming out with us tonight?”

“Coming out where?” he asked distractedly as he waited for the next set of emojis from Jess.

“Guys night!” Cash griped. “Come on, man, I’ve been telling you about it for two days. And I know King mentioned it to you too. And Wreck!”

“Oh. Oh yeah. Sure. Where is it again?”

“The address is literally in the group text.”

“Fine, fine, I’ll probably stop by.”

“Don’t stand me up,” Cash said as he walked out.

Kade narrowed his eyes at the door as it swung closed. He yanked it open and poked his head outside, then called after Cash, “You better not bring those matching fanny packs. I’m not wearing one.”

“It has our initials embroidered on them,” was Cash’s response.

Kade gritted his teeth and ducked back into the bathroom to check his phone. Jess had sent a picture of a half a pizza smothered in sliced tomatoes, and then an innocent angel emoji. Gross, but he would still eat it just for the excuse to drop by.

“Kade!” Tommy yelled from outside the door.

Crap.Got to get back to work. I’ll stop by after I get out to finish off that pizza.Send. On a whim, Kade leaned over in front of the mirror, and held up his phone to take a picture of himself with his shirt lifted and his six-pack flexed, but then shook his head hard, let his shirt fall back down and said, “Nope.” He was not taking flirting advice from Cash.

He and Jess were just friends.

Friends with no strings attached. No contract. No Promise.

Friends who asked for advice on each other, and waited on each other’s texts, and bought each other pizza.

Friendzone buddies—nothing more, nothing less.

Chapter Nine

“Relieved?” Raynah asked.

“I don’t even know what I feel,” she admitted as she tucked her phone into her purse. “Excited maybe?”

“Did he say why he hasn’t been talking to you?”

“He said he was waiting on me to text him.” She thought about it. “Hewasencouraging me to take alone time and figure things out.”

“Two days is a lot of alone time,” Raynah pointed out. “I wouldn’t know what to do if I had two days to myself. I’ve been away from Breah for a couple hours and I’m already missing her like crazy.”

“You should’ve brought her.”

“It’s Garret’s day off. He does this thing where he takes her to lunch every week and calls it dad-daughter-date, because he’s convinced if he spends that quality time with her, she will expect the moon out of a man when she grows up, and won’t settle for scraps.”

“That’s actually amazing,” Jess said, a little emotional. She wished her dad had done that for her. Maybe things would’ve ended up differently. Garret cared about his daughter and already anticipated her future. Good dad.

“Yep, and then tomorrow night he will ask one of the Crew to watch Breah so we can get a date night just the two of us. He feels like it’s important for us to get grown up time where he can spoil me.”

“Any tips on how to secure a dream man like that?”

“Girl, I don’t even know. I’m messy, but he handles it easily. I think it’s just got to be the right match, and things are easier.” She gestured to her pizza, all boxed up. “Are you ready to go?”

“Kind of. I’ve had fun hanging out with you. Thank you for calling and checking on me, and for inviting me out. I haven’t just gone out with someone for fun in…I don’t even know how long. We only go out with purpose in Sister’s Edge.”

“Well in Wreck’s Mountains, we will create purposes to go out,” Raynah said with a laugh. “I think the boys are doing guy’s night out at some local bar none of us has been to tonight.” She shrugged. “Just because they are all dudes wanting to hang out without us, I guess. They’ll be bored in ten minutes. We have a bet going on how long it’ll be before they call one of us and ask us to come out.”

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