Page 21 of Rules, Roses, and Rivals
“Because of that bitch Rachel.” Archie paced over to the drink fridge in the corner bar. He pulled out a soda and unscrewed the cap. “She told her we’d blocked everyone who ever wanted to date her.”
“Shedidn’twant todate.”If Jake spit the words out any harder, I was pretty sure they would catch fire.
“I’m aware.” Archie took a long drink. “That was why she stopped talking to us. She believed Rachel. She believed her and then she went to San Antonio and this guy makes moves on her.”
“To be fair,” I said, already aware that I was going to get some shitty looks. “We did make sure some guys didn’t ask her out.”
“No,” Jake countered. “We made sure the dickweeds left her alone. If she doesn’t want to date, she doesn’t need to deal with assholes chasing her. Besides, most of them just wanted to nail some ass, it had nothing to do with her.”
While he wasn’t wrong, I couldn’t escape the fact that we had made sure that the guys at school left her alone. Jake handled most of it. Archie had some. If anyone got really persistent, well… We all dealt with it and that was that.
“She’s pissed about us dating too,” Coop volunteered.
“Since when?” Jake scowled.
“She mentioned that,” Archie admitted and I studied him. He was staring at his drink, as if he could decipher the answers from the bottle’s ingredients. “But she never cared before. Just reminded me that she’d always been supportive of us dating.”
He chewed the words like they left a rotten taste in his mouth and he had to talk around them. Arms folded, I leaned against the side of the sofa. “What else did she say?”
Archie shook his head. “She’s just mad. We can fix this, we just need to get rid of him. If she wants to date, we can do that too.”
“Has it occurred to you that maybe she didn’t want to dateus?” I hated the idea. I hated even bringing it up. But here we were. “It’s not like we haven’t all asked.”
Archie might have been the last to roll into our friend group in freshman year, but he’d been interested in her from day one. We all told him she didn’t date, but it hadn’t deterred him.
If anything, he seemed to relish the challenge. Admittedly, I’d watched his attempts in both amusement and fascination. One, he didn’t give up, and two, she just didn’t respond like the other girls did. Even when he invited her directly, she always made sure to include all of us.
The fact she didn’t respond any differently whether it was Coop whom she’d known the longest or Archie just after we’d all met him, said a lot. She wasn’t into guys. If one of the girls tagged along, she always seemed fine with it.
The first time I asked out Sharon, I swore Frankie had her fingers crossed for me. I wasn’t even sure how she’d known I asked in the first place, but she’d been enthusiastic.
“No,” Archie said bluntly. “That didn’t occur to me. We’re her best friends. We’ve always looked out for her. You guys did before I got here and I’ve been invested since the day I met her.”
That was one description for it.
“I’m not giving up now.” Like he needed to declare that? Still, Archie lifted his chin. “The only question I have is, are you all in or out?”
“In,” Jake said without hesitation. Coop answered half a beat later, but with more skepticism to salt his enthusiasm. When they looked at me, I had a hard time doing more than shrugging.
“I’m not out, but I’m not going to sign off on hurting the guy to get rid of him, especially if it hurts Frankie.” I had a hard line and that was it. I also wanted totalkto her. Needed to find out what we missed or if we’re all just off base.
“We all care,” Jake reminded me. “Let’s not forget that.”
“No one has forgotten, Jake,” Coop said with a sigh.
“Except Frankie,” Archie admitted. “She doesn’t seem to think we do.”
That… Yeah, on that, I didn’t disagree, we needed to fix that.
Chapter
Ten
FRANKIE
The whole drive home, I fought the urge to sob. The fact they could piss me off so badly and I could practically vibrate with anger, yet I still wanted to cry was unfair. It was also so damn frustrating.
I was still sniffling when I pulled into my parking slot at the apartments. The sun beat down with a vengeance, the heat slapping me as soon as I opened the car door. It followed me all the way into the apartment with my backpack.
