Page 112 of Love Collided

“What?”

She pulled out her headphones and looked at me, the hint of a cocky grin on her face making me smile.

“I said, gummy worm.”

I finally laughed, realizing what she meant. “That is not the way it’s supposed to be used.”

“It’s my word. I can use it however I want.”

“Fine,” I said, laughing as I moved. “Can I at least sit across from you?”

“Fine,but no staring.”

There was no way I wasn’t going to stare. Her hair was back into two long braids, and today, she had makeup on, the sparkling brown making the hazel of her eyes stand out more. She also had a little ring in her nose, which was new.

“Is that a new piercing?”

“Chase, I don’t want to talk right now.” She looked around at the crew quickly. “Maybe later, but definitely not now. And no, it’s fake. I just thought it was cute.”

“I’ll take later if that’s the only option I have. And you’re right. It’s very cute.”

Her cheeks turned the lightest shade of red as she put her headphones back in and looked down at her phone.

Later.

Later was a hell of a lot better than never.

It was already darkout when the plane landed, and we settled into the hotel. I was sharing a room with Kye, which I didn’t mind, and Scout was happy because that meant she got her own room.

After spending a few hours on the strip, everyone headed to a club Ash found to celebrate Scout’s races, along with Ransom and Quinn.

We walked in, and I tried to stop Scout again, but she was brushing me off for the hundredth time today.

“Scout, please, I need to talk to you.”

She spun to face me, her eyes narrowed, and lips pulled into a frown. “Why?”

“Because we need to fix this, and I don’t want to keep going through this weekend pretending nothing happened.”

“We aren’t pretending nothing happened. We are doing exactly what we should be doing aftermanythings happened, and we agreed not to let them happen anymore.”

The crew had disappeared into the club, and she looked ready to bolt inside, too.

“But I want them to happen more. I don’t want this to be over just because of that fucking party.”

“It wasn’t that party,” she said, nearly yelling. “It’s that this won’t go anywhere else. I don’t want it to, and neither do you. We aren’t together, Chase. You can do whatever or whoever you want.”

“There is no one else.”

“I was recently introduced to yourfiancé,so I beg to differ.”

“You know that was all bullshit from my dad.”

“Either way. My point still stands.”

“So that’s it? You aren’t even going to give me a chance to talk about what happened or tell you.”

“We have nothing to talk about. Just go do whatever. There’s a club full of girls here. Plenty of them will blend into your life better than I would.”

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