Page 90 of The Darkness Within

How does that match?

“You gonna spill the beans, Ken, or what?” Nacho asks.

“What beans?”

“About your honeymoon,” Tex clarifies.

“It wasn’t a honeymoon,” I say, but I’ll be damned if I don’t feel heat rise to my cheeks, and it’s not from the sun. I shift my weight, making the cheap lawn chair creak.

“Whatever you wanna call it, you still gotta tell us about it.”

“I don’t have to tell you shit, Tex.”

“Trust me, it’s worse if you let me fill in the details with my own imagination.”

He’s probably right. “What do you think happened?”

“What I think, what I know,” he stresses, “is that the two of you were pining for each other’s dicks when you left and you don’t look like you’re pining anymore, which means you either got over it or you got on it. Do you want to guess which one I’m going with?”

Fucker. I refuse to let him think he has the upper hand here. “Well, I guess you got it all figured out then, Barbie.”

“Not you, too,” he whines.

“Are you happy?” Nacho asks. “That’s really all that matters.”

My smile is genuine. I feel it all the way down in my soul. “Yeah, I’m happy.”

“I’ll drink to that,” Nacho cheers, popping open a fresh can of Fanta.

“You got soft on me while you were gone,” Riggs taunts. “Pick up the pace, Sommers!”

“Soft? I hiked miles! Christ, we walked all over Asheville. My leg’s killing me.”

“Not as much as it’s gonna be if you don’t catch up to McCormick and Wardell,” he warns. “They’ve each got one leg, for fuck’s sake. If you can’t beat them, you’ll be swimming extra laps until the sun sets.”

Wonderful. I hold my breath and push off from the wall, slicing my arms through the water. When I surface on the other end of the pool, the guys are already deep in conversation about me. Did I say conversation? More like speculation.

“Wonder what made him lose his edge?”

“Yeah, it really shoots Riggs’s theory about your sex drive being a great motivator, doesn’t it?”

“Unless…his appetite has been sated, in which case…” McCormick bends his finger down slowly, to emulate an erection going soft. He makes a dying whistling sound and then… “Poof,” he says, mimicking an explosion.

Asshole. I thwack him hard on his back. Too hard. “What’s the matter, Hot Dog, did you swallow too much chlorinated pool water?”

“No, I wasn’t choking,” he plays along, knowing damn well I didn’t think he was choking. “I was showing West an example of your dick, I mean your sex-drive,” he hastily corrects, “going soft.”

McCormick has no idea I suffer from limp-dick, so I can’t be offended. He’s just joking, trying to be clever about my weekend getaway with Brewer. Was there anyone who didn’t know? Fuck.

“Oh, I get it. No wonder you’re the fastest swimmer,” I tease with a wink. “How long’s it been, four months? Five?” He splashes me in the face and takes off for the other end of the pool.

“Nice,” West laughs. “It’s been almost six,” he clarifies before taking off.

The Bitches’ bullshit continues in the locker room, and then down the hall as we head towards group.

“Where’s Brewer?” Jax asks, making a show of looking all around me and behind me.

“In his office, I guess. Why?”

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