Page 158 of They Break Beauty

Mason: Do you have to be so crass?

Colt: You know you love it. You’re just pissed because it’s making your dick hard while you’re in your mock trial thingy.

Mason: Fuck, Colt.

Colt: LMFAO. Wanna step out and I’ll give you some relief?

Mason: Stop.

Levi: Save it for later tonight once Brianna is done with her fair-weather friend.

What the hell?

Colt: What’s up your ass, brother?

Brianna: Seconded. You don’t care for Chloe?

Levi: I don’t care for her screwing you around and getting your hopes up about coming back.

Brianna: I’m a big girl.

Levi: Still don’t want you hurt.

Mason: Let’s tone it down. Bree, have fun with your friend. We’ll come by later and I’ll make sure Lev is in a better mood.

Colt: Me too. I’ll cheer him up.

Brianna: Thanks. TTYL. Get back to your stuff.

We finished texting and I pocketed my phone and settled into eating my sandwich, pushing Levi’s strange reaction to the background and focusing on the fact that I’d get to finally see Chloe again tonight.

“I was surprised when you wanted to meet over coffee, not booze or hard liquor,” I said, eyeing Chloe across from me in the little coffee shop in downtown Stonewell.

Her short purple hair was striking against the black lace dress she had on that was held together with safety pins and what appeared to be buckles. A pair of silver, shimmering denim boots added an extra edge to her look.

“Not exactly my preference, but my mom is sending two movers down early tomorrow to pack my stuff up for me so I can’t exactly be hungover and useless.”

I choked on my sip of coffee. “What? This isn’t you actually being back then? You’re really done here?”

She smiled sadly. “Yeah, I am. I tried everything, but her mind was made up.”

“Jeez,” I groused. “It’s not the way I thought it would go, especially with the spotlight on your designs that we were able to get for you all over social media.”

“That was the sweetest, so thank you. Thank you so much for trying for me, Bree. But my mom just turned that around, citing that I’d been noticed by fashion influencers and a couple of designers looking for fresh talent, so I needed to capitalize on it by attending the hoity-toity design school in the city.”

“Shit. I’m so sorry, Chloe.”

She shrugged, clearly resigned. “It is what it is.” Laying her hand on mine, she told me, “I swear we’ll keep in contact. Much better than I have been at it too, once I get settled. We can visit each other too. We won’t lose our friendship.”

“I’ll make sure of it.”

“I know you will. You’re cool like that. Caring too. You’ve got a lot of that to go around.” She winked. “Enough to give to three guys.”

I chuckled. “Yeah, that came about completely unplanned.”

“I always thought those three were nightmares walking. Well, except for Colton. Are they nice beneath the hard surface then? Like, actually human, after all?”

“They are with me, yeah. We mesh well together somehow.”

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