Page 83 of Forgotten Pieces

I want to call Cam. But after our last conversation she will probably fly down here just to skin me alive for even considering the idea of Ryder and I together again.

Besides, Laney is coming over later today and she seems to be a little less crazy about the whole situation than Cam is.

I hear a knock on my door. I look over at the clock and see it’s already five in the afternoon. I look down at my outfit and I am still in my pajamas. In fact, I think it’s the same pajamas I’ve had on since I got home yesterday.

“It’s open,” I yell as I go to pick up the dishes I left on the coffee table.

“Why are you not dressed?” Laney asks me.

“Happy Birthday to you.”

Her hands fly to her chest. “Oh my goodness, what I have always wanted! Tacoma with dirty hair in her pajamas!”

I roll my eyes at her as I grab the gift I got her a few days ago.

“You didn’t need to get me anything.”

“I know but I thought you would need this since you are over Mac and all,” I joke. She says she is over him but she clearly isn’t. In fact, we are meeting him at the only restaurant in town for her birthday dinner.

She sticks her hand into the glittery bag and pulls out a gigantic black vibrator. “You got me a dick?”

“Comes in real handy.” I laugh.

She throws it at me and I dodge it. “You are the grossest person ever. Now go put dry shampoo in your hair and shave your pits. I don’t want some dirty hippie as my date tonight.”

“Isn’t that why Mac is invited?”

She mocks me. “Well, just so you know I told him to bring Ryder. Guy needs to hang out with people other than himself.”

I go still at her comment.

“Ah ha. I knew it. You have been hanging out with him.”

I walk toward my bedroom. I thought I wanted to talk to her about this but now I am not so sure. “Here and there when he’s at the bar,” I shout before slamming the door shut.

It doesn’t keep her out.

“Anything interesting happen between you two?”

I could deny everything but I know that won’t do me any good. “Where do you want me to start? How we kissed a week ago? Or how about how I fell asleep in his arms two nights ago by mistake? Or how the next day he told me he wanted us to try to be together. That he would leave his fiancée.”

Laney gapes at me. “Wait, rewind.”

I throw on a black tank and a tight pair of ripped jeans, pulling the tight material over my ass. “You heard me.”

Laney sits on the bed, opening and closing her mouth a few times. “Are you sure you aren’t bullshitting me?”

“Positive,” I say as I walk into the bathroom and use half a can of dry shampoo on my head to clean it up and give some volume.

She follows me into the bathroom and sits on the toilet. “What are you going to do?”

I throw some bronzer on and curl my lashes. “No fucking clue. I can’t fathom the idea of Ryder and Tacoma. It’s like some fairytale. It can never happen.” I coat my lashes in mascara. “But the dream that it could be real. Gosh, Laney, I would kill for it. We were soulmates. I am sure of it. And it didn’t take long for our connection to return. It was like lightning.”

“This all sounds like trouble.”

“No shit.”

“But I also know that you were the happiest you’ve ever been when you were with him before.”

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