Page 22 of Runaway Bride and Prejudice

“Why? What’s on here? Loads of blackmail material?” I realize after I ask that maybe I don’t want to know.

Van gives me a sidelong glance. “Nah. I just don’t want them all up in my business.Youcan look through whatever you want.”

I would love to snoop to my nosy heart’s content. Especially considering Drewneverlet me look at his phone.

Now, of course, I know why he didn’t. I’d like to find his phone and smash it with a sledgehammer. Then run over it. Then shove it down a garbage disposal. I try not to think at all about Becky. Because that betrayal, even if she and I weren’t ever very close, cuts deeper. You don’t do that to family.

“The passcode is ten-ten-ten.” Van’s voice shakes me free of a dark mental path and I’m glad.

“October tenth, 2010?” I ask.

“Nah,” Van says with a smirk. “It’s perfect tens. Like me.”

“Oh mygosh,” I say. “Are you for real right now?”

He totally is. I can tell by the way he’s grinning unapologetically. Smugly.

Okay, so Van has a mad case of overconfidence. He scores a perfect ten on the self-esteem scale. And, okay, fine—maybe close to ten in terms of looks. But he’s edging pretty far into cocky territory.

Today at least, I don’t mind overly confident. Or even cocky.

Maybe I just don’t mindVan. Whether it’s his protectiveness or the unapologetic way he barged into someone else’s business just to do the right thing or maybe it’s the allure of the tiny bit of ink creeping out of his shirt collar, I like him. I feel comfortable and safe around him, like we’ve known each other for years.

A strange reality, but there it is.

“You’ve got a whole lot of missed texts,” I tell him. “What’s the Dream Team?”

“Ah,” he says. “That’s a group text with some of the guys. A reporter called our line that once and it stuck.”

“Yourline?”

He laughs. “You really don’t know hockey, huh—even with your dad as a coach?”

“I really don’t know hockey.”

“A line is the guys you’re usually out on the ice with. Technically, my line is only offense with Logan and Eli, but the Dream Team is all the guys who start: Alec and Nathan on defense and Felix in the goal. We also just added two new guys to the thread: Camden and Wyatt.”

“Okay, well, they’re still blowing up your phone.” Texts are coming through even while the phone’s in my hand. Too fast for me to even read them.

Though I’d like to.

“Can you mute the conversation? They won’t stop anytime soon.”

I do, catching only a glimpse of texts asking Van if he ran off with the bride and if he thinks this will get him his starting spot back. Did he lose his starting spot? Another question I wonder but don’t ask.

I tap in Morgan’s number, one of the only ones I’ve got memorized. Before I call my dad, I need some intel. I can only hope she answers. I never pick up when it’s numbers I don’t know. Despite putting myself on a Do Not Call list, I get daily calls asking me to donate to all kinds of things or scammers telling me I have a computer virus and need to download their software.

“Hello?” she says, sounding slightly breathless.

“It’s me. I’m on Van’s phone.”

“Oh, hey, Julia.”

I wrinkle my nose. “Julia? It’s me, Amelia.”

“I meant Julia Roberts, a laRunaway Bride,” Morgan says. “Too soon?”

I laugh. “No. It’s fine. The shoe fits, I guess.”

---