Page 10 of The Rogue

He headed down the highway, and Rue pulled out her folder, leafing through some of her pictures. “You’re nice,” she said. “Consistently. Fantastically. You are also a rake. A rogue. And I like that about you. Iexpectit about you. I actually told you to be there a whole half hour earlier than I needed you to be.”

“Treacherous,” he said, but he didn’t seem mad.

He was never mad at her.

She was never mad at him either, regardless of what a hard time she sometimes gave him.

The truth was, she admired Justice. Not in a way that made her want to emulate him. But the way he lived his life was just strangely commendable to her.

Her parents had been chaotic, but they hadhurtpeople with it. They had hurt her with it. They had gone around using sex as a weapon, acting unhinged in their attraction for each other. Justice didn’t do that. He was promiscuous, putting it mildly, but he always seemed to treat everybody that he encountered with respect. Especially the women that he slept with. He neverplayed games with them. He never hurt them. He was scrupulous in his misbehavior, and it was a revelation to her that such a thing could occur. She had only ever seen this kind of behavior as a sort of walking DUI. A potential hazard to all and everyone around them. Until him.

“I’m going to throw you a bachelorette party,” he said suddenly.

“Oh, I don’t need anything like that.”

“Don’t look scandalized, Rue. We’ll have a party at King’s Crest the night before the wedding. It’ll be great.”

“Asher will be back in town.”

“I know. But are you really going to spend the night before your wedding with the guy? You’re going to spend the rest of your life with him.”

“A fair point,” she said. “But I don’t know. Doesn’t it seem...?”

“Doesn’t seem traditional to fuck your groom the nightbeforeyour wedding night.”

“Justice,”she said, sounding scandalized. She could see that he loved it.

Rue felt a strange pang in her stomach. She didn’t care for it. She did not... They did not... It wasn’t like that. And hearing Justice call it all wrong like that made her feel tetchy.

“I’m just saying. You have the rest of your life with the guy. You oughtta spend your last night of freedom getting silly with your best friend.”

It warmed her, she decided, that Justice cared like that. Which had to be the pang. And he was right. It wastraditionalto spend the night away from the groom. There was definitely something about that which appealed to her.

“Okay,” she said. “I will submit to your bachelorette party. But no strippers.”

“Oh damn,” he said. “I was really looking forward to it.”

He looked both innocent and devilish at the same time. A Justice King special.

“I don’t even know what to make of that,” she said.

“I’m messing with you. You know I would never. It’s not you. Your wedding is about you. Not me.”

It did feel so extraordinarily lucky to have a friend like him. When they arrived at the florist, he looked vaguely overwhelmed by the intensity of the blooms around them. But he sat quietly and attentively the entire meeting and it reminded her a whole lot of watching him in school. Restless energy pouring through him while he tried to sit and listen. Absently, she touched the top of his hand. He went still.

“It’s nice that you’re involving the groom,” the florist said.

They both jumped, and Rue put her hand back in her lap.

“Oh,” she said. “He’s not the groom. He’s my best man. My man of honor. He’s my... He’s my best friend.”

“Oh,” the woman said, looking surprised. “I’m sorry. I assumed.”

Well, Rue supposed she couldn’t blame her. It was probably weird for a bride to walk into the shop with a man she was not related to—and who was absolutely gorgeous—and have him not be the groom.

She didn’t touch him again, though.

She had known him forever.

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