“Good call on the paintball. I needed to de-stress after this week,” Nicki says, stretching out her arms, her rental gun on the ground beside her feet. She’s always loosening her muscles. In full-length black pants and a black turtleneck stretched over her strong frame, she doesn’t really fit my idea of a social worker who helps troubled teens, but I’ll bet she’s better than most at it.
I went with my usual garb—camouflage pants and a matching long-sleeved shirt. It’s loose and I definitely don’t look appealing, but this is paintball. If you come here to look good, you’re an idiot. And you leave with welts. “Where is Lina and this mystery guy of hers?” I mutter. “It’s going to get hot out here if we wait too much longer.” I’m not stepping off these grounds until I’ve unloaded at least one hopper on Caroline.
“Good question. Lina’s never late,” Nicki agrees. “And you’re always late. I can’t believe you were waiting on the doorstep for me when I pulled into your driveway.”
“Just trying to be considerate.” I decided not to ride my bike here today. Too conspicuous. I’d rather Caroline and Jared don’t see me coming until it’s too late. “And I guess I could use some de-stressing, too.”
“Yeah, you’ve had a rough week, with the universe hating you and all,” she says with sympathy in her eyes. I filled Nicki in on the car ride over about the whole Ben thing and about Jared and Caroline being in the city. Of my two best friends, Nicki is probably the easier to talk to. She asks questions while recognizing my unspoken feelings. She’s also a better listener than Lina. Lina just tells you what she thinks, flat out, without tempering it with even a hint of grace.
Of course, no one knows that Caroline and Jared will be here today. That’s just a bit too much honesty.
“Well, look who finally graced us with her presence!” Nicki exclaims, throwing her arms up in mock exasperation. I don’t miss the strained smile and shifty-eyed glance toward me, though I don’t understand why.
The second I turn around, I do.
“Mason?” I feel my face bunch up in a tight scowl. “What are you—”
It suddenly clicks.
“Oh my God!” I gasp out loud as my best friend steps forward to loop her arm through his, almost as if to keep him in place. “Remember, I’m your friend and you love me,” Lina states matter-of-factly. I simply stare as she announces, “Mason and I are dating.”
What? What! I look from her to Mason—who’s eyeing the paintball gun dangling in my fingers—and back to her. “Seriously? You’re having sex with my stepbrother?” I can’t help but cringe.
“I said we’re dating.”
I glare at Mason’s beet-red face. All I see is a gangly kid with thick glasses, who loves Jeopardy and bitches at me about leaving gobs of toothpaste in the sink. If she’s not sleeping with him, then he may still be a virgin. I hope she’s not expecting great sex again for a long time.
Mason and Lina? But . . . But . . . “He wears old-man pajamas!” I cry out, as if Mason’s two-piece striped, collared, button-down sleepwear—with pockets—explains everything.
Lina tucks her short blond bob behind one ear, her face calm and composed, as though she expected this reaction from me. “He’s smart, cute, and nice. Don’t be a bitch.”
I’m fully aware that I am being a bitch, so I don’t take offense. Plus, I’m still in shock. My best friend is dating my childhood nemesis? “But . . . how?”
Lina’s arms fold over her chest. “I was going to tell you over dinner but you bailed on us, too busy working.” Gray eyes dissect me as Lina lays that well-timed guilt trip on me.
“But . . . how?” I ask again.
“Remember when we came by your house to borrow some tools from Jack?”
I nod. It was the weekend Nicki and Lina moved down. They needed a hammer and a drill. I was busy studying for my final exam that following Monday, so I couldn’t help.
“Mason offered to come by and help us.”
“Does Mason even know how to use a drill?”
“Yes, Mason knows how to use a drill,” Mason responds in an annoyed tone at the same time that Lina admits, “No.”
His eyes flash to her as she shrugs. “You really don’t, babe.” As if to temper the blow to his ego, she leans in and kisses his cheek, leaving me gaping like a wide-mouthed bass. Nicki’s too busy muffling her snorting laughter with her hand to say anything.
“Anyway . . . he spent the day trying to help us out”—Mason rolls his eyes at that—“and then I took him out to dinner as a thank you. After that, we started chatting over Facebook, and . . .”
“Fucking Facebook. The enabler of mutiny,” I growl under my breath.
“. . . he asked me out to the movies and dinner,” Lina ends. “We didn’t tell you right away because we wanted to make sure it’d be worth dealing with your inevitable fit, first.”
“And?” I eye the two of them, the resignation clear in my voice because I already know the answer to that, given we’re standing here right now.
“And you can go out there and shoot your best friend and stepbrother to your heart’s content. After that, not a word. Got it?” Lina scolds.
Technically, I can’t because they’ll be on my team, but . . . I lift my gun in the air. “Fine. Can we go? Or are there any other surprises for me today?”
A set of strong arms ropes around my body, pinning mine to my chest as I’m lifted off the ground, a clean, sporty smell filling my nostrils. “So this is what you ditched me for?”
Chapter 12
BEN
“Good morning, sunshine!” I plaster on a wide smile as I drop Reese back down to the ground and watch her whip around, a mixture of surprise and irritation on her face.
“What are you doing here?”
I gesture down to my worn jeans and a crappy gray shirt. “Giving you a chance to get even with me for laughing at you.”
Those caramel eyes flash, as if afraid that I’ll elaborate. I step back a bit as she marches toward me, wondering if I should stop grinning like an idiot and protect myself against an imminent throat punch. “I mean, how did you know I’d be here?”
I jut my chin in Mason’s direction. “After you bailed on me over text last night—really lame, by the way—I called Mason to kick your ass. He was over at your friend’s place and told me what was going on. So . . .” I shrug and then offer her a smug smile. “Here I am. I figure we can head back to the office together after.” Not waiting for her response—because I’ll throw her over my shoulder and carry her stubborn little body to my car if I have to—I call out to Mason, “Is this the one you were givin’ it to last night? If so,” I nod once, “nicely done.”
Mason’s face bursts with color as he tries to keep the small, proud smile from stretching out across his lips. Good for him. The guy needs to get laid on a regular basis. And the girl—I recognize her as the non-Korean Korean friend of Reese’s—is girl-next-door cute. “Hey! Long time no see!”
“You actually remember me?” The girl’s tone is flat and thick with doubt.
“I don’t forget a pretty face, darlin’.”
“Cheesy” Reese mutters, skewering me with a strange look. “That’s Lina and this is Nicki, since I’m sure you don’t remember the names that go along with those unforgettable faces.”
I open my mouth but falter as it clicks. So . . . that’s what jealousy looks like on Reese. “Didn’t you give me fake names?”
Reese’s face twists up as the girl to her right, the one who looks like she could give me a good run for my money in an arm wrestle, bursts out in laughter. “That’s right. We were Charlie’s Angels that night.”
Reese, on the other hand, isn’t smiling. “Traitors. The lot of you!” She yanks her mask on, spins around, and marches toward the field entrance like she’s on a mission.
And I watch her cute camouflaged ass the entire time, knowing that at least one of those paint bullets has my name on it.
“I haven’t done this since I was, like, fifteen,” I say as the five of us pick our path through the wooded terrain, my eyes peeled for our opponents. There are several teams playing at once today and we—the purple team, as picked by Reese—are hunting anyone with a thick red band on their arm.
How fitting.
We’ve shot four already, with no casualties on our side as of yet. “This place is great,” Nicki purrs in a soft voice. “They could do a whole Hunger Games theme.”
She’s right, they could. It’s like an arena out here—the forest is thick enough, and the ground cover high enough, to create the perfect hunting ground. They even have small outpost buildings scattered throughout. I wish I had known about this place sooner. I’ll have to bring Nate and the guys here for a game. Maybe even Kacey.
“Too bad you’re not allowed to climb the trees,” I murmur with a head shake as I watch Reese wrap her arms around a tree branch and start pulling herself up. Handing my gun to Mason, I hook an arm around her small waist and yank her down just as she’s about to throw her leg over it. “I have a feeling you’re worse with following rules than I am.”
She answers by spinning around to train that gun of hers on my chest. “I’m also not against shooting my own team members.”
I chuckle, pushing it away. I know she’s telling the truth. “You want to get kicked out of the game? Because there are refs everywhere here.” The playing field is so big, they ride around on ATVs.
“I was merely trying to get a better—”
Her words are cut off by the clicking sound of a semiautomatic gun and bursts of paint splatters nearby.
“Take cover!” Mason’s girlfriend, Lina, shouts, oddly enough sounding like a soldier as she bolts, running for the small shack about twenty feet away. We’re all tight on her heels, diving into it as the assault continues. Mason’s howl just as he rounds the corner to protection tells us we have our first casualty. Lina spins him around to confirm the big blue splatter on the back of his tidy plaid shirt. “Yup, you’re dead.”
“That hurt,” he complains.
I hear a fake cough muffling a “Sissy” coming from Reese as she peeks out the small window, followed by a soft punch in the shoulder from her friend Nicki.
“What do I do now?” Mason asks, ignoring his stepsister.
Someone outside answers for us. “Guy in the plaid shirt! We know you’re hit! Don’t be a cheater and try to wipe off the paint!” he yells.
“I’m not cheating!” Mason exclaims with indignation. “I don’t cheat!”
“Yeah, whatever,” comes the lazy reply. “Come out where we can see you with your hands up!”
“There’s some real wackos around here,” Nicki mutters, sticking the nose of her gun through the hole to shoot a few rounds out.
“I guess I’ll wait for you guys at the front,” Mason mutters, stripping off his purple band and heading out, his head hung a little. I actually think he was having fun. Plus, being the first one shot down in a group of girls probably hit his ego a little.
“Don’t worry. I’ll take care of the ladies for you,” I announce, stretching my arms out to reach around all three women as we watch Mason trudge down the path through the tiny window, toward the group, his purple band held out in surrender.
And that’s when all of them let loose, paint pelting the skinny guy as he lifts his arms, trying to protect his chest from the sting of being that close.
“Those motherfuckers!” Lina screeches, elbowing me out of the way as she tears out of the hut with Nicki trailing her, guns out and firing ahead of them in a manic “banzai!” charge, yelling at the stop of their lungs while Reese and I watch from the safety of our hut.
When it’s all done about twenty seconds later, all four male opponents and both Nicki and Lina are out of the game.
And Mason is covered in paint from head to toe.
“Poor f**ker,” I chuckle. “I guess she must really like him.”
“No, that’s Lina. It’s inevitable that she goes kamikaze at some point. I’m surprised she lasted this long.”
“Go win for us!” Nicki shouts with a wave. “We’ll wait for you at the gate.”
Reese sighs, shoving my arm off her shoulder. “Well, this isn’t going to be a long game.”
“We could always hide out in here for a while. Regroup. ” I smile, taking in her cute little camouflage outfit. The pants are tight around her ass, making it look all the more round and appealing.
Her mask shifts as she shakes her head. “Even though I can’t see your face, I know you’re checking me out.”