right arm instinctively wound around her, his gloved hand holding her lower back, while his left hand cupped her soft cheek and he managed to drag the one kiss into two.
Go big or go home, right?
“Enough!” Nick bellowed over a laugh. “You guys are as bad as Carter and Regan.”
Ellie pulled back, swallowed hard, and licked her lips, but all Brett could do was stand there staring after her as she hopped on her bike and rode away.
He shouldn’t have done that, but it sure made it a hell of a lot easier to act his way through the next few minutes.
“Damn, buddy,” Nick laughed. “I thought something was up last week at practice, when you looked all glazed over, but this? Shit. Not in a million years did I see this coming. What the hell happened?”
Brett sputtered over a breath, scrambling for an answer and coming up empty. Maybe he should follow Ellie’s lead and go with the truth whenever he could.
“I don’t even know. One second she’s standing there on the side of the road calling me Poncherello, and the next all I could think about was how much I wanted to kiss her.”
The parking lot echoed with Nick’s and Carter’s loud, deep laughs.
“Okay,” Carter snorted. “First off, has she ever even seen an episode of CHiPs? ’Cause you’re way more Baker than Ponch.”
“Right?”
“And second, you should’ve just kissed her right then and there.”
Nick choked. “Yeah, right—can you imagine what she would’ve done to him if he’d tried that? Like, ‘Hey, Ellie, I’m going to revoke your license, and since we’re here and all, I’m just going to go ahead and plant a big wet one on you.’ ”
The whole time Nick spoke, Carter stood there shaking his head.
“How are we even related?” he asked, grinning at Nick, then turning to Brett. “If it’s the right chick, you don’t have to ask if you can kiss her—you just do it. And if you do it right the first time, that’s all it takes, am I right?”
Still a little dazed, Brett slumped down on the bumper next to Nick, who handed him a bottle of water still dripping from the cooler.
“It was all her,” he said. “She kissed me first.”
“Even better! Takes all the pressure off, doesn’t it?”
Brett just nodded as he chugged down half the bottle while the other two stood there grinning and shaking their heads.
“Still don’t think I’d have believed it if I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes,” Carter said. “I mean, shit, man…Ellie?”
Brett pulled the bottle down and wiped his mouth, but before he could say anything, Nick piped up.
“What’s going on with her and that Kurt guy, anyway?”
“He hasn’t made contact with her since last week, but he’s still hanging around.”
“Have you seen him?”
“Not for a few days. You guys talked to him—what was he like?”
They both shrugged; then Carter sniffed in disgust.
“Punk-ass piece of shit. One of those slimeballs who thinks he’s got it going on because he’s got his toe right up on the line but he’s not crossing it.”
“Exactly,” Nick agreed. “You don’t even have to listen to him—just looking at him you know you’re going to hate him.”
“Doesn’t it drive you crazy?”
“What’s that?” Brett asked. There were a few things about all of this that were driving him crazy, so Carter was going to need to be a little more specific.
“Having Tory work this instead of you? I don’t know how you do it, man. I’d go hunt the little shit down and kick his ass.” His grin returned. “Course, I’d take you two with me, just in case.”
“I lay one hand on him and the whole case goes for shit.” He took another swig of water, then recapped the bottle. “Hudak’s got this. She might not be Ellie’s biggest fan, but she’ll get the job done.”
When Nick’s phone buzzed, he’d barely started reading the text before he nodded. “Jayne’s making dinner, if you guys want to come over.”
“Thanks,” Carter laughed, lifting his eyes up from his own phone. “But Red’s got nothin’ on, so don’t you guys even think about coming over. Damn, you’re my ride. Let’s go. Double-time it.”
“Brett?”
“Uh, yeah, sure. I’ll just run home and shower first.”
“Yeah, great, whatever,” Carter muttered, waving his hands like he could make Nick move faster. “Let’s go! Oh, forget it, gimme your keys.”
Nick barely had his keys out before Carter grabbed them and jumped behind the wheel.
“Watch out,” Brett warned. “They’ve got radar set up by the lights.”
A wave out