Unless our resident blonde was the duty?” His eyebrows wiggled making me laugh. Even he suspected we were more than friends. I didn’t come to the frat often because I was busy with school, painting, and spending time with Sophie and Theo when I could. When I did make an appearance, it was always with Ren, Jase, and whoever their flavor of the month was. In fact, it was not so long ago I learned the redhead I’d been talking to was sleeping with both…at the same time. It’d made me uncomfortable to know what Ren was up to, but I never judged.
Shortly after that discovery, Jase had admitted that he would have made a move on me if it weren’t for Ren’s territorial nature. Even though I set the record straight, for what felt like the millionth time, Jase told me he wouldn’t make a move anyway because Ren was his brother. Maybe not by blood, but by bond. I could respect that. Plus, I didn’t want Jase as more than a friend to hang out with when I was around anyway. He was nice but knowing what he enjoyed was a little too much for me. It made me wonder what Ren had thought about our few times together. We hadn’t done a lot more than was I assumed was common—traditional even. Looking back now at my lack of sex experience, I wasn’t sure what other kinds there were which made me feel like such a prude. A feeling I hated.
Snapping out of the thought, I grinned at Jase and said, “He had to come to my house and insult my piano playing skills first.”
His face twisted. “You’re learning to play piano? Boring.” He dropped an arm over my shoulders but had to bend slightly because of our height difference. He was well over six feet tall, probably close to six-three. “Let me guess. Your aunt? The one that looks like there’s something shoved up her—”
“Yep, that’d be the one.”
He chuckled. “Want me to tell her what men really want? I could probably show her a thing or too so she could get a good visual.”
Unlike Lawrence, I had no doubt that Jason would try to hook up with my aunt. “I don’t need therapy, but thanks.”
Ren shoved his friend away and stole my arm again. “Come on. I want us to hang out downstairs. I challenged Rita and her latest boy toy to beer pong and need a partner.”
As he dragged me toward the basement stairs off the kitchen, I couldn’t help but tease him. “Is this the same boy toy you’ve been going after since you had that sociology class together?”
“Perhaps.” Translation: yes.
“You’re hopeless.”
“Hopelessly infatuated,” he corrected before shooting me another wink. As soon as he walked into the open living area where a pool table, flat screen, and few couches were set up, we got loud cheers from some of the other guests. There weren’t many people lingering down here because it was typically for “VIP” guests only, usually girlfriends of the fraternity, or whoever they were hooking up with at the time. Then there was me, the perpetual best friend slash third wheel. I was okay with it though because it meant I didn’t have to suffocate in the crowd of people upstairs.
I spotted Lawrence’s crush instantly hanging around Rita Malcom. She was a sweet girl that ran in a similar social circle as us. Her father worked with Theo as some investor—they might even be friends or something close to it if memory served. Rita and her father both showed up to the funeral where she’d given me a hug and her father gave me his apologies. For once, I’d believed somebody had actually felt bad that my father was killed. I didn’t talk to Rita much other than the occasional greeting in passing or during these where we were typically partnered up for whatever Ren forced me to take part of, but I could see her being a friend. An ally.
As always, I didn’t get a choice before I was teamed up with Rita to go against Lawrence and Ben. He was cute, around the same height as Ren, and the kind of preppy, clean-shaven guy that my best friend usually went for. He was on the lacrosse team at school, something Rita told me a while back when they first started hanging out. Like a lot of women who hung around this house, she was into any sports team and loved