hand over my ankle and held it there, giving it a light squeeze. It was warm and dry.
He left it there for a while.
I couldn’t help but wonder some more who the Alicia person was. Someone he’d met in Houston apparently. It shouldn’t be a surprise.
Maybe it was even the same blonde from the party. More than likely though, it was a different one. He hadn’t remembered her when I’d brought her up a while back. Cool. Fine. Okay.
My phone beeped right then, and I peeked at the screen to see I’d been tagged in something.
Tagged by HTWONHAUNTEDFACTORY.
I unlocked the screen and hit the icon to open it.
I nudged at Zac’s shoulders, getting those baby blues swinging in my direction. I showed him the screen.
On it was Zac, mostly, mouth open as he laughed, and behind his shoulder—like the other twenty pictures that my grandma had had in her house of us—was me. A forearm wrapped around his neck, face scrunched up, eyes closed. Behind us was the man holding the fake chainsaw, acting like he was chasing us out, which he probably had been, but I’d been too busy having my eyes closed to know for sure.
The owner man tagged me in the post. And Zac.
Me. The Lazy Baker.
Zac. Zac “Big Texas” Travis.
Well, if our friendship had been a secret before, it wasn’t any longer.
The hand on my ankle gave it a light squeeze, and I looked up to find Zac’s light blue eyes on my face.
“It’s a good picture, huh?” I asked him.
His thumb rubbed along the sole of my foot. “Yeah, kiddo. It’s a real good one,” he agreed, looking me dead in the eye.
Chapter Sixteen
I would have paid money to have a picture of Trevor’s face when he saw us walking up to the front doors of the club where the Halloween party was being hosted weeks later.
Honestly, from the handful of interactions we’d had, I wasn’t sure he was physically capable of doing more than rolling his eyes, scowling, or making his features go completely emotionless. So that was something. I mean, Zac had needed to lift his hand to get him to shake mine the second time we’d met.
First, he blinked.
Then I’d swear that he rubbed his eyes with a fisted hand and looked at us again, like maybe his eyes had tricked him.
They hadn’t.
While I didn’t enjoy his disbelieving face anywhere near as much as Zac did, I still got a kick out of it. And I knew without a doubt that Zac got a huge kick out of it because he started elbowing me and giggling. All “hehehe” under his breath while we made our way through the parking lot with CJ and Amari trailing behind us, more than likely tugging at their own costumes. I’d helped them come up with a quick costume the day before when I’d gone over to the house to pick up Zac so we could go grocery shopping.
Salt and pepper.
It had almost brought a tear to my eye.
But nothing had made me laugh quite like what Zac and I had managed to find at the costume store.
But Trevor wasn’t laughing as he gazed at us with a sigh and muttered, “Really?”
Zac’s plaid-covered elbow hit my bodysuit-covered one.
I mean, it had been freaking fate—like we’d planned it when we hadn’t. Yet it had worked out perfectly. Beyond perfect honestly. Even CJ shook his head when he’d met us outside of the house while we waited for the ride Zac ordered. “You both would” was all he’d said before snapping a picture of us. Zac had an elbow on my shoulder, because why not when it was level and I could basically be used as a crutch?
I’d asked CJ to take one for me too on my phone, and then Zac had taken my cell and sent it to himself.
“Whatcha think, Trev?” Zac asked as we stopped in front of his longtime manager.
Trevor scrubbed at his face again, finally making me take in the “costume” he had on.
It wasn’t much of one. Honestly, he looked like he usually did. I was pretty sure I’d seen him wearing the same suit like a week ago when I had gone to pick up Zac before going to the movies. He’d been stressed as hell that day—I was able to tell by his face—but it had been because of the game the White Oaks had been set to play the next day. Going to the movies had been my idea to