The Pass (Smart Jocks #5) - Rebecca Jenshak Page 0,23
counter and watch as she finishes her food and puts it on a plate. I’m working out how to best broach the topic of what I will now forever think of as the greatest kiss of my life. She gets there first.
“About today,” she starts as she takes a seat next to me. “I’m really sorry. I should not have put you in that position. I’d been drinking, not that it’s an excuse, and I guess I just really wanted to prove to everyone that what we have is real. You’re my best friend, Tanner. I never want to do anything to put that in jeopardy.”
I’m waiting for an opening to speak, but she just keeps going. “You just got out of a relationship and I think I’ve been feeling a little lonely and jumped at any opportunity for a spark with someone, even you. Plus, we had our window years ago. If anything was going to happen, that was the time. Not now when we have this great friendship.”
Finally, she goes quiet and takes a deep breath. She said a lot and I’m still wrapping my brain around some of it, but the most important thing I say without hesitation, “You’re my best friend too. Nothing will ever change that.”
“Promise?” She looks more vulnerable than I’ve ever seen her, and I realize just how much I mean to her, too.
I take her hand in mine and gently squeeze her long, delicate fingers. “I promise. I’m not going anywhere.”
The relief she feels is evident in the relaxing of her shoulders. Conversation is still stilted, though, as we eat and clean up the kitchen together.
I’m scanning texts from Jonah and Ollie about their plans for the night while she starts the dishwasher.
“Do you feel like going out tonight?” I ask.
“Am I totally boring if I say no?”
“Not at all. We’ve got an entire month. Movie night?”
Her eyes light up. “Yes, that sounds perfect.”
I let Sydney run the remote and pick what we watch. That nap earlier only served to make me more tired, and I have a sneaking suspicion I’m going to pass out five minutes in. She picks one of the Mission Impossible films—they’re all basically the same—and we lay together on the couch.
Now that I’ve had time to think about what she said earlier, there’s one piece that keeps bothering me. She said, we had our window. I don’t deny that part, but it’s the way she said it, like it wasn’t what she wanted.
That isn’t how I remember it. I kissed her and she shut it down. And, yeah, I thought something would happen eventually but the more we hung out the closer we became and I thought it was a mutual decision that neither of us wanted to risk our friendship for more. To think that we might have hooked up and then never spoke again, seriously makes me feel sick even now.
“Hey.” We’re laying at opposite ends of the couch and I nudge her elbow with my foot. “Remember our first kiss?”
She looks surprised I brought it up at first but then smiles. “Yeah, of course. We were in the pool at The White House.”
“What is it with us and water?”
We both laugh, and then it’s quiet, except for the suspenseful background music of the movie.
“What about it?” she asks.
“I was thinking back to that night and those first few weeks we hung out. I wanted to kiss you again so bad, but I was scared of freaking you out or pressuring you. You intimidated the hell out of me.”
“No way.” Her brown eyes stare back intensely.
“Yes way. I figured it was obvious.”
“Not to me. I thought I turned you off with my five-date thing.”
“What five-date thing?”
“My five-date rule,” she says again like that’s supposed to mean something to me. “I had a rule about not hooking up with anyone before five dates. Actually the rule died after you.”
“It did? Why did it start?”
“Remember the guy, Will, that I told you about?”
“The dickwad who ghosted you?”
She nods. “After him, I was determined to make sure I didn’t let anyone else take advantage of me like that, so I told you I had a five-date rule to keep myself from sleeping with you and then being hurt when you never called me again.”
“I wouldn’t have done that.”
“Which is why I gave up on the rule. It obviously didn’t work.”
“Well, it kept us from sleeping together.”
“The idea was that I would get to know a person before I