Wright with Benefits

Ashleigh rolled her eyes and took a sip of her drink. “Whatever, Sutton. You just don’t believe in true love.” Then she stepped around her and walked off.

Sutton staggered back a step at the comment. She looked like a wounded bird. She closed her eyes briefly around the pain of what Ashleigh had said. I actually stepped forward to catch her in case she fainted.

“Are you all right?” I asked.

Sutton clenched her jaw and opened her eyes. “Fine. And I do believe in true love. In fact, I believe that if you’re lucky, it can happen more than once,” she said defensively as her eyes flitted to David across the room. “I wouldn’t listen to Ashleigh’s ramblings. Annie and Chase dated. They broke up. They made this silly pact because he was moving across the country and likely never coming home. It’s nothing more than that.”

Then she nodded at us both and returned to David’s side. He pulled her in close and kissed the top of her head. Ashleigh’s comment had been callous. I disliked her even more for it.

“Seriously, I didn’t mean—” Julian began.

I interrupted him and waved it away, “Let’s forget it. You didn’t know who he was to Annie.” I glared at the door. “Nor did I, apparently. But there’s nothing I can do about it until she gets back.”

“You sure you don’t want to go after her?”

“Positive,” I told him.

I clapped a hand on his shoulder and directed him to the living room.

A Super Bowl party game had been set up. Everyone dropped in twenty dollars to pick three tickets. Every twenty dollars got you more tickets. Each ticket had a phrase on it, such as, This ticket wins if the national anthem is longer than two minutes. Then a raffle would be held at the end of the game for all the winning tickets, and the names drawn would win some of the pot money.

I blindly dropped down two hundred dollars for tickets. I’d been warned about the game and planned to buy enough for both Annie and me to play. But right now, I needed the distraction of sorting through the tickets, so I wouldn’t think about her absence.

I won the national anthem ticket and dropped it into the collection bin that Jensen held out. He stood next to me as the game got geared up.

“Who are you rooting for?” I asked absentmindedly.

Jensen didn’t answer. He just gave me a look. “You know, I always admired your work ethic and your complete hold on control at the office, even when things didn’t go your way. But I don’t know how you’re standing here right now.”

I met his gaze. My cousin and the only person who had ever felt like an older brother to me. “You’re right.”

I passed him my beer and left.

Annie still wasn’t back. It had been long enough. She wasn’t going to like me stepping in, but she was going to have to deal with that. I tried to tamp down on the anger. I didn’t want to blow up on her and lose all the ground that we’d gained. But it was hard to temper my rising fears and redirect them to something manageable.

I wrenched open the front door, prepared to head out into the darkened exterior and find Annie. But before I took the first step out, Annie stumbled forward, her hand on the doorknob.

“Oh,” she gasped with a laugh. Her eyes lifted to mine. “Jordan, hey!”

“Sorry,” I said automatically. “I didn’t know you were there.”

Obviously.

“No problem,” she said, straightening. “It got dark really fast. We didn’t realize how late it was.”

I stepped back to let her inside.

Chase followed behind her. He shot me a smug smirk. “You must be the boyfriend.”

The boyfriend? The boyfriend? Was I the boyfriend? Had she told him that? Or was he fucking with me? From the look on his face, I was a hundred percent certain that he was fucking with me.

“Be nice,” Annie said with another carefree laugh. “Jordan, this is Chase. Chase, Jordan.”

I closed the door behind them and turned to face Chase Sinclair. He held his hand out, and I put mine in his. We both squeezed harder than necessary. Until my hand was cramping and I could see the wince in his eyes before he abruptly let go. I tried not to look self-satisfied, but I’d clearly failed because Annie sighed in frustration.

“Chase and I grew up together,” Annie explained. “He’s in town to buying a house.”

“You’re moving here?” I asked, sizing him up.

He was such a fucking pretty boy. I couldn’t believe that Annie had ever been into this guy. She didn’t seem the type to want a guy who spent more time getting ready than she did. I was being petty and didn’t fucking care.

“Yeah. Next week,” Chase said smoothly. “We’ll be seeing a lot more of each other.”