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- Herausgeber: K.A. LINDE
- Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
- Serie: Coastal Chronicles
- Sprache: Englisch
- Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021
A new angsty stand alone romance from USA Today bestselling author K.A. Linde that will keep you guessing which man is her groom and which one objects…
I’m in love with two men.
But I can only marry one.
And today is my wedding day.
The bridesmaids button my wedding dress. They titter excitedly as the music begins. My groom is waiting for me. I walk down the aisle prepared to say I do. All according to plan.
Except for the shout from the back of the room, “I object!”
I should have known it couldn’t be that easy. After more than a decade of push and pull, neither of them is going to let me go. We’re a trio that should have never been. Me and Cole and Ash. One that I’m to marry and one that I’m to leave behind.
Now, once and for all, I have to choose: my groom or the man objecting?
But until then…Hold the Forevers.
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Hold the Forevers
K.A. Linde
Contents
Maps
Prologue
Wedding Day
1. Wedding Day
Part I
2. Athens
3. Athens
4. Athens
5. Savannah
6. Savannah
7. Savannah
8. Savannah
9. Savannah
10. Duke
11. Athens
12. Athens
13. Athens
14. Savannah
15. Athens
16. Frat Beach
17. Frat Beach
18. Athens
Part II
19. Atlanta
20. Lake Lanier
21. Atlanta
22. Savannah
23. Savannah
24. Savannah
25. Atlanta
26. Savannah
27. Savannah
28. New Orleans
29. New Orleans
30. New Orleans
31. Atlanta
32. Atlanta
33. Savannah
34. Santa Monica
Part III
35. Houston
36. Savannah
37. Savannah
38. Savannah
39. Nashville
40. Rehearsal
41. Wedding Day
42. Wedding Day
43. Wedding Day
At First Hate
Also By K.A. Linde
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Hold the Forevers
Copyright © 2021 by K.A. Linde
All rights reserved.
Visit my website at
www.kalinde.com
Cover Designer: Staci Hart,
www.stacihartnovels.com
Editor: Unforeseen Editing, www.unforeseenediting.com
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without the written permission of the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
ISBN-13: 978-1948427449
Maps
K.A. Linde has created maps for the Athens and Savannah locations in this book. You can locate them on her website for reference:
www.kalinde.com/maps
To Sarah Kates
for not letting my ex object at my wedding
Prologue
I’m in love with two men.
But I can only marry one.
It should have been simple to choose one over the other. To make my life with only one of them in it. But it isn’t. And it never has been.
Not when fate spun us together. An infinite wheel that none of us could ever escape. Just kept spinning and spinning. One of us took a left turn instead of a right. We stepped off for a cycle as if that would let us leave. Let us continue on into a normal, ordinary life. Whatever normal and ordinary could possibly mean.
But then the next rotation would come around, as it always inevitably did, and then we stepped back on. The three of us. In perpetuity.
I tried my turn at the wheel. Tried to pull free from fate’s death grip on my life. It was barely a moment. It was an eternity. For that time, I should have been happier. Without them. Without the drama and the heartache and the constant way my life went up in flames and reduced me to cinders.
I wasn’t a phoenix; I didn’t rise from the ashes.
Still, I wasn’t happier.
The shattered bits of my heart sliced through me at every turn that I avoided them. That I tried to move on.
And when the wheel tugged me back into its trappings, I let it. I hung there, suspended, caught in a spiderweb, thick and viscous and unrelenting. I made my choice. Stay on the wheel. Embrace that this was where I always belonged. And slowly, the million pieces of me were put back together, one by one.
Not all of them, of course. Not without them both.
But I can only have one.
I’ve always known it and tried to accept it. It’s still hard to believe that it’s happening though.
Me and Cole and Ash.
A trio that never was.
Because I’m in love with two men.
I can only marry one.
And today is my wedding day.
Wedding Day
Wedding Day
June 15, 2019
Every girl dreamed about her perfect wedding.
But I hadn’t dreamed of white dresses or bouquets or I dos. And when it came right down to it, I’d never imagined my future husband. What he’d look like or what he’d wear or how he’d smile when he saw me that first time.
Because for so long, there hadn’t been just one face in my life … but two.
Two faces. Two outfits. Two smiles.
Two men.
Cole and Ash.
Ash and Cole.
It felt surreal that today of all days, I was going to marry one and not the other. But it was here, and there was no looking back. I’d made my decision. In the end, we’d all made this decision. With our actions and our broken promises. We’d walked right up to today and let it happen.
I wasn’t the typical blushing bride. There would always be a part of me wondering if I’d done the right thing, chosen the right guy. If all the hell that we’d gone through together to get here had been worth it.
But I didn’t have cold feet. I was ready for this.
Except now, my bridesmaids were missing.
I stuck my head out of the bridal suite. My three sisters sat at a table in varying shades of red. Two in floor-length gowns and one in a red suit jacket. They were all matrons of honor for this affair, but they wouldn’t be standing at the altar with me. They’d be seated in the first row.
“Have you seen Josie and Marley?” I asked my sisters about my two best friends.
We’d known each other nearly our entire lives. Been through thick and thin. It wasn’t like them to disappear on my big day.
“They said they had an errand,” Eve said as she poured champagne into flutes.
Elle nodded. “They’ll be right back.”
Steph jumped from her spot and made me twirl in a circle. “You look gorgeous. I wasn’t sure on the bust, but that dress is stunning.”
I beamed at my sisters.
We’d all gone dress shopping multiple times. I’d thought I’d be one of those lucky ones who picked out the very first dress I tried on. But it hadn’t been the case; it might as well have been the last dress I tried on. The thousandth dress I tried on. The dress was a full tulle skirt with a lacy balconette top and thin spaghetti straps.
Josie had told me it was likely bad luck that I was that indecisive. Marley had rolled her eyes and insisted it meant nothing. Two sides of the same coin, those two.
I drank champagne with my sisters and stared down at the massive ring on my finger as I waited for my best friends to return.
“Don’t drink too much,” Eve warned. “You’ll want to remember tonight.”
Elle burst into laughter, and Steph joined her.
“Oh, I’ll remember tonight,” I assured them.
I couldn’t imagine forgetting my wedding night even if I had one too many glasses of champagne. I checked my phone again. Seriously, where the hell were they?
“Maybe we should go look for them.”
“You can’t,” Elle said. “You don’t want the groom to see you before it’s time.”
Tradition.
It was pretty ridiculous, considering how long we’d been sleeping together. But it was ceremonial, and we’d agreed. It would make tonight even more special.
I was about to send out a search party when Marley and Josie rushed back into the room, looking frazzled.
“Everything all right?”
Marley and Josie exchanged a look.
“What is it?”
“Nothing,” they said together.
Josie continued, “Don’t worry about it.”
“Is it nothing, or should I not worry about it?”
“Both,” Marley said.
I narrowed my eyes. That certainly didn’t sound like nothing.
“It’s this.” Josie came to my side and pulled out a black case. “I know that I’ve always had my differences with my mom, but she’d want you to wear these today.”
My hand went to my throat as I opened the black case to reveal the white pearls that I’d always coveted. “Josie! I can’t wear these.”
“Something borrowed,” she insisted. “You’ve always wanted them.”
“I have,” I said softly.
Josie took them out of the box and strung them around my neck. They were dainty and just brushed my collarbone. They looked perfect with the white lace of my dress and my blonde hair pulled up in an intricate updo.
“Thank you,” I told her, drawing her in for a hug.
“Okay, ladies, it’s time!” the wedding planner, Courtney, said as she strode into the room.
She was the best of the best. She handled everything for the day of. I didn’t know how I would have survived the last six months without her expertise.
Everyone moved into place. The string quartet began to play. My sisters went in first. Marley and Josie both pulled me in for a quick hug before stepping out into the chapel and proceeding down the aisle. I was last.
I touched the pearls Josie had given me for luck. Then I took a deep breath and walked into the chapel, alone.
The crowd had risen to their feet. But I only had eyes for one person in that room—my groom.
My stomach flipped at the sight of him in a tuxedo at the other end of the aisle. His smile was magnetic, and I couldn’t help but return it. My mother wiped her eyes as I passed her in the front row with my sisters. Her last baby, finally getting hitched.
And then I was there. I took the final two steps up to the altar, passed my bouquet to Marley, and faced my groom.
“I’ve waited for this day our entire lives,” he whispered.
“Me too.”
A hush fell over the church as the service began. I heard little of it. The minutes passed in a blur. All I saw was the bright blue eyes looking back at me and the smile that said I was his world.
There was a pause in the ceremony. Just a moment. Barely a breath.
And everything collapsed.
The doors at the back of the church burst open. Everyone faced the figure who stepped into the sanctuary. The wedding planner trailed him. Whatever she was saying was lost in the drone of voices.
But I knew exactly why he was here.
I’d been a fool to think that he would let me go.
“I object!” he yelled into the church. “Lila, you can’t marry him!”
And there I stood, on a precipice, ready to fall back onto that wheel that had always dragged us together. I couldn’t have both.
So today, I had to choose: my groom or the man objecting.
Part I
Athens
April 4, 2008
The energy in the lecture hall was contagious. Pens drummed on notebooks, legs jostled under desks, the tap, tap, tap of computer keys was more distraction than note-taking. Professor McConnell was still droning on, but no one was listening anymore. Not with ten minutes until the end of class. Not when spring had blown in hard and fast that week, bringing with it the restless need to be out of the classroom and out on the quad.
All around me, people packed up early, stuffing papers and computers into backpacks. The noise was loud enough for Professor McConnell to finally sigh and conclude.
“All right, all right,” he said with that same exasperated tone he used for everything. He was one of those ‘cool’ professors who wore khakis and polos instead of suits and bow ties. Youngish type with lots of girls flocking to take his classes. “We’ll pick this up again on Monday, but don’t forget that your term paper is due a week from today. If anyone needs help, email me or come to office hours.”
Half of the class was already out of their seats before he even finished speaking.
I idled in my second-row seat, biding my time until it emptied. My term paper wasn’t where I wanted it to be. I was ahead of the rest of the class, considering I’d started my paper. Intro to Kinesiology was inundated with athletes who had tutors and private study sessions and, you know, other smart people to write their term papers for them. But I was in the class for my Exercise and Sports Science degree because I actually wanted to become a physical therapist. Not the typical student.
When the room was sufficiently empty, I snapped my notebook closed and stuffed it into the leather backpack my mom had gotten me as a graduation gift a year earlier. I got to my feet and stretched just as someone walked up my desk.
I jolted. “Uh, hi.”
My eyes traveled up, up, up the gorgeous body that I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t noticed at the back of the room with the other football players. He always wore the same Nike gear—joggers, red-and-black T-shirt, black jacket—with the football tags hanging off of his University of Georgia backpack.
No jacket today. And the hat that normally adorned his head was absent as well. His dark brown hair was gelled perfectly, short on the sides and longer on the top. And those blue eyes. They were electric blue … and they were staring at me. Straight at me. With a half-smile that was almost … hesitant?
“Hey. Lila, right?”
“Delilah,” I corrected. Though I had no idea how he knew my name.
“Delilah,” he said with a casual nod. “I’m Cole.”
“I know who you are,” I said before I could stop myself.
He smirked, running a hand back through his hair. When he touched the gel, he stopped as if he’d remembered his hair wasn’t its normal floppy, just-sexed mess. “Right. Yeah. Forget that sometimes.”
If it wasn’t obvious from his outfit, Cole Davis was a football player. He had been a highly sought-after recruit for UGA. He’d helped take us to a Sugar Bowl victory this season. Cole wasn’t quite the star, but he’d sure run up a ton of points his sophomore year. Not to mention, we all noticed his face that the university liked to plaster all over the enormous end zone scoreboard.
Not to mention that his dad was the Hal Davis. He played ball in college and then professionally for the Eagles. Now, he was an offensive line coach for the Atlanta Falcons, my favorite team. Every time Cole did something good on the field, his dad’s name and record was blasted as well. Everyone liked a good story.
“Can I help you with something?” I asked.
“You seem to be doing really well in this class.”
I narrowed my eyes suspiciously. “Do you need help with your term paper?”
He laughed. “No, I have a handle on it. Man, I’m shitty at this.”
“At what?”
“Asking you out.”
I blinked. “If that’s what you’re doing, then yes, you’re pretty bad at it.”
He chuckled again. Shooting me the dimples that made every girl on campus swoon.
“So, okay, let’s start over again,” Cole said.
He dropped his backpack on the ground next to mine and held out his hand. I took it because what else was I supposed to do?
“There’s a luau tonight, and I was wondering if you’d want to go with me.”
“Isn’t tomorrow the spring game?”
“Yeah. It’s kind of a tradition,” he said with a shrug.
“So, it’s a football party?”
“Uh … well, sort of.”
“Thanks for inviting me, Cole,” I said, hefting my backpack on my shoulder. “But no thanks.”
He blinked at my response, and I left the classroom before he could say anything else. I’d email the professor instead.
I didn’t know why Cole Davis had asked me out, but I knew it was a bad idea. I’d sworn off football players and dark hair and blue eyes. I’d sworn off broken hearts. I’d had one, and one was enough as far as I was concerned.
I was out of the room and into the hallway of Ramsey, the university gym, before I realized Cole was following me.
“Hey, wait up,” he said. As if he needed the help to catch me. “Where are you headed?”
I stopped in the hallway. “I don’t want to go to your party.”
“Okay. Well, what if we don’t go to the party tonight? We could hang out instead.”
“Don’t you have to go to the party?”
“Not if you don’t want to go,” he said with that same smile and those same blue eyes.
That wasn’t the response I’d expected. I tilted my head up to get another look at him, and all I found was sincerity. Cole was gorgeous and pursuing me, and every other girl would be dying for this to happen to them.
And I wanted to say yes.
I didn’t want to spend the next three years of college miserable all because one stupid boy had broken my heart.
“All right,” I said tentatively, releasing the tension in my shoulders. “What do you have in mind?”
His smile lit up his entire face when I said yes. I’d thought that damn smirk he always shot the camera was his real smile. But no, it was nothing like that. It was megawatt, full of joy, and completely irresistible. If he’d led with that, I might have said yes to the damn party. Fuck.
“Let me take care of that.” He slipped me his phone which I was jealous to see was the new iPhone. They’d been sold out in stores for months, and everyone was still raving about them after the first design had released last year. Of course, he’d have one. I entered my number into the shiny thing, still unable to believe this was happening to me. “I’ll pick you up at seven?”
“Sure,” I said, not able to hide my own smile. “See you then.”
My mind was still whirling when I pulled up in front of my dorm twenty minutes later. I didn’t even check my phone as I climbed the hill to the all-girls dorm, Brumby. If I had, I wouldn’t have been as shocked to find Josie sitting on the futon, watching a baking show.
“Josie! Oh my God!”
She jumped up from the futon and threw her arms around me. We swayed side to side with excitement. Josie—though she went by Josephine now—was one of my two best friends. She had grown up in Atlanta with her dad and spent summers in Savannah with her mom in her ridiculous mansion on the coast. We’d met at the age of six and looked forward to every summer together. Now, I was here in Athens, and she was full-time in Savannah at Savannah College of Art and Design, studying film.
“How did you get past security?” I gasped, releasing her.
She laughed, flipping her long black ponytail. “I smiled.”
Of course she had. “I completely forgot that you were coming into town this weekend.”
“You forgot?” Josie asked. “Who are you, and what have you done with Lila Greer?”
If I couldn’t call her Josephine, she certainly wasn’t going to start calling me Delilah.
“I just had a weird day.”
“Define weird.” She narrowed her hazel eyes, which were almost gold today. “Because you must have had something catastrophic happen to make you forget that I was coming up.”
I winced slightly. “I … kind of have a date tonight.”
Josie shrieked, dramatically jumping up and down and twirling in place. The little drama queen. “That’s such amazing news. Tell me everything.”
She dragged me to the futon and muted the show.
“Well, there’s this guy in my kinesiology class who asked me to a party, but it’s a football party.”
“Ah,” Josie said, understanding without me having to say anything.
“So, I said no. And I thought that was that, but he offered to ditch the party and take me out.”
“Oh my God. You said yes?”
“I mean … I probably shouldn’t have. He’s … Cole Davis.”
Josie’s mouth dropped. “Holy shit! He’s the one we were all swooning over when I came up for a game in the fall?”
I nodded.
“Remind me why you said no the first time.”
I shrugged, averting my gaze. “He … reminds me of him.”
Josie blew out a harsh breath. “Is this your first date since Ash?”
My body twitched involuntarily at the name. “I mean, no. I made out with a few guys at a frat party and went on a date or two. But …”
“But?”
“I don’t know. Maybe it doesn’t matter. Maybe I’m being crazy.”
“Crazy is good for you, Lila. Forget Ash. You’re going to go out with Cole Davis tonight and have the most amazing time.”
“What about you?”
Josie rolled her eyes. “It’s me. I’ll manage.”
Understatement of the century.
“But we’re still going to the spring game tomorrow.”
“Oh, absolutely. I fully intend to drink a few bottles of André at the tailgate and walk into Sanford Stadium, trashed.”
I snort-laughed, immediately falling back into the ease of being with Josie. We were just missing Marley, and then we’d be complete.
“You have to help me find something to wear.”
Josie jumped to her feet. “My expertise is required. Come. I’ll be your fairy godmother for the night.”
By the time seven rolled around, Josie had done her work and I was ready to go. Cole had texted, saying that he was going to come up. Because obviously he could just walk up into the all-girls dorm.
At the knock, Josie rushed to answer first.
“Josie!” I hissed.
She swung it open. “Heyyy!”
I put my head in my hands.
“Uh, hey,” Cole said from the door. “I’m here for Delilah.”
“Lila, your date is here,” Josie called.
I took a deep breath and stepped forward. “Yeah, I gathered that. Thanks, Josie.” My gaze caught Cole’s bright blue eyes, and my stomach flipped. He had on jeans and a white button-up with the sleeves rolled to his elbows. “Hey.”
“Hey, you look nice.”
I bit my lip, and Josie nudged me, as if to say, See.
I’d wanted to go with jeans and a T-shirt, but Josie had insisted that I needed to—quote—“show off your dancer body.” So, we’d compromised on a light-blue wrap dress that matched my own blue eyes and made my brilliantly highlighted blonde hair shine even lighter.
“Thanks.”
“I’m Josie.” She stuck her hand out.
He laughed. “Cole. Are you Delilah’s roommate?”
“No, I go to SCAD. Just here for the weekend.”
“Am I interrupting your weekend? Should we reschedule?”
“No!” Josie said, all but pushing me out the door. “Y’all have a good time.”
She shut the door on the pair of us. I was left shaking my head.
“She seems … friendly,” Cole said.
“She’s a film major,” I said by way of explanation.
We left my dorm and found his white Jeep parked at the front of the lot.
“God, how did you even get this spot?” It was almost impossible to park this close to the dorm.
“Someone was pulling out right as I drove up.”
“Lucky.”
“It’s my superpower,” he told me as he opened the passenger door.
“That is a random superpower.”
“I don’t make the rules,” he said as I hopped in. Then he jogged around to the driver’s side and got in. “It’s just how it happens.”
“Well, the real test will be downtown.”
He grinned. “I got this.”
And he did. We only circled the block once before a prime spot opened up right in front of us on the most coveted corner of Clayton and College. I was so jealous of his parking luck.
“Fine, you win. You have a parking superpower.” I slung my bag onto my shoulder and hopped out of his Jeep before he could jog back around to help me out.
“What’s yours?”
“My superpower?”
“Yeah. Something random, like finding a good parking spot or being able to win things off the radio before nine in the morning.”
He directed us down the sidewalk. “I don’t know. I’m not sure I have one.”
“Everyone has one.”
I bit my lip, contemplating what my power was while Cole navigated us toward The Grill. It was a dive diner at the heart of downtown, known for its twenty-four-hour diner breakfast and milkshakes. It had red plastic booths and a working jukebox. Every orientation group ended up at The Grill when they came into town; it was tradition.
He pulled open the door for me. “This all right?”
“It’s perfect.”
The harried waitress ushered us into a booth and plopped down menus.
“I hope you like feta fries. They have the best ones in town.”
I blinked. “Feta … fries?”
“Uh, yes. They’re phenomenal. We’re ordering some.”
“All right. I do like feta and fries. I’ve never considered putting them together.” I shrugged as I looked back at the menu. “I think I’m getting breakfast. Don’t know if feta fries go with pancakes …”
“They’re a potato. Potatoes go with everything.”
I chuckled. “That is true.”
Once we ordered our breakfasts and fries, complete with two milkshakes—strawberry for me, chocolate for Cole—he returned to the question at hand.
“So … superpower?”
“Okay, okay,” I said, tapping a black-painted nail on the table. “This is going to sound weird, but when I get a Coke out of a vending machine, I almost always get two.”
“What?” he gasped.
“I know. It’s weird. It doesn’t happen every time, but it happens a frightening amount.”
“Forget it. Take my parking power. I want that. We’re going to have to find a vending machine and test this.”
I buried my face in my hands. “No! It won’t work, and you’ll think I’m a fraud.”
I peeked up at him, and he was grinning like he couldn’t wait to try it out.
“I need to see this in action.”
“Fine, but if I fold under pressure, it’ll be you suppressing my powers.”
“Fair.”
Our feta fries showed up first, and my mouth watered at the sight of white cheese sauce drizzled all over the double-battered French fries. I dipped the fry in more sauce and then took my first bite. My eyes rolled into the back of my head.
“Oh my God,” I groaned. “Why have I never had these before?”
“Exactly,” he said, pointing a fry at me. “These are to die for.”
And they were. I gobbled up half the tray without pause. I was almost full by the time my pancakes showed up. And though I did try to eat some of the meal, I was too focused on Cole. I’d thought that this would be awkward. First dates were always awkward. Or…the entire two first dates I’d ever been on since Ash were so unbelievably awkward that I’d really never wanted to do them again.
But hanging out with Cole, it felt like I’d known him my entire life. As if he just somehow … fit.
“Let’s take the milkshakes to go. I have an idea,” he said with a gleam in those baby blues.
Once our milkshakes were properly put into giant Styrofoam cups with thick straws, Cole paid for us both, despite my protest, and we headed back out onto the Athens streets. Downtown Athens was a five-by-six block of bars, restaurants, and shopping. It was the heart of the city. And The Grill was directly across Broad Street from North Campus, where the arch stood as a proud symbol of the university.
We waited at the corner, sipping our milkshakes. The city was busier than normal due to the spring game tomorrow. During game weekends, half of Atlanta flooded the small town, burgeoning from a hundred thousand people to three to five hundred thousand overnight.
And Cole was entirely recognizable. In the minute we waited, about a dozen girls ogled Cole as they walked past.
“Do people always act like this?” I asked.
“Like what?”
I shot him a look of disbelief. “Stare at you?”
He looked behind him, confusion clearly on his face. “Were people looking? Sorry. I know it can be weird. I don’t even see it.”
He was serious. He hadn’t even noticed that girls were eyeing him and fans were snapping pictures. That he was a celebrity to them. But he was just a normal guy.
“You really don’t?”
“Nah. I’m used to it, because of my dad. You know my dad’s a Falcons coach?”
“Everyone who listens to ESPN is well aware.”
He chuckled. “Yeah, probs. Well, people would approach my dad some when I was younger, and I thought it was so cool. But he always remained firmly humble. Talent doesn’t make you special. It just means you have a different skill than someone else.”
“That’s actually a great way to look at it.”
Cole shot me that megawatt smile as we crossed the street and approached the arch. He nudged me in front of one of the openings. I gasped and pushed him back.
“Stop trying to bring me bad luck!”
He chuckled. “Afraid you’re not going to graduate?”
As the superstition went, if you walked through the arch before graduation, you wouldn’t graduate. It was a big deal at graduation to get that first walk through, and people lined up for hours to get that special moment photographed. I certainly wasn’t planning to ruin it.
“I have no fears of that, but gah!”
“I wouldn’t actually do that to you,” he said as we slipped past the arch and onto North Campus. “You seem like the smart, studious type.”
“What gives you that idea?”
“You sit at the front of class.”
“Lots of people do.”
“And don’t bring your laptop.”
“So?”
“Because you’re actually taking notes,” he said. “And you answer half of Professor McConnell’s questions.”
“Only because no one else ever speaks up and I cannot handle awkward silence.”
Cole chuckled, draining the last of his milkshake and tossing it in a nearby trash can. “See … smart, studious type.”
“Fine, I like school. Sue me.”
“Nah, I like it.” He flushed slightly, running his hand back into his gelled hair and cursing under his breath as he remembered it. “I was actually … nervous to ask you out.”
I snorted. “Why? You’re Cole Davis.”
“That doesn’t mean anything. And anyway … you’re intimidating.”
“Am I?” I asked with raised eyebrows.
“Well, not now that I know you, but yeah, you kind of are.”
“I’m not sure that’s a compliment.”
His eyes were so bright when he looked over at me that my heart practically stopped. He reached out and took my hand in his. Our fingers threaded together. I could feel my heartbeat everywhere at once. That one easy movement changed everything. Now … we were holding hands. And he just smiled.
“It’s a compliment, Delilah.”
I swallowed and looked up into his face. He tugged me toward an admin building.
“Come on.”
“What are you doing? Everything is locked.”
He shot me a mischievous look and opened a side entrance.
My eyes widened. “That’s not supposed to happen.”
He didn’t respond, just drew me inside. The lights were off, but brightened his phone screen until he found what he was looking for and flipped on the lights.
“Aha!” he said.
And then I saw it—a vending machine.
I couldn’t help the bubble of laughter that exploded out of me. “You dragged me into a dark corner of campus to find a vending machine?”
“Work your magic, Delilah.”
“I don’t have any change.”
He winked at me and pulled out his Bulldog Bucks card. “Got you covered.”
He passed it to me as if he never considered that there might not be any money on his card. That it would just be there when he needed it.
I swallowed back my emotions on that, like I did everything, and hoped my superpower wouldn’t let me down.
With a deep breath, I swiped his card on the machine and pressed the Coke button. We both waited with anticipation as the machine rattled, taking its sweet time. It was an old model, and honestly, I was surprised it had card access at all.
Then there was a sturdy clunk, followed immediately by a second clunk.
“Ohhh!” Cole cheered, throwing his arms in the air and doing a two-step, as if I’d scored a touchdown.
I burst into laughter at the display and joined him, dancing circles around him. “It worked! Superpower unlocked!”
We dug into the bottom of the machine and pulled out the two Cokes. Cole looked at it as if it were a goddamn miracle.
“This is seriously the coolest shit,” he said after we shut all the lights off and headed back to his car.
“It’s so random.”
“That’s why it’s the best superpower ever.”
“I accept this great achievement.”
He slipped his hand back into mine and gave me another look that made me melt into a puddle. “I don’t want this night to end.”
I flushed again. “Me neither. I’m having a great time.”
“We could go get a drink,” he suggested.
“I don’t have a fake.”
He shrugged. “You don’t need one. I can get us in.”
“Are you that self-assured about everything?”
“No,” he said. “I wasn’t sure that you’d say yes.”
“I didn’t.”
He leaned back against his Jeep and finished off the Coke, setting it on the hood. “Yeah. Why did you say no anyway?”
“I kind of swore off football players.”
He raised an eyebrow. “You dated a football player here?”
I shook my head. “In high school.”
“Well, damn, guy must have broken your heart if you swore off all of us.”
“Something like that.” Not that I wanted to talk about Ash at all.
“So, why’d you say yes then? I’m still a football player.”
“Don’t remind me,” I said with an eye roll.
“I guess it doesn’t matter. I’m glad you did. I’d been working up the courage for weeks.”
“No, you haven’t!”
“I’m serious,” he said. “I liked that you never gave a shit who any of us were.”
“So, you do notice that people notice you,” I teased.
He held his hands up and shot me that same cocky grin he always shot the camera. “I mean … I noticed more that you didn’t notice.” He tugged me a little closer until we were nearly sharing the same space. “I like that.”
I cleared my throat, feeling everything in me set aflame from that look. “What if I said I had noticed?”
His eyebrows shot up. “That so?”
“Maybe,” I said with a laugh.
His eyes dipped down to my lips, and for a split second, I thought he might kiss me. Right here in the center of downtown, where anyone and everyone could see us.
I realized two things simultaneously: I wanted him to kiss me, and I wasn’t sure I was ready for that to happen.
This date … this date had been perfect. Easy. Uncomplicated. I’d made out with random strangers, and it hadn’t meant anything. But I knew without a doubt … this would mean something.
Cole Davis meant something.
So, I took the step back that I needed to breathe in his presence.
“Why don’t we get you home, Lila?”
I nodded. This time, I didn’t correct him.
And I never would again.
Athens
April 5, 2008
The tailgate before the spring G-Day game looked like a stampede of elephants had trampled over North Campus. Josie wove drunkenly through the crowd of people, as if she went to Georgia, easily maneuvering us from one drink to the next.
To be fair, Josie had gone to an Atlanta high school that had sixty people out of their senior class come to the university. So, it was feasible that she knew more people here than I did.
“You have to sit with us,” Channing said, latching on to my arm.
“Definitely.”
My buzz was tipping into dangerous territory, but how could I deny the captain of the dance team? I couldn’t.
Georgia had two main dance teams. The one that marched with the band for football games and the varsity team that performed at all basketball games, volleyball games, and gymnastic meets. Channing and I were on the latter.
The lot of us pushed into Sanford Stadium, falling into place in the one hundred–student section in our array of red-black-and-white game day dresses. The good thing about being surrounded by other dancers was that we knew every cheer and doubled the volume in the stadium.
“Oh my God!” Josie screamed. “There’s Cole!”
Her words were lost in the uproar as the football players jogged out onto the football field for the annual scrimmage. Half of the team was in red and half in white. They’d play each other, including any new recruits who had signed to Georgia for next season. The coveted quarterback position was typically won at this game, and we had two promising quarterbacks this year. I couldn’t wait to see them both play.
Though I’d be lying if my eyes didn’t follow Cole in his red uniform. I’d told him last night where I’d be sitting with the rest of the dance team. And today, he looked up at the audience and pointed straight toward me.
The crowd went wild. No one, except Josie and me, knew that the gesture was pointed and not just a thank-you to the entire crowd. My face was on fire, and Josie bounced up and down with excitement.
“He is so hot,” Channing said next to me. “Not my type obviously, but I can appreciate a pretty face.”
“He really is,” I agreed easily.
“I heard that he’s back on the market. His last relationship went down in massive flames.”
I frowned. I didn’t want to know more about him than what he’d told me. If I wasn’t ready to discuss my relationship … maybe he wasn’t either.
“Lila went on a date with him last night,” Josie said gleefully.
Channing’s head snapped to me. “Excuse me? And no phone call? Are we even friends?”
I laughed and shot her an apologetic look. “It was kind of last minute. We have Kinesiology together, and he asked me out.”
“Holy shit! How did it go? Tell me everything.”
So, as the two teams lined up for the game, I divulged to Channing what I’d already spent last night telling Josie. And by the end, Channing looked as if she were going to explode with excitement.
“So, he was pointing at you?” she gasped. She pulled her blonde hair up into a ponytail since the heat was out of this world today. It was like spring had come yesterday and full-blown summer hit today. Typical Georgia.
“Yes!” Josie squealed.
“Oh, I love this. Who knew our little Delilah would snag Cole Davis?”
“I mean, it was one date.”
“Whatever,” Channing said with a hand wave. “That was more than a first date.”
And I couldn’t deny that. Not one bit.
It was a brutally hot day. I was sticky and would have happily gone home to shower and chill in the air conditioning, but I couldn’t leave my seat. The dance team continued to cheer through the fourth quarter. When the red team scored the winning touchdown, the entire stadium went wild, even with the dwindling numbers. We made up for the empty seats.
Before the clock ticked down its final few seconds, I grabbed Josie’s hand and tugged her out of the bleachers. We raced down the stairs to field level. Sanford Stadium was set up with a ring of five-foot hedges surrounding the field and a path around the hedges that led to the seats. I wanted to be the first one down there to take pictures between the hedges.
Josie and I snapped pictures individually and then together when we could grab someone to take it for us. The person taking our picture gasped.
I was about to ask what was wrong when I heard the cheers of the football players behind us. Josie grabbed her phone back and swiveled to take shots of the football players in the hedges, chanting with the marching band and remaining fans.
A few players jumped the hedges and pulled themselves up into the stands in front of the marching band to dance and celebrate.
“Oh my God!” Josie cried, taking picture after picture after picture.
We were at the heart of it. I couldn’t have planned it better if I’d tried.
Then I heard my name behind me.
Josie and I both whipped back around to find Cole Davis standing on the other side of the hedges. His helmet was still on, but I could see the gleam in his eyes and the wide smile on his face.
“This is crazy!” I yelled over to him.
Whatever he said next disappeared as the marching band started up another song.
“What?” I called.
He shook his head in exasperation, and then with two purposeful steps, he jumped, vaulting the hedges and sliding over to the other side. My eyes widened in shock. I’d seen other players clambering over the hedges, but he’d made it look like he’d taken a hurdle. Precise and somehow effortless.
“I said,” he began, tugging his helmet off of his head and looking down at me, “I was looking for you throughout the game.”
“Oh,” I said. “You found me.”
“I guess I did.”
He took that final step forward, bridging the distance between us with ease. His hand pushed up into my hair. My head tilted up to look at him towering over me.
We hung there, suspended in space and time. Everything shifted. The world dropped away. The chanting buzzed into silence. All around us, people celebrated, and here, right now, it was just me and Cole.
Then his head dipped down, and his mouth touched mine. We melded together as if we were always meant to be. He tasted like sweat and the sweet tang of a sports drink and something inexplicably him. My fingers tangled into the front of his jersey, distorting the number eighty-eight. I reveled in the feel of his kiss. I’d been hesitant last night, but all that hesitancy had evaporated.
He hooked his other arm, still holding his helmet, around my back, crushing me against his chest. I’d never felt so small as I did against his muscular build. I stood on my tiptoes, throwing my arms around him as he deepened the kiss. His tongue sweeping in to claim mine. I groaned deep in the back of my throat.
Then to my surprise, he effortlessly lifted me off the ground. I gasped as he twirled me around and then stole another kiss.
My eyes were only for him as he gently set me back on my feet. That was when everything else rushed back in. And the cheers from the crowd had changed in volume, erupting into applause and catcalls and whistles. Which was the moment that I realized they were cheering for us.
My face turned beet red, and I buried it into his jersey. “Oh my God!”
He laughed. “That was quite a kiss.”
“You were on the big screen!” Josie cried, snapping a picture.
“We were not!” I gasped.
Josie winked. “I got it all on my phone.”
“Stop! You did not. How many pictures did you take?”
Josie shrugged. “How could I not take pictures?”
Cole chuckled softly. He put his finger under my chin and tilted it up until I was looking at him. Then he stole another kiss. “Don’t listen to anyone else. This was perfect.”
My eyes locked with his again. “It was.”
“You’re mine now,” he said with all the heat of our first kiss baking in the summer sun.
Still, I shivered at the proclamation. And how right it was.
“I already was.”
And that would never change.
Athens
May 5, 2008
Finals week wasn’t the ideal time to throw a party. I definitely should have been studying for my Spanish final. Languages were not my strong suit, and I needed an A on the final to keep my B in the class. It was pathetic.
Instead, I was waiting for Marley to show up in Athens. She was the genius of us. She’d been in the Duke TIP program since middle school, which identified young talent, and had been admitted to the university with early acceptance. I missed her, as she was five long hours away. Thankfully, she didn’t have any finals at Duke and was currently driving south to be here in time for my birthday party.
I texted her, requesting an ETA.
Driving down the Atlanta Highway. *insert B-52 lyrics*
She was ridiculous, but I was glad that she was finally here.
Cole had been needling me all day about coming over to his place early for birthday shenanigans. It didn’t matter that we’d celebrated his birthday yesterday downtown. Half the football team had drunkenly shown up and gotten him so plastered that he’d blacked out the second I got him into his bed.
It was still surprising to me that our birthdays were so close. His on the fourth of May and mine on the fifth. I’d always hated having my birthday on Cinco de Mayo until college when it was apparently the coolest shit ever, and Cole had promptly declared that he was throwing a joint birthday party. Then he’d planned two anyway. Having two birthday parties after claiming we were only having one was perfectly Cole.
HERE! HERE! HERE!!!!!
I dashed out of my dorm room and down into the Brumby lobby. Marley had hiked up the hill and opened the lobby door when I got out of the elevator. We collided in the middle, laughing and practically near to tears. This was the longest either of us had ever gone without the other. I’d seen her at Christmas, and it was too long to go.
“I missed you!” Marley said.
“So much,” I told her. “Let’s never do this again.”
“Deal.” She finally released me. “So, when do I get to meet him?”
“Cole has been asking the same thing.”
“Well, it’s not fair that Josie was here the weekend y’all met,” Marley said. She brushed strands of her curly, dark hair out of her face and adjusted the large backpack on her back. It was likely all she’d brought with her for the day that she was staying with me before she returned to Savannah for the summer. If I knew my best friend at all, the rest of stuff was neatly arranged in boxes in the trunk of her giant SUV. Likely labeled, dated, and color-coordinated. “I mean, she’s been rubbing it in that she got those pictures of y’all at the game.”
“She sold them to a newspaper,” I groaned, dragging her deeper into the dorm.
“I know! That’s so Josie.”
“Isn’t it?”
We hurried back upstairs, chatting animatedly about everything and nothing.
I’d known Marley since second grade when we were both in Mrs. Jackson’s class. Marley complimented my Lisa Frank shirt, I gushed over her scrunchie, and then we promptly got in trouble for talking too much. We’d been inseparable ever since.
After we both got dressed, I texted Cole to let him know we were on our way and then took my beat-up Hyundai north of the dorms to the light-blue house where Cole lived with his two roommates. I knocked twice on the front door and then let myself inside. The party wouldn’t start for another hour and wouldn’t really get going until later, but already, there were a handful of people present, sitting around, watching TV, and pregaming with beers.
I pulled Marley in behind me. We hurried past one of Cole’s roommates, Barry, and continued into the kitchen. Cole turned at our presence, and a smile split his face.
“Finally,” he said, scooping me up and kissing me.
“I did text you.”
He patted his pockets. “I don’t know where my phone is.”
“You’re always losing it.”
He shrugged. “Doesn’t matter now. You’re here.” He turned to my best friend. “And you must be Marley.”
“I am,” she said, extending her hand for him to shake.
He took it. “So good to finally meet you. Lila talks about you nonstop.”
“Funny. I was going to say the same thing about you.”
He grinned as his gaze shifted back to me. “You talk about me nonstop?”
“You’re my new, shiny toy,” I told him with a wink.
“And what does that say about me?” Marley asked.
“You’re the Woody to his Buzz Lightyear.”
“I don’t know whether or not to be offended by that.”
“You’re forever, babe,” I told her, slinging an arm over her shoulders. “Now, we have two birthdays to celebrate.”
“Yes, what can I get you?” Cole said. “Beer, wine, margaritas?”
“Margaritas,” Marley and I said in unison.
Cole blended together the drinks, and we took them into the living room to watch SportsCenter. I’d seen the baseball highlight plays already. Apparently, it was a casualty of spending a lot of time with Cole. More and more sports.
“So,” Marley said as she sank into a chair. She tucked her legs up underneath her and looked at Cole.
“Oh no,” I said into my margarita.
Cole glanced at me. “What?”
“Here it comes.”
“Tell me everything about you,” Marley said. “What’s your major? What do you want to be when you grow up? What do your parents do?”
“Mars,” I grumbled. “We talked about this.”
She looked sheepish. “I know you told me to stagger my questions, but this is who I am.”
Cole just chuckled. “It’s fine. I don’t mind the third degree from your best friend.”
Cole’s other roommate patted him on the back. “Good luck with that.”
“Thanks, Tony,” Cole said with an eye roll.
Tony leaned forward. “I’ve known him since high school. Trust me, he’s not that interesting.”
Marley and I laughed as Cole punched him in the shoulder.
“Dick,” Cole grumbled. “My major is sports management and marketing. I don’t ever want to grow up. And my dad is a football coach. My mom is a middle school teacher.”
“Okay, okay,” Marley said, holding her hands up. “I don’t understand what sports management even is.”
“It’s someone who wants to work with sports,” I told her.
“Yeah, but … what do you do with that?”
“Ignore her,” I said. “You don’t have to submit to this interrogation. She’s a science person, and she wants to, like, cure cancer.”
“Dementia,” Marley corrected.
“Interrogation already accepted,” Cole said with that same smile. His blue eyes bright as they rested on my best friend. “Sports management could be anything from professional sports to running a rec league. Personally, I’d like to be a talent scout for a professional football team, but I’m also interested in marketing and PR. Which is why I’m a double major.”
“I’m surprised you have time with football.”
Tony chuckled. “He thrives most when he’s swamped. You should have seen him in high school. He played football, ran track, held down a job with his dad, volunteered at a nursing home, and kept a 4.0.”
My eyes widened. Thanks, Marley. Somehow, I was learning more about my own boyfriend through this conversation. I’d known he was a double major. He’d schooled me about that on our second date. But all the rest, I wasn’t aware.
“Yeah, fine,” Cole said, “I like to keep busy. Nothing wrong with that.”
“You were salutatorian without trying. You had to turn down an academic scholarship,” Tony said, crossing his arms. “You’re a monster.”
“You turned down an academic scholarship?” I asked.
Cole shrugged. “I had to. I was offered a football scholarship, too, and there are all these weird NCAA rules. The academic scholarship could go to someone else.”
“Whoa,” I muttered.
“Oh, so you’re smart!” Marley said with a smile.
“Well, I don’t need help on my Intro to Kinesiology paper if that’s what you mean,” Cole said, winking at me.
I stuck my tongue out. “It was a fair question! Most of the jocks aren’t writing their own papers. How was I to know that you’d turned down an academic scholarship?”
“It was cute.”
Marley nodded as if she saw the pieces fall together. “Sports management for you and physical therapy for Lila. You’ll recruit the players, and Lila will piece them back together.”
“Big dreams,” Cole said.
“I like your big dreams and big brain,” I told him.
“Is that a euphemism?” Cole asked, rubbing his nose against mine.
“Maybe.”
“You two are disgusting,” Tony said. He leaned away from our very public display of affection.
I didn’t mind being disgusting. I was exactly where I wanted to be.
Hours later, the house was packed. Everyone must have invited more and more people until I was sure that the police were going to be called for noise complaints. Not that I cared too much as we cheered on Marley doing an upside-down margarita. Marley sat on a chair with her head tipped back while one person simultaneously poured a bottle of tequila and a bottle of margarita mix into her mouth.
The crowd counted for her. “One! Two! Three! Four! Five!”
She waved her hands helplessly, swallowing down the contents and grasping for a lime wedge. Everyone applauded for her as she wobbled back to her feet.
“I’m never doing that again.” She clutched my arm and pulled me away as another victim took a seat. “Why did I do that?”
“Because you’re drunk, Mars.”
She giggled and stumbled a step. “I am not.”
“Yes, you most definitely are. Maybe that last upside-down margarita was a bad idea.”
“No,” she said, waving me away. “It was fine. I’m fine. It’s your birthday! Plus, I rarely drink at Duke. Mostly dance rehearsals and basketball games.”
“Same,” I said with a smile. “I miss having you with me.”
“I know. It’s not the same. Though performing in Cameron has to be better than Georgia basketball.”
“Not an unfair assessment.” Duke basketball was unequivocally better than UGA, but I still loved watching the Georgia games.
“But,” she said, her voice dipping as she leaned into me, “do you know who I saw before I left?”
My stomach dropped at the insinuation. I only knew one other person who went to Duke. “No.”
“Yes, you do,” she teased. “He wanted to come see you for your birthday, but I told him no.”
Ice ran through my veins. “He didn’t say that.”
“He did!” she said, her voice rising.
“Shh,” I hushed her. “Ash hasn’t spoken to me in a year. He’s not going to suddenly want to show up for my birthday. That’s absurd.”
“Fine, don’t believe me. But he said he was going to text you.”
My hand immediately went to my phone. I pulled it out and showed her the blank screen. “Look. Nothing.”
Marley shrugged. “That’s just what he said.”
“What’s going on over here?” Cole asked.
He appeared as if out of thin air, and I jumped nearly out of my skin. I hadn’t been expecting him. My mind had been on Ash, and I definitely didn’t want to be thinking about him.
“Marley’s drunk,” I told him.
“I’m not drunk,” she countered. Making her point by trying to push off of the wall she was currently leaning on and failing spectacularly. “Oof!” She latched back on to the wall. “Maybe I am a little drunk.”
“We should get you some water.”
“On it,” Cole said, heading back into the busy kitchen.
“He’s in Athens tonight,” Marley continued when he was gone.
I closed my eyes and took a breath. “Ash is here?”
“He offered to drive with me. Then, we wouldn’t have had to drive separately.”
“What were you going to do with your stuff?”
“I don’t know. It’s Ash. He probably had his stuff flown home.” She waved her hand. “You know how he is.”
“I do,” I whispered.
“So anyway, yeah, I think he’s downtown.”
“Downtown?” Cole asked as he reappeared with a water. “I don’t think that sounds like a good idea for you, Marley.”
“Not me. Ash.”
I closed my eyes and sighed heavily. Cole didn’t know what that name meant to me. We hadn’t talked about deeper topics yet in our relationship. I hadn’t wanted to tell him about what had happened with me and Ash in high school … the good or the bad. And I really didn’t want to talk about it on my birthday.
“Who’s Ash?” Cole asked.
Marley’s eyes widened. “Um … nobody.”
Cole looked to me with raised brows.
“My ex,” I told him. “He goes to Duke with Marley, and I guess he’s also in town.”
“The football player?”
I nodded.
Marley sipped on her water and eyed us. “Sorry. I hadn’t planned to tell you.”
“It’s fine.” I patted Marley’s shoulder. “Maybe you should sit down for a bit, Mars.”
After I got her into a chair to continue to drink her water and made sure she was comfortable and watched by one of my dance friends, I returned to Cole. I ran a hand down my face. “Sorry about that.”
He shrugged. “Doesn’t bother me. I’m still friends with my ex. Jess actually called to wish me happy birthday yesterday. It’s not weird.”
Right.
Not weird.
Except that he had no idea about me and Ash. Or else he probably wouldn’t have said that.
