Matt: I mean, this is actually Cyclone. He hacked my phone.
Matt: This is Matt now. I got control over my phone again. Wtf is Kashsters? That’s disrespectful and I have a respectable amount of fear of both my sister and Kash and I would never make a joke like that, now.
Torie: **handing you a wipe for your drool there**
Matt: Thanks. I’m handing it to Cyclone. Love you, B. A lot. Don’t sic anyone on me please.
Matt: I’m still grateful for my ass.
Torie: Moving on before Matt remembers he’s had too much to drink for this group chat. B, you okay with the no-Liam vote?
Bailey: I am. Thanks you guys for even thinking of that.
Melissa: Care about you! Also, I’m super excited for a Naveah night. Seems like forever since we had one.
Torie: Whoop for some drinking.
Matt: Whoop!
Torie: Not you, Matt. You’ve already been over served.
Tamara: ** snickering ** you just got served
Matt: I’m thinking I was added by mistake.
Melissa: Lol! You’re fine. Everyone’s fine. I just wanted to make sure about the no-Liam invite because tonight seems like a night where he might’ve been invited, but this semester’s been different.
Bailey: I’m good and thank you! See you guys at Naveah. Matt, we’re waiting for you downstairs.
Matt: See you in two snaps.
THIRTY-FIVE
Kash
“You two seem cozy.”
That was Matt’s greeting as he slid into the booth beside me. He’d just gone to the bar for another drink, though it was more to flirt with the new bartender, and now he was studying where Bailey was standing with Torie and Tamara. Her friend Melissa was there, too, and there was an uneasy edge to the whole group. It’d been worse when we first arrived. I’d kept an eye on it and it was getting better. A couple more drinks and they’d be laughing like times before Bailey had lost her mother.
“Bailey and me, or are you talking about someone else?” I nodded in their direction, turning to eye Matt as he continued to eye them.
He took a drag from his drink before putting it on the table. He slumped a little in the booth, but that was his way. He threw people off with that body language, but he was never not watchful and alert. Or he wasn’t unless he had too many drinks or something else in his system, and so far, I was counting only two drinks.
We’d been here two hours by now, so that was a tortoise rate for Matt Francis.
“You and the B Master.” He tipped his head her way. “She’s happier now that you’re back.”
Well, shit. Here we were.
I grinned at him, cocking my head back a little. “We doing this?”
His eyes met mine, and he had his own answering grin. He sat up and leaned forward, resting his arms on the table. “I guess. I mean, why not? We didn’t get to it before.” He shrugged, his head falling down a little. “I am her brother, you know.”
“You want to know my intentions towards your sister?”
Another half grin. “Yeah. I do.” The grin vanished and he leveled a look at me, a hard look. “Don’t leave again, fucker.”
“There’s a part of her that blames me. I needed to give her time and space to process those emotions, and you know it.” I rested my head against the seat, rolling my head to look his way. He had slid down, mirroring me.