Zellman, Cross, and I stood in a straight line. I think we were all of the same mindset, simply waiting for him to tire himself out.

Jordan went back to grunting and cursing, and soon the couch was through the door and out onto the patio. That couch wasn’t ours. If we damaged it, who was I kidding? If we were able to stay here for all four years, the couch was going to be replaced. Probably multiple times.

“Her father fucked up.”

He was kicking the couch over to the lawn as he talked.

“So he took a bad loan out from Harper, Sr.”

Another kick. A shove. More grunting and cursing.

“And fucking Harper, Sr. is going to cash it in, I don’t know what the fuck that means, but Tabatha being Tabatha—” one last heave and Jordan throws one end of the couch over the other and it tumbles all the way to the street. And we’re also on a slight hill. “—being fucking Tabatha, decides to whore herself out to Harper, Jr. to get the Dad Douchebag off her own douchebag father’s back, and for who?” He stalked to the street, lining up on the other side of the couch as he bent down. “For her mother! All this shit is for her own mother. Not for her dad, not for herself, not for either Harper Fucktwit, but for her mom. She doesn’t want her mom getting sick from worrying, from the shame? That’s the catalyst for all of this.” With a roar, he picked up the couch and began walking back to the house. With the couch. Over his shoulder and over his bent back.

As if we were one person moving in tandem, Zellman, Cross, and I shifted, stepping back.

Jordan went past, still with the couch on his back.

He dropped it, straightening.

The guy wasn’t even fazed.

I glanced at Cross. What the hell did they do in the gym all those hours? Could he do that, too?

As if sensing my thoughts, Cross shot me a look, his eyes darkening. Not now.

I grinned back, but he was right. Back to Jordan.

Instead of starting to toss it, because that’s what I’d been expecting, he righted it back up and dropped down onto it. Burying his head into his hands, he leaned over and yelled, “FUUUUUUCK!” Looking up, his face was stricken. “Did she sleep with him? Why?” His voice hitched. “Why didn’t she come to me? To us?”

Zellman coughed. “Uh, I’m not trying to disagree with you or set you off so you’re all Hulk again, but what could we have done? What could we do? None of us have parents who have connections.”

Well…

Jordan glanced at me, his eyes sliding to Cross.

I followed his look and yeah. That wasn’t technically true.

Cross noticed and backed up a step. “What?”

Jordan stood, but he did it slowly. He was being smart, though his words came out hurriedly. “Bren’s connections are to a motorcycle club and bounty hunters. Zellman—Zellman’s connections are to us. And my parents own a small construction company, emphasis on the small part. You, though. Your dad works—”

“But he doesn’t. He took a new position this year. He’s got no connections anymore.”

“But—”

“But nothing, Jordan,” Cross raised his voice. “None of us have the connections to handle a bad loan.”

“Eh…”

I was getting sick of the …

This one came from Zellman, and his eyes were pinned to me. “Do we really not have those connections? Bad loan, right? That’s something in Bren’s circles, if you ask me.”

A growl emanated from Cross’ throat and he stepped in front of me. “That’s bad business.”

“Bad loan. The one guy’s daughter felt like she needed to whore herself out—”

“I don’t like the whore word.” My two cents.

“—or heavily kiss the guy to appease the son, whom she was hoping could appease the dad to lay off trying to get his money back from the bad loan. I mean,” Zellman took all of us in before swallowing, “that doesn’t seem like it’s in the up-and-up business world, if you know what I mean.”

His gaze came to me.

Jordan’s gaze was on me, too.

Cross was rigid, standing in front of me. “No.”

Jordan noted, his tone softening, “She could call her brother, talk it out with him. He might have ideas.”

“I said no!”

Jordan sighed. He shifted forward, his foot sounding on the pavement, a rock scraping over it. “Bren was arrested last semester and you lost your shit. You had to be carried out of the police station.”

I sucked in my breath, and held a hand out, touching Cross’ back. It was so tense. He was solid, almost like pavement.

“Guys.” Jordan’s anguish was so deep, so raw.

I stepped around Cross, hearing him draw in a sharp breath, straightening as if my touch had kept him in place. His hand came to my arm, sliding to my wrist. He held me there, keeping me to his side.

Jordan choked out, “A phone call. One call.” He looked at Cross. “What could it hurt?”

As he spoke, Cross’ tension just doubled.

I moved forward, my hand lifting, and I laid my hand on his chest. With my palm against his shirt, I held it in place, speaking to Jordan. “One call to Channing. We’ll see what he thinks.”

Zellman spoke up, “Tabatha has to be there.”

“Z…” From Jordan, a whisper.

Zellman shook his head, his jaw firm. “She has to be there. She has to know. This is going to affect her and her family. She has to know.” He focused only on Jordan. “You’re going to have to apologize for all that pussy you ran through, thinking she cheated on you willingly.” His mouth twitched. “That’s going to suuuuck. But on the bright side, at least you didn’t get to her sorority girls yet.”

Jordan expelled some air, shaking his head and massaging his jaw. “You’re a dick.”

“Nah.” Zellman pounded him in the shoulder before stepping back quickly. “Just family.” He began backing toward the house, his hands in the air. “My two cents, we should do this as soon as possible.” His eyes fell to the couch. “And that thing should go in the garage. We can drink beer out here on it.”

Jordan frowned, but he was also trying not to grin at the same time. “We need a couch inside.”

“Yeah,” Zellman called out from inside the garage, opening the door to the house. “We can con Blaise into buying one. He’s rich and bad at cards. He’ll cough up two grand easily.”

That had merit. I asked Cross, “Does your brother play cards?”

Cross shrugged. “Who the fuck knows. He’ll give you the money. Just tell him he can hit Harper first.”

“No!” Jordan barked out, his eyes heated again. “Harper’s mine.”

Cross got quiet. “Harper did something to Aspen.”

The heated look only got worse. “Then he can think he’s getting first crack, but the reality is that I’ll get first crack.”

Cross was quiet, then nodded. “I’m good with that.”

Zellman yelled from the house, “Can we get back to our crew meeting? We didn’t finish it from last night, and I have curse words to say about Sunday having Bren’s ex’s baby. It’s my turn in the chair.”

I grimaced. “When he says it like that, it just sounds God-awful.”

Jordan chuckled. “Good thing that documentary is already done, huh? Can you imagine if they got this shit on there?”

No. I didn’t want to imagine that.

We went inside and Zellman got his turn to spew.

FROM: Tazsters

TO: Brenners

SUBJECT: holy fuckers fucking around

I just got off the phone with Tab. I’m coming there. I’m packing my bags now. We’re going to bust him open. Wide open. I’m heated, Bren. Seriously fucking heated. Please tell me you guys are going all-crew on him? Or maybe not.

That’d be evidence, wouldn’t it?

Never mind.

Code words now.

When I want you to beat someone up, I’ll use the word ‘hug.’ I really really really want you to fucking hug the fuck out of the Zach guy.

Wait.

Zeke, right?

I’m still confused on who we’re hating, but I need to know because I’m seriously hating. I’m looking him up. I can cyber stalk his ass. I’ll find everything there is to know about him, so you can, you know—hug him. For me. Extra hard.

Race is in too.

—Still The Best Twin

BREN

Two days later and we had everyone in our living room, my phone sitting in the middle of the coffee table.

“This is a nice couch.”

No one groaned hearing Blaise’s smug comment, but I knew everyone wanted to. He’d been rubbing it in since he showed up, and Zellman hadn’t been able to talk him into losing a game of cards. Turns out that Cross’ brother wasn’t a big gambler when it came to cards. He mentioned something about ‘reforming himself’ so he couldn’t do cards, but when Blaise pushed for the reason behind the invitation, Cross told him. Grudgingly.

This morning, a new couch was delivered to our front door, no cards were ever dealt.

“Shut up,” Jordan sniped at him, throwing Tabatha a glare, too. “No one fucking asked for your charity.”