I’m grinning while I eyeball the table to decide how I want to play my next shot. “House rules. You lose a turn for making up stupid house rules.”

“Agreed,” Grady calls.

“Rawk! Eat shit and sniff my armpit. Rawk!”

Cooper points at Long Beak Silver, who’s flitting around unsupervised. Pop must have left the window open for him again. “That means he’s taking my side. We need a tie-breaker.”

“Are they always like this?” Henri whispers to Luca. Everyone’s gathered around to watch. The locals because they know we’re going to be utterly ridiculous, and the team because the locals gathered.

I assume.

Possibly Cooper’s planted people in the crowd to distract me and throw me off my game.

“I took a glitter bomb meant for Cooper,” Max tells her dryly. “Pretty sure they’re always like this.”

“Oh my gosh, I wondered if you knew your hair sparkles a little when you turn just right.”

“Been saving it to share with Luca.”

“Get your glitter hair away from me, dude. I’ve got a commercial shoot next week.”

“Tillie Jean’s turn,” Aunt Glory calls. “You’re rusty on dreaming up dumb rules, Cooper.”

“Rawk! Girls smell like fart powder! Rawk!”

I lean over the table. “Eleven in the side pocket. Also, I get seventy-five Shipwreck points if I manage to take the bird out with a ball shot off the table.”

“You get three thousand Shipwreck points if you take the bird out with a scratch,” Annika corrects.

“Babe,” Grady says.

“I said what I said. That parrot needs remedial training.”

“But three thousand Shipwreck points means she’ll get the trophy even if she poisons everyone at the Pirate Festival.”

“Worth it.”

“Rawk! You wet the bed and your mother reads Chuck Tingle! Rawk!”

I ignore the bird and take my shot, but just as my stick’s about to connect with the cue ball, Max speaks up. “Manners, you mangy bird.”

And I scratch.

I freaking scratch.

Cooper starts to hoot, but then—

“Rawk! Sorry, King Growly Bear, ruler of all the land. Rawk!”

The entire bar goes silent, and all of us turn to stare.

Half of us gawk at the bird.

The other half of us—me included—gawk at Max.

“What did he just call you?” I ask.

Max doesn’t look at me. He’s having a stare-down with the bird, who’s sitting on a pirate boat steering wheel mounted to the wall.

Also?

His cheeks are going ruddy under the thick stubble he’s been growing out this week, and the bar’s soft lighting can’t hide it.

“Long Beak Silver.” Grady steps between them. “Go swab the deck.”

“Rawk! Asshole.”

The parrot fluffs his bright feathers, then takes off from the wheel and flies to the perch set up just for him over the door.

Vinnie reaches over and opens it, and he departs into the night.

I look back at Max. Our eyes meet for a split second before he drops his gaze to his stein.

My heart flutters.

I don’t know why it flutters, but it freaking flutters. I feel thirteen again, wearing braces, my biggest worry that my acne medicine won’t work in time for my skin to be clear before the very first dance of my life where the boy I was crushing on would probably be there.

Long Beak Silver hasn’t ever called anyone king of anything before. And King Growly Bear?

I call Max growly bear.

Pretty sure no one else does.

Did I accidentally teach Long Beak Silver to say that?

Or did he?

“Asshole parrot,” Grady mutters, snapping my attention back to the game. “Cooper. Your turn.”

Cooper props his hip on the table, slides his stick behind him, and takes aim at the cue ball. “Four in the corner pocket.”

I shake my head, which is still living in Max-land. “Do I even have to remind you that you just tried to make it illegal for me to put my boobs on the table, and now you’re sitting on it?”

“We don’t both have boobs, but we both have butts. You can sit on the table too. That’s fair.”

“That is not—”

“Agreed,” Grady interrupts. “You both have butts. That house rule can stand.”

I point to my eyes, then use my fingers to point at Cooper. “Don’t try anything else cute. I’ve got my eye on you.”

“Did you know he could play pool?” Robinson mutters to someone behind me.

I say someone because I can’t afford the distraction of acknowledging who that someone is.

Not if I want to win.

Cooper won our final game last winter before leaving for spring training. I owe him payback.

“Yes,” Max answers Robinson. “That’s why none of us play him when we’re out.”

Cooper taps the cue ball, shooting from behind, and it rolls smoothly across the table, cracks against the four, which ricochets off the side of the table and sails directly into the corner pocket.

“Is Tillie Jean any good?” Robinson whispers.

I look back at him. “You wanna play me next?”

His eyes go comically wide, and you can practically see him debating with himself if he wants to lose to me, or if he can live with himself—and Cooper—if he beats me.

“I can take losing,” I tell him.

Max smirks. “I’ll play you.”

“Three in the side pocket,” Cooper says, saving me from answering Max.

I wonder if Max knows any trick shots. Or if he cheats. If he’d insist on playing again if he lost, or if I’d be the one demanding a rematch.

If I’d let him win.

What would I bet Max Cole if we were playing pool?

Probably my underwear.

And if we were anywhere else, and I were related to anyone else, he might take that bet.

The balls crack together on the table, and I jolt back to reality as Cooper puts the three ball in the side pocket.

He grins at me over the table. “Should I go easy on you?”

“Never.”

“Remember, you asked for it.”

“Famous last words, Stinky Booty.”

I’m eating my own words, watching as he sinks the two, six, five, and seven balls as well, ignoring my attempts to distract him or make up new house rules until he has one solid ball and the eight ball left.

He squats next to the table, examining the layout. It’s not looking good for him—I have five balls clearly between him and his precious one that he needs to sink without hitting any of my balls first, plus, he’s in a better position to sink the eight ball and lose outright—but I don’t ever, ever count Cooper out.

“You ever play?” Brooks asks Grady.

Our big brother shakes his head. “Not against the two of them.”

“I won’t think less of you if you call it a pass and walk away,” I tell Cooper.

He snorts.

It’s so predictable that I smile bigger.

“Off the top, around the corner pocket, one in the side,” he announces.

“One-armed and blindfolded?” I ask.

His eyes meet mine, and he starts to grin. “If I hit that shot, you’re doing my laundry for the next month.”