Page 74 of Irresistibly Us
I shake my head. “I really, really don’t. There’s somethingelse. Something more. The way he looks at me lately? Touches me? It’s new, and it’s not all friendly. I tried to convince myself it was all in my head, but that stopped working right around the time he told me he didn’t want me to clean my stuff up because he liked havingproof of Sophieall over his house.”
“Oh my god,” Sarah swoons, and when I look at her, I have to smother a laugh because she is the actual human embodiment of the heart eyes emoji. “He loves you,” she says. “He really, really loves you.”
“Yep.” Maddy nods emphatically. “I’ve thought he did for a long time. He just didn’t know it yet. Cam thinks so too. And Drew.”
I narrow my eyes at her. “You’ve talked about this with Cam and Drew?”
She shrugs, unbothered. “Cam just asked me if I ever thought Tyler had big time feelings for you because he and Drew always thought he did but was maybe mistaking them for friendship. Aside from Oliver and Jack, they’re closest to him, and maybe even closer since they’re teammates. They see things, and everything they’ve seen in the four years since Tyler joined the Renegades has made them think that man is head over heels for you. Maybe it took you guys living together for him to figure it out.”
“Also, you dropping your towel probably didn’t hurt,” Emmy says wryly.
“Definitely not.” Maya points at me. “Like we said. Fabulous tits.”
I snort out a laugh even as hope bubbles up inside me. Hope I’ve been too scared to let myself feel in case I was making all this up. But with Maddy’s words reverberating around my head, I consider that maybe, when it comes to Tyler Hansley, it’s time to let bright-side Sophie come out to play.
“Oh my god,” Sarah says with a brilliant smile on her face aimed directly at me, and I feel a rush of warmth for my sunshiniest friend. For all of them, really, but no one is a biggercheerleader for love and fun than Sarah Wyles. “Are you thinking about it? Is it happening?”
“Is what happening?”
Without warning, the door to Maddy’s house flies open, my grandma’s voice ringing through the room. We all turn as one to watch my mom, followed by Tyler, Caitlin, and Maddy’s moms—Julie, Hallie, and Emma—come piling into the living room. They are led by Rachel Parker, technically Caitlin, Jack, and Tyler’s grandma, but in actuality, the matriarch of the Parker family has long since claimed all of us, and our parents, as her own.
“You invited the moms?” I hiss at Maddy.
“Oh, honey,” Rachel says, nudging Emmy aside and plopping down right between us. “You should know by now that no one has to invite us anywhere.”
“Sorry not sorry,” Julie says with a shrug, dropping a kiss on top of my head and grabbing a taco before taking the seat on my other side. “Tyler told us you were all hanging here, so we decided to crash.”
Shit. My stomach does a nervous little shimmer at the reminder of who, exactly, Julie is. She’s always just been Aunt Julie, my best friend Tyler’s mom and my mom’s best friend. But considering we’re sitting here talking about how I am head over my damn heels in love with her son, it might be time to reframe that relationship in my head. Except my traitorous brain chooses this moment to serve me up a three-year-old memory to remind me that Julie does, in fact, know I’m in love with her son and the exact circumstances surrounding her acquiring that little nugget of knowledge.
“He said you would have tacos.” My mom sits behind me and slings an arm around my shoulder, tugging me into a backwards hug. “Besides, I think the better question would be why didn’tyouinvite me? It’s been a minute, Soph. If your dad wasn’t keeping tabs on your house renovation, I wouldn’t know anything about you, and you know how much I hate notknowing things. How come you didn’t tell me about the fireplace?”
“Uh, what about the fireplace?” I ask, turning to face my mom, trying to remember if Tyler told me anything about a fireplace. I can’t even remember if my fireplace was damaged in the flood. Or what it looked like before the flood, if I’m being honest. The salient details of home ownership are not my forte.
“Don’t ask her anything about the renovations, Aunt Molly,” Caitlin says with a rare grin. “Soph is on a strict need-to-know basis. As in, she wants nothing to do with it, and Tyler took control of everything with Uncle Gabe.”
“Did he?” Hallie says with a full-blown smirk as she takes the seat next to Caitlin and grabs a taco from the platter. “How thoughtful of him.”
“Tyler has always been the most thoughtful of our boys.” Emma runs a hand over Maddy’s bright red ponytail and helps herself to a margarita. “He’s good like that.”
“Isn’t he just,” Rachel says thoughtfully, leaning to the side to bump my shoulder with hers, and I watch as she, my mom, Hallie, Julie, and Emma exchange a look that manages to be both knowing and gleeful all at the same time.
“Uh, what is happening right now?” I ask suspiciously.
“Nothing,” Rachel says, her voice givingI know nothing at all, but her body language and amused eyes telling the opposite story. “We don’t know anything.”
“We definitely don’t know anything, and we definitely didn’t crash this taco night to see if maybe you were finally spilling your guts about your feelings for Tyler. We wouldn’t know anything about that.” Julie gives me a wry grin when I cough out a laugh because this night isn’t turning out at all the way I thought it would.
“What do you mean, finally? How do you know I have feelings for Tyler?” is all I can think to say, even though I know exactly how Julie knows.
All at once, Julie, Rachel, Emma, Hallie, and my mom start laughing.
“Sorry,” my mom manages, leaning forward and squeezing my shoulder. “It’s just…well, you haven’t been all that subtle, Soph. What’s it been? Like, two years now?”
“Three,” Julie says, wrapping an arm around my waist. “Ever since the night that…”
“No,” I say, holding up a hand, feeling my face flush with embarrassment. I don’t get embarrassed easily, except for anytime I get a reminder of the night my feelings for Tyler stood up and introduced themselves. “We are not discussing that night.”
“Wait,” Emmy says, studying Julie like she holds the secrets of the universe. “You know what happened the night Sophie realized she was in love with Tyler?”
