Total pages in book: 139
Estimated words: 133655 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 668(@200wpm)___ 535(@250wpm)___ 446(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 133655 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 668(@200wpm)___ 535(@250wpm)___ 446(@300wpm)
“I have fake IDs for both of us.” He winks. “I figured I should balance my crime with something fun.”
“So, you want to balance the crime of killing Luna with the crime of underage drinking? A sin for a sin?” I question, and he just laughs.
“Fake IDs are barely a crime. Everyone on campus has one. Frankly, you should feel lucky that your best friend can always pull through with the right connections. If you ask me, while the day started out a little…bad…it’s starting to feel like it’s turning around.” He grabs the pothos and holds it up. “And let’s not forget about Luna 2.0.”
“Fine. I’ll eat your stupid pizza and watch Grease and go to Groove.” I sigh again. “But I swear, if you manage to kill this Luna—”
“I’ll buy you a whole fucking jungle, Jules.”
I laugh. I can’t help it. Ace Kelly is irresistible—just like he always has been.
Ace
My phone vibrates in the back pocket of my jeans as my eyes catch sight of the sign for Groove in the distance. I pull it out to find missed text.
Lindsey: Hello? Ace? Don’t leave me on read. When are we going out again?
Like I told Julia earlier today, Lindsey is a nice girl—with great legs and a curvy ass—but she’s not really my style. Frankly, this is the tenth text she’s sent me in the past forty-eight hours.
Emily: Hey…
And Emily is a girl I met at a frat party two months ago. We danced and flirted and kissed a few times, but we haven’t managed to meet up again since that one night.
Now, I’m not a total asshole who ghosts girls, but when Julia nudges me in the ribs, saying, “Ace, now isn’t the time to text your harem. Get your head in the game,” I don’t hesitate to slide my phone back into my pocket.
“Relax, Jules,” I say, wrapping my arm around her shoulders. “It’s all going to work out.”
She flashes me a nervous look, and I pull her closer to my side. She’s anxious about using a fake ID for the first time.
“The bouncer isn’t going to know, okay?” I whisper into her ear. “I got you.”
She rolls her eyes but follows my lead, officially allowing me back into her good graces after the fuckup with her beloved plant.
Luna’s funeral was short but adorably dramatic in a way that only Julia Brooks can pull off.
She insisted on a eulogy, and I let her roast me the entire time while I buried the dead plant in the Brookses’ backyard. We ate pizza, argued over whether Grease is a rom-com some more—it is—and then sat down and watched it for probably the hundredth time. I know every fucking word of that movie, and Julia still pretends to be annoyed by it even though I know she ships Danny and Sandy together as much as I do.
It was a great day, despite the rocky start, and now, with the night still young, we’re with our closest pals and heading to one of the hottest clubs in the city.
The bouncer flexes and postures as we approach the front door of a brick building in SoHo. His mouth curls into a subtle snarl that accompanies the complaints from the people waiting in line behind us—otherwise known as the ones I’m acting like don’t exist right now as I move our group toward the entrance where music pounds through the door and the flicker of strobe lights peeks through the bottom crack.
Groove is a college club that’s well-known by the young and rich of NYC. No doubt, socialites, polo types, and American royalty have soured Mr. Muscles’s point of view on groups that bypass the line, but I’m not fucking standing out here sweating my balls off in the June heat. And I’m sure as shit not letting our friend Scottie suffer through the wait in her wheelchair while people whisper.
Playing cutsies is the only way.
Luckily, I know I’ll change the beefhead’s mind—since he’s already preparing to tell us to fuck off—because I, Ace Kelly, have a special gift for changing everyone’s minds.
It’s the reason broody Finn Hayes and star quarterback Blake Boden are my friends, the catalyst for my popularity, and truthfully, the only way I got into Dickson University last year.
In high school, I slacked a bit on my grades—shocking, I know—and landed myself on the wait list. But all it took was a quick trip to campus and a chat with the dean, and I was well on my way to my first semester of freshman year on time, with my parents none the wiser.
Which is good—because my mom would have fucking killed me. She’s not the type of mom to whisper disappointment with clasped hands and pursed lips. Cassie Kelly is a stone-cold soul-snatcher. If she ever finds out, you’ll be talking to my ghost. Seriously, R-I-P me.