The sound of the water isn’t coming from his bathroom. It’s coming from his roommate’s bathroom.

Confused, I twist the doorknob, and push the door forward, but it suddenly swings open and I fall forward into something hard. Something super hard. It takes me several seconds to realize that that the “something” is a set of abs. A set of sexy, wet, and all too familiar abs...

Slowly glancing up, my eyes widen as I see the man who’s invaded my nightmares for the past ten years. He’s ten years older now. Ten times sexier.

Dean Collins...

What the fuck!

My throat is dry and I can’t move. My mind can’t seem to form a coherent thought.

For a single second, my mind travels back ten years ago and I remember when his body was pressed against mine, when he pulled me into the shower with him and made love to me after a game.

“Have you forgotten how to use your motor skills, Mia?” He quickly snaps me into the present with his asshole greeting. “Do you really need to keep leaning against me?”

I immediately step back, scowling. “What are you doing here?”

“I live here. What are you doing here?”

“My brother lives here. He owns this place, actually. I take it you’re his latest charity case?”

“I’m not anyone’s fucking charity case.” He hisses, glaring at me. “How long will you be in town?”

“Why?”

“I need to know how long I need to stay at a hotel.” The look in his eyes is glacial. “How long I need to stay the hell away from you.”

“Oh, hey!” Eric suddenly walks over, completely unaware of the tension between us. “I didn’t know you were home, man. This is my little sister I told you about months ago. Aim, this is Dean. Dean this is Aim. I think you two went to the same high school, right? Central? Or did mom try to make you go to Main like me?”

“I went to Central.” My eyes are on Dean and I can’t help but notice that his left arm, which is way more sculpted than it was in high school, is covered in a sexy sleeve of all black ink. (And by “sexy,” I mean someone else would find that shit sexy, because I don’t.)

“Alright, well.” Eric shrugs, still oblivious. “We were going to go zip-lining, Dean. You want to come?”

“The zip-line is closed this month,” Dean says flatly.

I let out a sigh of relief and Dean’s jaw clenches.

“I forgot about that,” Eric says. “Well, would you like to join us for dinner? You always pick the best places.”

“No,” I say, shaking my head. “He cannot come. He. Can. Not. Come. You said it was going to be just us, Eric.”

“Dean is family, Mia. He’s practically like a brother to me.” He ignores me and looks at Dean. “You want to come or not?”

A twisted smirk crosses Dean’s lips. “I’d love to.”

***

Hours later, I sit at a table and try to prevent myself from leaning over it and stabbing Dean in the eye with my fork. Since Eric is sitting at my side, he’s missing the palpable hate that’s practically radiating off the two of us.

He and Dean have mostly been discussing football, but Dean has thrown looks of disgust my way each time Eric has looked away.

I cannot believe that the guy who broke my heart in high school is sitting across from me and is seemingly friends (good friends) with my brother. Not only that, but I can’t believe that he’s glaring at me, like I’m the one who hurt him.

Out of nowhere, I find myself muttering, “Portland is a long way from Harvard...How the hell did you end up here?”

Dean, clearly catching my every word, mutters back, “If you kept in contact, you would fucking know.”

“I had no reason to keep in contact, because as I first told you years ago, I don’t approve of douchebags.”

“Then how have you been living with yourself all this time?”

Eric looks over at me. “Mia, who the hell are you talking to?”

“No one important,” I say. “Speaking of which, your friend Dean here looks like he’s about my age. And since you’ve been living here for as long as I can remember, and you don’t typically hang with people who aren’t as ‘established’ as yourself, are you mentoring him? Is he an artist in training? A freelance charity project for your shop?”

Eric playfully places his palm against my forehead. “Are you sure you’re not jet lagged? Sick? You’re acting like the guy isn’t sitting right across from you.”

I overhear Dean mutter, “I wish I wasn’t,” but he quickly recovers.

“Dean can speak for himself.” He looks right at me. “I went to college here, and for the second time today, Eric’s little sister, I am not his charity case.”

He and Eric quickly slip back into their football conversation, and Dean uses every free moment possible to glare at me again and again.

As they’re discussing the upcoming playoffs, the waitress sets a new basket of breadsticks on the table. Dean and I both reach for it and end up grabbing the same breadstick.

“You can have it,” he says under his breath, low enough that Eric can’t hear. “You always did like taking things away from people when they needed it most. Didn’t you?” He lets the bread go. “Shouldn’t stop your habit now, should we?”

“Fuck you, Dean,” I say, high enough so that Eric can hear.

“What the hell, Mia?” Eric turns to look at me. “What’s wrong with you? Why are you being rude to a guy you just met?”

“We’ve met before,” Dean says in an ‘I’m-clearly-the-more-mature-one’ voice that drives me insane.

“Oh?” Eric asks, looking back and forth. “So, y’all were cool in high school, after all?”

“No,” we say in unison, and then I clear my throat.

“I wouldn’t say that at all.” I break my breadstick. “He was the quarterback. I was the nerd.”

“Ah! Okay, okay, I get it.” Eric raises his hands in a playful surrender. “So, does everyone at Central have some type of long-running inside joke if you were in different social circles?”

Neither of us answer him.

“We had something similar at Main.” Eric smiles to himself. “I still can’t bring myself to like any of the jocks if I run into them now. We just didn’t get along that well.”

“Exactly,” Dean says, breaking a new breadstick—glaring at me as he continues to break it into even smaller pieces. “We just didn’t get along that well...”

Chapter 12

MIA

There are no words to describe how awkward it is being in a car with Dean after all these years. Eric is driving and Dean is sitting in the passenger seat, while I sit in the back. Ever since we left dinner, the two of them have been chatting as if they’ve known each other their whole lives, and thankfully, neither has asked me to contribute to the conversation. Not that I would know what to say anyway.

I keep my head directed toward the side window and stare at Portland’s skyline as we head back to the condo. Just as I think we’re seconds away from ending this awkward-as-hell day, Eric pulls into a gas station.

“I need to fill up so I won’t have to do this in the morning,” he says, putting the car in park. “Be right back.” He gets out, leaving me trapped with the past.

I unbuckle my seatbelt and prepare to get out, so the two of us won’t have to speak, but Dean turns around to look at me.

With no expression on his face what so ever, he speaks. “He told me your name was ‘Aim’...He mentioned that I might’ve known you in high school, but he wasn’t even sure what school you went to, since he left home when he was so young.” He clenches his jaw. “I swear, if I had known that you were his little sister, if he had ever shown me any pictures, a social media profile, or given me even a slight inkling that Aim was you, I would’ve moved the fuck out long before you got here.” He gets out of the car before I can and slams the door.

I sit there with my heart in my throat and curses ready to fire off on my lips.