In my life, no one has ever offered to help me. I’m the one who does the helping. I help and plan and lead and organize everyone and everything and no one offers to help because everyone knows I would never accept it. But Asher either doesn’t know me well enough to know that, or he understands me so well, he knew exactly how to ask. I’m not naive enough to think it’s the former.
We’ll take a week to drive there and make some fun stops along the way.
I can’t wait to show you everything there is to do in Boulder.
Just pack a suitcase and leave everything else to me. I’ll take care of all the plans.
I think Asher offering to take care of everything melted my brain because I found myself saying yes, spending a week clearing my calendar and getting Molly and Emma to cover whatever I couldn’t cancel or reschedule.
Molly is right that this is unlike me. But with my suitcases packed and my friends crowding my space, I admit something to myself. Something that has been hovering in the background of my mind all week, since I agreed to Asher’s insane idea. That the relief of saying yes to Asher, of clearing my calendar and getting away from it all for the first time in my life, was so overwhelming that it almost brought me to my knees. And that’s fucking scary because if I’m not the go-getter who always wants to be in the office, the attorney who thrives on the pressure, the has it all together law firm partner, then who the hell am I?
The doorbell interrupts my thought spiral.
“Tacos!” Molly jumps off the bed and runs down the stairs to answer the door with Emma close behind her, leaving Hallie and me in my room.
“I’m proud of you, you know,” Hallie says from her perch on top of my dresser.
I just scoff at that. “Proud of me for what? And can you get off my dresser? You know I hate when you do that.”
She smirks at me but doesn’t move. “I know. I’m proud of you for going on this trip and for taking the time away. You deserve it, Jules. I won’t ask you again why you’re going because I know you have your reasons, but I just want you to know I think it’s a good thing.”
“You don’t think it’s crazy? A two-week road trip with a guy I barely know?”
Hallie grins at me. “Oh, it’s definitely crazy, but the good kind of crazy. Asher is a good guy, Jules. He and Ben have a miles long text chain and are basically besties. Jeremy wants him to come work for the foundation full time, and you know how protective Jeremy is over who gets close to his baby. And did you know he went to the gym with Ben, Jeremy, and Jordan yesterday?”
I did, in fact, know that because Asher texted me a selfie they took and fuck if his smiling face next to some of the most important people in my life didn’t hit me right in the feels. And…other places. I really need to get a handle on myself before I get into his car tomorrow morning.
“It’s nice that he’s making friends with them. It seems like he doesn’t have close friends here which is weird because he’s played for the Renegades for eight seasons.”
Hallie looks at me strangely. I realize my mistake almost immediately and start talking before she can question how I know anything about Asher’s friend situation.
“Anyway, it’ll probably be weird and if it gets too awkward to be stuck in a car with him and I have to escape and fly home from some tiny town in the middle of nowhere, can you come pick me up at the airport?”
Hallie hops off my dresser and wraps an armaround my waist, squeezing me in a side hug. “Literally anytime, day or night.”
Both the hug and the reassurance go a long way towards calming my nerves about the next two weeks. Things may be different now that Hallie and Ben are together, but moments like these remind me that we’re still Jules and Hallie, even if she’s also part of Hallie and Ben.
“Thanks, Hal. We better get down there before Molly and Emma eat all the good tacos.”
As if on cue, Molly yells from downstairs. “Jules, Hal, get your asses down here. I’m already pouring my second margarita, and Emma’s eating all the chicken tacos.”
“Don’t listen to her,” Emma calls up. “She’s actually pouring her third marg.”
Hallie and I both dissolve into giggles and head downstairs. I spend the next few hours sitting on my living room floor with my best friends, laughing and eating too many tacos and getting a little drunk on margaritas, and trying not to think about the gorgeous man with the strong arms and the sky-blue eyes who somehow sees the parts of me I bury deep and why I don’t hate that nearly as much as I want to.
Chapter Thirteen
Asher
“Good morning, ladies,” I say as I slam the driver’s side door and circle around the car to the sidewalk in front of Julie’s house.
“Quieter, Asher. Much, much quieter,” Hallie mutters.
“What she said,” Emma hisses through gritted teeth.
“What happened to you guys?” I ask, already knowing the answer but wanting to see what they’ll say, mostly for my own amusement. It’s the little brother in me.
“Tequila,” moans Molly. “So. Much. Tequila.”
