“I think someone else cares more than they let on too. You should give my brother a chance then.” Sheldon smirked at Willow who scoffed and looked away.

“Look, I came for rides and prizes. Let’s go Pepé. We got shit to do.” She grabbed Pepé and stomped off with him.

“Why did you have to say that?” I fussed at Sheldon.

“What? You know it’s true. They are dying for each other and I’m sick of his ass walking around the house with pissy panties stuck up his ass.”

“Let them figure it out.”

“It isn’t me you need to tell that to. I’m telling you, Dash won’t wait forever.”

“So he will move on.”

“No, he’ll force her hand. The men in my family don’t play fair. Consider that a warning. Now let’s go get her. I can’t have my future sister-in-law mad at me.”

* * *

“I can’t eat anymore cotton candy. I’ll puke,” Sheldon whined. We were on the Ferris wheel after inhaling ample amounts of cotton candy. Sheldon of course, wanted to outdo us all and turned it into a competition.

“Eww. Puke that way,” Willow fussed, her voice filled with disgust.

“Stop pushing me.”

“Get away yuck mouth.”

“Ugh, tell her to stop pushing me, Lake.”

“Settle down children…Hey, slide over will you? I’m being crushed.”

“I’m going to murder you,” Willow threatened to Sheldon, ignoring me.

“Not if I puke on you first.”

“What are you, three?”

“You’re hurting my feelings.”

“Toss the candy, already.”

“We are on top of the wheel!”

“Maybe a kid will catch it.”

“Mmm,” Sheldon moaned as she took another bite. “Good cotton candy….Oh god,” she slapped a hand over her mouth. “No more.”

“Sheldon!” Willow shrieked.

I tried not to listen to my two friends bicker and even harder tried not to think about pushing them both off. That was bad right?

“Quit licking me!” Willow screamed.

“There was cotton candy on your face!”

Maybe not.

The ride started again and once it stopped for us to get off I was tempted to fall to my knees and kiss the ground. Willow had to hide Pepé her bag so he could get on the ride with us and she quickly took him out. He rolled his eyes at her before settling on her shoulders and looking around.

“Hey, look. Eleven o’clock.”

I looked over by the stage of acrobats and saw Trevor…with Anya. Kissing. Seeing the two of them together without a care in the world mad me sick and suddenly I wanted Keiran here with fierceness. “We need to move. I don’t want him to see me.”

“Too late. He’s already looking at you.”

Sure enough Trevor and Anya were both regarding us with hateful looks on their faces. I sincerely hoped Trevor wasn’t stupid enough to try anything. I took Sheldon and Willow’s hands and hurried away in the opposite direction.

“Hey, Lake!” I heard my name called out in a gruff voice.

“Well no one ever accused him of being smart.” Willow’s voice dripped with sarcasm.

“Keep walking,” I urged, rushing for the exit.

“He’s mighty ballsy,” Sheldon stated. She let go of my hand but kept up as I made my way to the car. A moment later she was on the phone telling someone that he was here. I had a good idea who.

We’d just cleared the gates when Trevor grabbed my arm, yanking me away from Willow and Sheldon. “Not so fast, sweetheart. Didn’t you miss me?”

“Take your hands off of me.”

“Why?” Anya snarled. “You think because you have Keiran that no one else is good enough for you? You couldn’t even get a boyfriend before.”

“Anya please get over yourself. Keiran never wanted you. You threw yourself at him.”

I almost had my arm out of his grip when he tightened it and began walking off with me in tow. “You’re coming with me. There is someone who wants to meet you.”

Before I could respond or scream for help I fell to the ground. Willow had jumped on Trevor’s back and began hurling insults and pulling his hair while Sheldon hit and kicked him from every angle. Luckily with Trevor’s arm broken he couldn’t get the upper hand, or so I thought.

“Get off me you crazy bitches!” he roared just before Willow went airborne and Sheldon hit the ground.

I saw red at seeing him manhandle my friends and before I could rethink it I delivered a two-piece to his face and swift kick to his groin bringing him to his knees.

I turned to help Sheldon and Willow who wasn’t moving from the ground. Pepé was sniffing at Willow’s face and making small sounds for his mother.

“Lake, watch out!”

I turned in time to see Trevor lunge for me with a murderous expression but before he could grab me he was thrown a few feet away by Dash and grabbed up by Keenan who delivered powerful blows to his face. They proceeded to tag team and beat the shit out of him. I winced at the beating he was taking. What surprised me most though was the absence of Keiran and how they’d gotten here so fast.

Sheldon was screaming for them to stop and as much as I hated Trevor I had to agree. They were quickly moving from assault to attempted murder if they carried on.

After a few more blows, Keenan grabbed Trevor by the arms and dragged him to Dash’s waiting car and threw him inside while Dash hurried over to Willow. He gathered her up into his arms and scooped up a scared Pepé.

“Where is her car?” His voice was rough and harsh and his face was a mask of unconfined fury. His whole body was shaking with barely controlled rage.

“Over – over there.” I pointed to her purple eclipse a few aisles over with a shaking hand. Willow seemed a little dazed from the fall but she was conscious and didn’t appear to have any injuries. He placed her in the passenger seat along with Pepé and turned to me.

“Go to her house and stay there. Keiran will come for you.” He jogged back over to his car. He and Keenan hopped in, and drove off… with an unconscious Trevor.

I looked around the empty parking lot and sighed in relief that no one was there to see Trevor assaulted and basically kidnapped. Then again, that could have been a bad thing. If Sheldon had never called her brother, who knows what Trevor would have done or where he would have taken me? What did he mean someone wanted to meet me?

I looked around again and noticed Anya was gone as well. “Where did Anya go? Did she run off?”

“Unfortunately, no. Keenan grabbed her too.”

“What!”

“Yup.”

“Why?”

“I don’t think I want to know.”

“We can’t just ignore the fact that happened Sheldon.”

“Do you really want to go against all three of them?”

“But Keiran wasn’t here.”

She looked at me as if I was dense. “Where do you think they are taking them? Look, let’s get Willow home and worry about that later.”

I reluctantly got into the car and dropped Sheldon off before driving us over to Willow’s house. Willow was silent the entire ride home and I kept checking to make sure she was still conscious. It didn’t look as if she hit her head from the fall.

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” she croaked.

“It doesn’t sound like it.”

“I’m fine.”

“What did Dash say to you?”

“What makes you think he said something?” she asked.

I shot her an impatient look but didn’t say anything more. I knew Willow sometimes better than I knew myself and vice versa.

She released an aggravated breath before stating, “He said he would be over to deal with my stupidity later.”

“He’s not making this easy for you is he?”

She snorted. “Nothing about Dash is easy. He’s always so determined to have his way. He doesn’t even really want me. He just thinks the world is supposed to change to fit him.”

Willow sounded so sad and heartbroken and I cursed my inexperience with boys because I had absolutely no idea what to tell her.

“So what are you going to do?”

“Wait for college to start and run away?”

“Aren’t you and Dash interested in the same school?”