I waved back, wanting to apologize for earlier, but I knew right now or when Erik was nearby wouldn’t be a good thing.

Brandon Shriver was beside Erik, a game controller in one hand and a beer in the other. He nodded at me and then turned to Cam, holding up the controller. “Want in?”

“Nah.” Cam slipped his baseball cap around backward. “It’s all yours.”

“Keg’s outside, bro,” said a blond guy I’d never seen before. He was perched on the arm of a worn, old recliner. His dark gaze moved over Avery and then stopped on me. Taking a sip from his bottle, he grinned. “And I think a game of beer pong is on.”

I smiled back. The guy was cute, even if he didn’t have dark hair or gray eyes. Right then, I decided that was a good thing. My smile started to spread.

“Awesome.” Cam turned, dropping his arm over Avery’s shoulder. “And stop staring at my sister, jackass.”

My mouth dropped open.

The guy chuckled and winked. “Yes, sir.”

“Cam.” Avery smacked his stomach as I turned away, my face burning. “Stop,” she said, smacking him again.

He shrugged one shoulder as he walked toward the open door leading to the garage. “Hey, I said she could come. I didn’t say she wasn’t going to regret it.”

Hurrying up, I squeezed past them and shoved my elbow into his side. Satisfaction rang throughout me as he grunted. “Last time I checked, I didn’t need your permission, ass wipe.”

“That is true,” Avery chimed in.

He made a face.

I shot him a look that warned if he opened his mouth again, I’d do bodily harm. Flicking the top of my bun, he dodged my swinging arm, bending and kissing Avery’s cheek. “Want to get in on the game of pong?”

She shook her head. “I think I’ll sit this one out. What about you?”

I had no idea how to play beer pong. “Me too.”

“You okay then?” he asked Avery in a low voice, and when she nodded, he kissed her forehead again. “I’ll be right over there.”

My brows arched. Right over there was like, right in front of the empty lawn chairs. As he jogged over to the group of guys clustered around a Ping-Pong table, we headed to the keg and returned to the seats with plastic red cups full to the brim.

I watched my brother with the guys for a few moments as I took a drink of the bitterness. Then another. “Not a lot of girls here.”

Avery leaned back, stretching out her legs. “I don’t come to a lot of the parties, but I think these kinds are more like get-togethers. So it’s usually just girlfriends.”

Wincing, I took another gulp. “Then I’m kind of standing out?”

She smiled at me. “Well . . . you want the truth or the make-you-feel-better truth?”

I laughed. “Hit me with the make-me-cry truth.”

The skin around her eyes crinkled as her smile spread. “Well, let’s just say if you want to meet someone, you’re definitely in the right place.”

Snorting, I gazed at the table. “Like that will happen with Cam around.”

“True. The guy back in the living room?” She took a sip of her beer and then lowered her hands. “His name’s Eddie. I think he’s actually a pretty nice guy, so . . .”

Looking over my shoulder, I couldn’t see into the living room, but I could hear the sounds from the video game and laughter. “Cam would probably pile drive the poor guy if I talked to him.”

Avery laughed. “I’ll distract him.”

Over the next hour we plotted, but that conversation drifted into the trip she and Cam were planning to take to the Poconos during fall break. “That sounds really romantic.”

The apples of her cheeks almost matched her hair. “It was his suggestion.”

“Aw.” I watched him, grinning. Who knew my brother was such a softie? “I’m proud of him.”

She laughed. “I’m so lucky.”

“More like he is.”

A ball zinged past us, smacking into the wall near the dartboard. Avery shook her head as one of the guys half ran, half stumbled after it. “How’s your knee doing?”

“It’s doing okay. Only hurts off and on. I have an appointment the week before Thanksgiving.”

“Keeping my fingers crossed for you.” She glanced over at the table. Cam was doing what I think was a victory dance. Or he was having a seizure.

“You miss dancing?” I asked.

She nodded. “Yeah. I really do.” There was a quick pause as she swallowed. “What was your favorite recital?”

Her eyes lit up when I told her about the last recital—the one before I majorly screwed up. Although she hadn’t danced for years, I could tell she was still passionate about it. I made a promise at that moment that at some point, I would get her to dance.

I stared into my empty cup, wanting to know where Jase was. I hadn’t seen his Jeep out front, but I knew several of them parked along the back. I didn’t ask because I wasn’t here because of him.

Not at all.

But why did he live in this frat house instead of at the farm? Wouldn’t he want to be closer to Jack? Or was it the opposite he needed?

I snuck another cup and then one more when Cam was busy making gooey eyes at Avery from the group of guys he stood among. Another girl had appeared at some point, but with the way one of the guys had his arm around her waist, I figured she was a girlfriend.

Brittany arrived, her short blond hair slicked back in a ponytail. Less than three minutes after she gave Avery and then me a hello hug, Ollie strode through the open garage doors, his hair hanging loosely, brushing his shoulders.

He raised his arms as practically everyone there shouted his name, a smile breaking out across his handsome face. “Aw, you guys missed me!”

Brit rolled her eyes, but before she could say anything, Ollie sidled up behind her. “Hello, Avery and Miss Teresa, how are you doing this fine evening?”

I giggled, shaking my head. “We’re doing good.”

“Great.” He captured Brit’s tiny ponytail. “I need to borrow you for a second, sí?”

Brit’s eyes went heavenward, but her cheeks flushed a pretty shade of pink. “I’ll be right back. Senor Fucktard can’t want me for that long.”

“It’ll be awhile,” he corrected, and her flush deepened.

We watched the two of them head back out into the night, and then I turned to look at Avery.

“Interesting,” she murmured.

I glanced at her, grinning. “I guess they are together.”

She raised her brows as she nodded. “I’d say something is most definitely going on there.”

The combination of the Erik/Debbie situation and Jase’s absence did not bode well for my good old liver, but it was doing great things for my mood. By the time I was halfway through my fourth cup, I didn’t care that Jase wasn’t around. Maybe later, when Avery coaxed Cam outside as planned, I’d go and find Ernest . . . or Edwin. Whatever his name was. And I would prove to myself that baggage-free guys could kiss just as well as Jase, if not better. That was my plan. But first, I needed the little girl’s room before I died.

“I need to find the potty.” I stood just as a Ping-Pong ball flew across the garage and bounced off the dartboard once more. “You need anything?”

Avery shook her head as she glanced at her barely touched cup of beer. “You’d probably want to use the one upstairs, on the second floor,” she suggested, looking up with a smile. “It’s not as gross.”

“But still gross?”

She nodded. “Pretty much.”

“Wish me luck then.”

Giggling, she scrunched up her face in distaste. “You’re going to need it.”

I headed for the door to the house at the same moment Cam darted away from the table and descended on Avery. It was like he’d been waiting for me to leave, to sneak in a kiss. And, boy, did he kiss her. Clasping her cheeks in his hands, his head lowered until there was no space between them.

A smile crossed my lips, but there was a pang in my chest—a throb of envy. And that was wrong. I shouldn’t be envious of my brother’s relationship. Both of them deserved the kind of love they shared, but I wanted to know what that felt like. To know firsthand the kind of love that healed instead of harmed.