Country Kisses (3:AM Kisses Book #8)(54)

“What?” Piper and I shout in unison before taking a brief moment from the lunacy to examine one another.

“This is the nut job you said was stalking your brother?” I bark as if demanding answers to every problem in the free world, and, at this very moment, I wish I could.

Sammy’s eyes round out in horror as if I’ve just struck her with my ham hock of a fist.

“That’s right.” Piper’s face contorts as if she’s about to get sick. “And now she’s here trying to ruin my party.”

Cade lifts a hand in protest. “Nobody is ruining your party,” he’s quick to correct his little sis. “Sammy is just as excited to be here as anyone else. You’re playing nice tonight, remember?” He gently removes himself from Sammy’s death grip and takes a step forward. “What are you doing here?” he asks me sweetly, with more of a surprise to his tone than an accusation, but Sammy flops right back to his shoulder like a fly to honey, and my stomach does a revolution at the sight.

This is the boy I’ve been pushing her to land at all costs? Telling her that the girl he was seemingly interested in was merely a bump in the road? Hot damn, I just called myself a bump in the road and all but cheered on this stalker twat as she steamrolled my budding relationship. And I willingly gave her my hairdresser’s private number!

“She’s here because she’s my roommate,” Piper spits the words out to her brother with a touch too much venom. “She’s also my best friend. She goes where I go. So what?” She jabs a finger into her brother’s hard-as-steel chest. “Are you going to tell me who I can and can’t bring to my own party?”

Owen steps up with his jaw clear to the floor, and it may as well have shattered, judging by his inability to pick it right back up again.

Sammy hikes up on her heels and takes a little bite out of Cade’s ear, but he’s too busy staring wide-eyed at me to notice.

“Oh my shit,” I spit the words out at the gnat trying to shove herself inside Cade James’s pants. “You were using me this entire time! You figured out that I was sleeping with him on the side, and this was your little twisted plan to get him back from me. And to think, I gave you the name of my beauty salon!” That last sentence comes out deep and throaty because let’s face it—that was the ultimate betrayal.

“What?” she squawks so loud I want nothing more than to shove her back into the henhouse she pecked her way out of. “Bless your heart.” Her demeanor changes on a dime as she fans herself while forcing a smile. “Are you telling me you’re the C U Next Tuesday I’ve been afraid to meet?”

I suck in a sharp breath. “Did you just C U Next Tuesday me?” Dear God up in heaven, forgive me because I do believe both a commandment and a federal law are about to be broken.

Cade tries to pick up my hand, but I pull it right back out of his grasp.

“Cass—you’re my sister’s roommate?” His brows flex, and that sad smile of his looks pained by the revelation, and even in this tumultuous light he looks sexier than any man alive on the planet.

“Whoa, hold the f*cking phone!” Piper jumps in front of my face. “What the hell did you just say? Are you sleeping with Cade? Oh my God! Is my brother Hot Buns?”

Both Scarlett and Daisy duck for cover, and Owen looks as if he’s wrestling with his own fight-or-flight instincts.

“Cake!” a cheery voice calls from the door as Cole and Roxy come in. Her arms are filled to the brim with that beautiful confection we spent the afternoon decorating.

“I’ll take that.” I swoop it right out of the box and whirl it around into Little-Miss-Out-to-Steal-Your-Boyfriend—right over her ever-so-perfectly-coifed-boyfriend-stealing hair. “How’s that for C U Next Tuesday?”

Piper is quick to applaud me. “What the hell is next Tuesday?”

“Cassidy!” Sammy shrieks, covered from head to toe in what looks like a pile of bull crap—just like the lines she was feeding me all along. “I thought you were my friend!” she shrills at the top of her lungs while making a run for the kitchen.

“Holy shit.” Roxy comes up beside me, as do Marley, Annie, and Baya. But Cade and I are still locked at the horns, having a stare down, while Piper rages to Owen on the side.

Cade closes his eyes a moment. “So you knew I was Piper’s brother.” He pushes out a tired grin. “And you knew Sammy?” He shakes his head, genuinely confused.

“And you—” Wait… How exactly is Cade the bad guy in all of this? Oh, that’s right. “And you’ve had a girlfriend this entire time!” Wait, what was it that Sammy said about their relationship? Oh hell, the room is starting to spin, and it feels as if my feet landed on a boat lost on high seas.

I snatch Piper’s keys from her pocket before leaning into Roxy. “Hold that boy off while I make a break for it,” I hiss as I run for the door.

I jump into Piper’s fancy car and hightail it to anywhere but here.

Deep down, I knew we were in for one shit ride tonight.

I just had no idea that it would end so spectacularly bad.





Cade





I’ve been caught off guard a time or two in my life, I’ve landed flat on my ass, the air deflated from my lungs and left with my head spinning, but never like this.