My Boyfriend's Best Friend

Chapter Ten

Connor

“Dude, how could you even say that?” Trey jibed. “Your bike has been in a shed for three years. There’s no way it’ll beat my new Yamaha.”

“I’m telling you, man, my bike’s a classic. It’ll run way faster than yours.” I shook my head and playfully shoved my friend Trey into the wall of a nearby building. “Three years is nothing.”

“Classic’s just another word for old,” fired Trey, giving me a cursory shove back. I accidentally bumped into a couple of younger girls and instinctively I reached out, placing a hand of both of their arms to steady them. I apologised quickly and they gave me warm smile back, both their cheeks heating in a blush. I winked at them before turning back to Trey who was chuckling at my predicament.

“Shut it, man. It’s not my fault your bike is so slow.”

Trey rolled his eyes. “Even if your bike was faster, I bet you haven’t ridden anything in three years.”

“And I’m sure it’s been even longer for you,” I retorted quickly, wiggling my eyebrows suggestively. Trey guffawed momentarily before cracking up laughing. I grinned at him as he gave me a hard slap on the back.

“You’re a real piece of work, you know that? And that’s so not true.”

It didn’t take long for us to reach the loud group of kids sitting at a long table outside a classroom and I felt my stomach clench slightly when I identified one of the guys sitting there. Aidan. I kept the easy grin on my face as we approached the group. I scanned over the people I could see and recognised most of them as my old soccer buddies with quite a few new faces.

“Hey, guys! Look who finally dragged their ass back home!” Trey shouted, getting them all to quieten down immediately and look at me. There was about twenty or so people there; mostly boys but there were a few girls. I recognised Rylie and shot her a smile. I couldn’t help but notice she was sitting down the opposite end and side of the table to Aidan and from the tension in her shoulders, she was mad at him. She kept sending him fiery glares and he was doing the same thing back.

I turned back to the rest of my friends and said a quick hello to the familiar faces and the newbies. Trey plonked himself down next to a girl I didn’t recognise and immediately started flirting with her. I looked at the table and found two empty spaces. One next to Aidan; the other next to Rylie. I took one look at the glare Aidan was sending me and decided there was no way in hell I was going to sit next to him.

“Hey, Ryles,” I said, placing my butt down on the chair next to her. She gave me a quick smile before turning back to her phone on her lap.

“Hey.” Her voice was even and didn’t tell me a damn thing. Was she mad at me about this morning? I hoped she wasn’t. She knew my intentions were only friendly; after all, I had my arm around Beccy as well.

My plan to win back Rylie was going far better than I expected. I had seen the look on her face this morning when I had hugged Beccy and I had recognised it as jealousy. If she was jealous then she had to have feelings for me, right? So basically all I had to do was keep it up and eventually she would snap and confess her feelings for me. I had to flirt with other girls but not overly so that Rylie would think I’d reject her when she finally admitted her feelings for me.

“Is that your natural hair colour?” I asked the girl on the other side of me, gently tugging on the end of her fishtail braid to get her attention. She snapped towards me instantly, her brown eyes ablaze.

“What’s it to you?” she snapped harshly. I was momentarily shocked at her harsh tone but I gave her a small smile to show her I was being friendly.