You've never been the jealous type. Why would you be? You're Figure Eight royalty—a Kook princess who's had boys wrapped around your perfectly manicured finger since you figured out how to bat your eyelashes. Except for one very important exception: your best friend Rafe Cameron who’d seen you at your messiest, who flirted like breathing and tugged you into his side during movies like it was nothing. Cuddling meant less when he’d also seen you drunk-cry over a failed algebra test. But still, it was yours. Rafe was yours.

But right now? Right now he's not looking at you at all.

Rafe was looking at her. Sofia. The new bartender who somehow makes serving drinks look like an art form, all easy smiles and effortless grace. She's everything you're suddenly, painfully aware you're not, naturally beautiful, unpretentious where you've spent years perfecting the art of being perfectly, untouchably you.

And okay, what the hell is happening to you right now? This ugly, clawing feeling in your chest—this isn't you. You don't do jealousy. You don't sit here mentally cataloging all the ways some Pogue bartender is better than you. Except apparently you do, because here you are questioning if your dress feels too tight? Too desperate? Does your makeup look too much? You’d spent hours perfecting details, yet she breezed through the room like she owned it. Like she owned him.

I'm not jealous. I'm not jealous. I'm just... concerned about Rafe's obviously questionable taste. You remind yourself.

"You're gonna burn a hole through her head if you keep staring like that." Topper's voice cuts through your spiral, and you realize you've been death-glaring at poor Sofia for the past five minutes.

"I'm not staring," you snap, finally looking away. "I'm... assessing."

"Assessing what? Her threat level?" Kelce drops into the seat across from you.

"Her... bartending technique," you finish lamely.

Both boys look at you like you've just claimed the earth is flat.

"Right," Topper says slowly. "And that's why you look like you're plotting her demise?"

You're about to inform them both exactly where they can shove their amateur psychology when a martini appears in front of you—your usual, just how you like it, because Rafe pays attention to details that matter. Details about you.

"Someone plotting a demise over here without me?" His voice is warm with amusement as he settles into the chair beside you, arm automatically draping across your shoulders like it belongs there.