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“Neither do I.” My heart was pounding in my near bursting chest as my stomach flipped wildly. “I’ve gotta go get cleaned up.”

Jake pressed in close, his hands going into the back of my dress to grab my ass as he kissed me hard.

He backed away. “I’ll be waitin’.”

We walked into the main room a few minutes later and stopped at the bar. With drinks in hand, Jake wrapped his arm around me. We’d barely taken a step when he was stopped.

“Hyde, how’s it hangin’?” a man greeted.

I was with the hottest of the hottest. I knew this without a doubt. However, I had to admit this man was good-looking.

Raw with a sharp edge, he was tall and thickly built. His dark hair was closely shaved and his eyes were a deep, midnight blue. Skipping over the traditional tux, he was wearing slate gray slacks and a shirt that matched his eyes.

“Long and strong, brother, long and strong.” Jake released his hold on me long enough to give him a back thumping hug before he put his arm back around my waist. “Piper, this is Lars. Lars, this is my girlfriend, Piper.”

I’d thought the label was silly. What we had was good. Perfect. There was no way that something so small and insignificant would make any difference.

I waswaywrong.

Hearing Jake call me his girlfriend wasawesome.

“Nice to meet you,” Lars said.

I knew I was grinning huge, but I didn’t care.

“You, too.” I took his outstretched hand.

“Happy for you,” he said, still holding my hand but looking at Jake. His voice was deep with meaning when he continued. “Truly, brother. Fuckin’ thrilled.”

“You and me both.”

“Alright, I’m gonna go catch up with Kase. See you both around.”

From that point on, every time Jake introduced me to someone, he referred to me as his girlfriend. I knew my cheeks would hurt by the end of the night from smiling, but I didn’t care.

We eventually made our way over to the tables and sat for a while with Jake’s childhood friend Liz and her partner, Sammi. They owned a restaurant together where Liz handled the business side and Sammi was the head chef.

“I gotta go talk again,” Jake said, kissing me.

As he walked away, Sammi and Liz burst out laughing.

“Boy, you both have got it B-A-D, bad! I’ve never seen Jake like this. Not even with Chloe,” Liz said.

“Chloe?”

“Jake’s ex. She was years ago, but basically the only real girlfriend he’s had. Well, until now.”

“I gotta say, I’m totally diggin’ this change in him,” Sammi put in. “He looks happy. Like really happy. And he isn’t even around a car.”

“Which makes me curious what happened earlier when he looked like he was ready to kill someone,” Liz said.

“Someone was talking to me that Jake doesn’t get along with.” I didn’t want to go into detail, mostly because I didn’t want to think about it. It was done, Blake was long gone, and what followed was what I wanted to focus on.

“Who was it?” Sammi asked.

“Blake Green.”

“Oh yeah, they’re not fond of each other. Blake thinks they’re competing for chicks. They aren’t; Jake’s not like that. But if they were, Blake’s record would be dismal.”