Page 43 of Astrid Parker Doesn't Fail

Astrid lifted her brows. “You have a hard time having fun?”

Jordan looked at her then. Shit, her eyes were pretty—a brown so dark Jordan could hardly make out her pupils. Juxtaposed with her sandy hair and thick dark brows... well, Astrid Parker was stunning. There was no doubt about it.

“I wouldn’t say that,” Jordan said.

Astrid shot her a look. “Really? You’re here with me, the person who treated you like shit over a coffee spill, and you hate everything I’m doing to your family home to the point that you’re pretty much trying to sabotage me.”

Jordan opened her mouth to protest but... well, shit, when the woman was right, she was right. “Fun” was not a word she would use to describe any part of her existence lately. She worked. She fucked up work. Her brother tried to save her. Rinse and repeat.

She hadn’t always been like this. She felt as though her recent lackof faith in anything at all had carved a hole right in the center of her chest where her heart pulsed the brightest, the strongest, and all that was left was a tiny ember she didn’t have the strength to fan most of the time.

“Goddamn,” she said, running a hand through her hair. “I mean, what am I even doing with my life?”

Astrid’s eyebrows popped up at first, but then she laughed—a real laugh that crinkled her eyes and showed off her incisors, which were a little bit sharp, like a vampire’s. “I’m not much better. After all, I’m choosing to hang out with someone who no doubt thinks I’m a garbage human and hates my taste rather than spend time with my lifelong friends, so.” She looked away, biting her lower lip with those sharp teeth.

Jordan shivered, then tilted her head at the other woman. She figured her line was something to the effect ofYou’re not a garbage human,but for some reason, she knew Astrid wasn’t fishing for reassurances, so she didn’t offer any.

“Well, then,” Jordan said instead, “I guess we really need to make damn sure we have some fun tonight. Just to prove to ourselves that we can.”

Astrid’s brows lifted, just a little.

Just enough.

“What did you have in mind?” she asked.

Jordan paused. She didn’t know what the hell she was doing. She should really just go back to her grandmother’s, binge-watch something on Netflix, and fall asleep after a nice long session with something battery-powered. Still, she couldn’t help closing her eyes and reaching back... back... years ago to a time she was actually happy—or at least, as happy as any human who had a loving partner and a steady paycheck. She searched for a different Jordan altogether, one who wasn’t scared of screwing up all the time, who wasn’tplanning on sabotaging this woman’s plans for the inn. A Jordan who slept easy, loved easy.

That Jordan knew exactly how to have fun. Granted, her brand of fun wasn’t the raucous kind going on behind them. It never had been. But somehow, she knew Astrid Parker would be more than okay with that.

“What I had in mind,” she said, leaning on her putter and into Astrid’s space, “is going to require a change in venue.”

Chapter Fourteen

IF ANYONE HADsuggested to Astrid that she’d be riding down a dark state road in a beat-up truck with Jordan Everwood that night, she would’ve thought that person was drunk.

Or high.

Or any other combination that would explain the ridiculous notion.

Yet here she was in the truck Jordan called Adora, the speakers blasting some moody indie folk music Astrid had never heard before while the wind blew her hair into her face.

“Where are we going?” she yelled, turning down the song. Astrid had asked the same question twice already, and every time, Jordan just grinned and turned the music back up, singing along.

She flipped the knob to the left again. “Jordan, seriously. I don’t do well without a plan.”

Jordan laughed. “I noticed.”

“So?”

“Your fiancé never surprised you with anything? Your friends?”

Astrid opened her mouth to sayabsolutely not, because everyone in her life knew she hated surprises. But that didn’t stop Spencerfrom buying a whole house in Seattle without telling her a week before their wedding last year. And it hadn’t stopped Iris and Claire from colluding with Delilah behind her back to break up her wedding. Granted, their intentions were good and their instincts were spot-on, but that was beside the point.

“They have,” she said. “And I didn’t love it.”

Jordan tucked a piece of tawny hair behind her ear, revealing a bevy of silver hoops, moons, and stars curling up the shell. “You’ll like this. I promise it’s not scary.”

“Does it involve tattoos or bungee cords?”