Free Brazing (Forged in Fire #2) by Rachel Higginson, Lila Felix

hard.
    “There you are!” Carter’s happy voice shouted behind me. “You just ran off, I didn’t know where you went!”
    I forcefully tore my eyes from Bridger’s and back to my best friend who was now flanked by those same two guys that could not have been more different from my childhood nemesis than if they were aliens and Bridger was a grizzly bear. They silently screamed of different upbringings and flashed with dissimilar impending-futures. Bridger on one cliff, Sawyer and his friend on the other. An endless gorge of contrasts and convictions kept them separated.
    The thing was, it wasn’t even money that separated these guys. I knew Sawyer and his friend had money just from looking at them. They were clearly well-classed and not wanting for anything. But my Grams had told me the same thing about Bridger. Stockton, Bridger’s older brother, had recently expanded his father’s business and the entire Wright family had benefited.
    No, it wasn’t money that separated them, it was something much more intrinsic, something innately them, something they couldn’t separate from who they were if they tried.
    Carter’s guys were all refined gentlemen and clean-cut pretty boys. Bridger was salt and earth; southern gentlemen in a way that proudly wore hard work and honest labor like a badge of honor or a blue ribbon around his neck. Carter’s men were gym-muscles and name brand clothing. Bridger boasted hard-earned strength and just enough rough edges to make him sharp enough to do serious damage.
    Carter’s guys were safe.
    Bridger was the pinnacle of a precipice and the top of a mountain.
    Carter’s guys were bright, happy and boring.
    Bridger was a dark, swirling abyss of something dangerous and forbidden.
    I had given up playing it safe when I was fourteen-years-old.
    And then I’d given up gambling with my life when I’d turned seventeen because I needed all the life I could get.
    So why-oh-why was I ready to take a flying leap off Bridger’s brink just to see if he would reach out one of those carnal, masculine hands to catch me?
    “This is Jake,” Carter hitched a thumb at the guy on her left. “And this is Sawyer, the guy I’ve been telling you about!” She winked obviously. Typical Carter. To the guys she said, “This is Tate and her friend Bridger.”
    Sawyer- a guy with wavy, pomade swept hair and two dimples that offset his chiseled features- reached for my hand and shook it firmly but familiarly. “Hi, Tate, I know we just met, but I feel like I already know you from how much Carter is always talking about you.”
    Oh, geez. Not a pick up line.
    I smiled politely and turned subtly so that Bridger could be included, too. “Don’t believe a word of it,” I ordered Sawyer.
    Bridger leaned in and shared a conspiratorial look with Sawyer. “Believe every word of it,” he told the guy. “This one’s trouble.”
    My mouth came unhinged and I stared at Bridger. Had he really just passed me off to some random guy from Carter’s Econ class?
    The nerve!
    I had just been dismissed. By Bridger Wright.
    Again!
    Sawyer laughed at Bridger’s joke and then the two men reached out and shook hands.
    Before I go on, it is important to note the boy-behavior in this particular scenario. They did not growl at each other, they did not gnash teeth or throw me over their shoulders like caveman or bucks fighting for the doe they both set their sights on during rooting season. They simply shook hands, made jokes at my expense and went on with their lives.
    There were some men that would have acted like alpha-douchebags if presented with that awkward introduction. And there were a lot of catty girls who would have acted worse.
    But the truth was that neither of these guys had any claim over me or my dating life and instead of baring their knuckles and smashing beer bottles over each other’s head, they’d tucked whatever aspirations they had for me away and made an effort to be cordial with each other.
    And in