“What?” he said, feeling defensive. “Just because I’m not putting you up at mine, you know, someone else could host. Get crumbs all over their couch.”

Derek frowned. “We don’t host because you love doing it. Or at least you did, before a trance DJ let you finger her in a bathroom.”

Willow glared at Psycho. “You fucking told.”

“I’m worried about you!”

“You should be worried about yourself and what I’m gonna throw at your head when you’re not looking.” He glared at Derek. “I fingered her in a closet, actually. Not that it’s any of your business.”

Derek raised a brow. “She DM you yet?”

The kid sank a little lower in his seat. “Sorry.”

“You will be. And not yet,” he told Derek. “But she will.”

“What are you gonna do in the meantime? You’re spacing out worse than Star Wars. You barely gave Logan shit about his hickey.”

“Who gives a fuck about that clown?”

“You do. You gave a fuck about everything around here until the DJ showed up.”

“Eden Jade,” Psycho said helpfully. “That’s her real name.”

Willow kicked him under the table.

Derek studied him with his flat, black eyes. Willow looked away. He wasn’t stupid enough to get into a stare-off with Derek Hardiman. “Can I help you?”

“I don’t know. Are you getting carried away about Eden Jade?”

“No.”

“So, you didn’t tell Psycho you want to marry her?”

Willow scrunched his nose. He probably had, but fuck Derek. “No. Anyway, you proposed to Mara after, like, four seconds.”

“We were together for a year in high school.”

“Wow. High school. Where all great marriages start.”

Derek kicked his shin under the table. “We’re not talking about me, dickhead.”

“Sure. Anyway, you don’t need to worry about Eden.” Willow stretched his arms behind his head. “I bet you… I dunno, something huge… all of this works out.”

“Yeah, nice and vague, Willow. As per.”

“What about one of your houses?” Psycho chipped in. “I could use one of those.”

Willow frowned. “You’d have one if you did what I said last year and saved up for a deposit.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

Psycho was following the well-trodden pro-football path of pissing his pay-check against the wall. No matter what anyone said to him, the kid was twenty-one and, in his own mind, bulletproof. Was Eden the same? Playing local shows probably wasn’t great pay. Did she save? Or was money just another way for her to live on a knife’s edge?

“Williams!” Derek glared daggers at him. “You’re gonna make me do it, aren’t you?”

“What?”

“Talk about your fucking non-relationship.”

Willow leaned across the table. “Oh, Hardo. You’re so sweet...”

“Don’t touch me!”