Holding Out For Skye by S.R. McKade Read Free Book Online Page B

question.
    “Even we didn’t know that,” Thea murmured.
    “How did you find out?” Nick’s eyes were filled with soft pity. So, Skye was all alone.
    “I heard her and Ash talking once.” Cian remembered the shock and sympathy he’d felt when he’d heard Skye tell Ash that. Ash, to his credit, hadn’t shown any of the pity he must have been feeling too. For all that Cian didn’t like Ash much, he had proven to be a very good friend to Skye.
    “You mean, you were eavesdropping on them,” Nick corrected.
    “I was not,” Cian denied, even though he had been.
    “Okay fine. You’re right. You don’t love her. I mean, look at her. How could you love someone like her?”
    Cian glared at Nick. “What’s wrong with her?”
    Thea hid her smile at Nick’s tactics. He was purposely trying to get Cian angry by saying bad things about Skye.
    “Well, you know. She’s unfriendly, rude, sarcastic, downright cold when it suits her and she doesn’t care much about people. She’s not your type. She’s not even beautiful. And you always go for the beautiful ones.”
    Cian’s glare turned icy. “That’s not true. How can you say such things about her, Nick? She’s unfriendly and sarcastic because she thinks she won’t be hurt if she keeps people at a distance. She is beautiful. And she’s not cold. She cares. She cares too damn much!” Cian was practically shouting by now.
    Nick smiled smugly. “And you know that, how?”
    “I—” Cian blinked. “You tricked me.”
    “No. I was just checking your reaction. You wouldn’t be so angry if you didn’t care about her.”
    Cian shrugged, feeling normal again. Back in safe territory. “I do care about her. She’s my friend. Even if we can’t stand each other,” he added as an afterthought.
    Even Thea was beginning to think Cian was only trying to convince himself.
    Nick felt like banging his head on the table. Both Cian and Skye were so pig-headed! No wonder they were perfect for each other. They’d probably figure out they had feelings for each other only if something drastic happened or when they were too old to do anything about it.
    If Cian grasped it first, they would have a chance of getting together. Skye would fight her feelings for him because, come on, she was contradictory that way. Cian, at least, after the shock wore off, would accept his feelings and do something about it. But no, his moronic best friend was in denial. Then inspiration struck. He cheered up. This had to work.
    “Okay. Fine. You win.” Nick waited a beat, munched on his pizza. “Ash was telling me the other day he heard there’s going to be an Underworld movie marathon for Halloween, I think. Do you guys want to go? He wants to surprise Skye with the movie tickets.”
    Ashton Daniels was a co-worker of theirs. He was in a different team and he looked a lot like the famous actor Ian Somerhalder who played Damon in the hit TV show, The Vampire Diaries that most girls were crazy about including Skye and Thea. However, they were both more down-to-earth fans. Ash’s eyes were green instead of the actor’s blue ones but his face bore such a striking resemblance to him, he could easily be mistaken for him. Ash was often chased by girls because of his looks and he usually took advantage of it.
    Two months ago, Skye and Ash had somehow become friends when she helped a teammate of his, Sarah Jameson over something.
    Nick didn’t know the details of it—Skye was pretty much close-mouthed about other people’s business, not that he wanted to know—but Ash and Skye had hit it off over a discussion about movies, probably because she was an oddity among other girls in that she loved action-packed movies, what Cian called guy movies, like The Transporter, Die Hard , Transformers , The Bourne Trilogy . Skye and Ash’d been thick as glue ever since then. And Cian didn’t like it. Oh, he didn’t like it at all. Ash was a touchy subject with Cian.
    At the thought of Ash taking Skye to