When the Stars Fall (Lost Stars Book 1)

couldn’t hang out with.
“Oh wait. Do you like Kyle Matthews? Do you have a crush on Kyle Matthews?”
“So what if I do?” I said, goading him just to see what he’d do. It was my favorite sport and he always played along.
“Well, let me tell you something. Even if you had bugs in your hair, I wouldn’t even care.”
“You wouldn’t care if I had head lice?”
“Nope.”
“What am I supposed to say about that?”
“Thank you would be a good start.”
“I’m supposed to thank you?”
“Yeah.” He gave me a look like Duh.
“Why?” I asked, confused.
“Because Rebel… if a guy is worth it…” He leaned in close, close enough that I could smell his minty breath, and wrapped a lock of my hair around his fingers, tugging it gently. It was playful but it felt like something else, especially with the way he was looking at me, his blue eyes darker, focused on my mouth. I wet my lips with my tongue, noticing the way his eyes followed and his breathing got shallow.
“If he really likes you, he won’t even care if he has to shave his head because of you.”
“That’s um…” I shook my head. Sometimes he made absolutely no sense. Was he saying he liked me? As in liked me? “You’re ridiculous, you know that?”
“Why don’t you two just kiss and get it over with?” Brody said over his shoulder.
My eyes widened in horror. “I wouldn’t kiss him if he was the last boy on earth.”
“Sure you wouldn’t.” Brody rolled his eyes then walked his horse out of the barn.
I watched him a minute to make sure he was okay on that mean, ornery horse. It was a bit skittish but instead of reining him in, Brody gave him the lead, leaning over his neck and talking in his ear, his voice too low to hear, as if he really was a horse whisperer and that horse understood his every word. Not only that, but Brody was riding him bareback. Raven wasn’t so crazy about getting saddled up.
When I was sure that Brody had it under control, I returned my gaze to Jude. He gave me a slow, lazy grin that made my stomach flip-flop.
It was only in that moment that I realized that my best friend slash bane of my existence was beautiful with his suntanned skin that made his blue eyes bluer and his dimpled smile and square jawline stand out.
Now I understood why girls fell all over themselves trying to get his attention.
I hated it. I hated the way they talked about him and ogled him and passed him notes at school. The way Ashleigh Monroe flipped her blonde hair over her shoulder and licked her pink-glossed lips whenever he looked her way.
How could I have been so blind not to notice what was right in front of me? I just stood there, staring at him like it was the first time I’d ever seen him.
“Now who’s lying?” he said before he strode out of the barn having gotten in the last word. He always got in the last word but this time all I could do was stare at the door he’d just walked out of while my pulse raced and my heart pounded so hard I could feel it in my throat.
What had just happened?

Chapter Five


Lila
“Just have a good time,” I heard Kate telling my mom on the phone as Jude dealt our cards. She had it on speaker so we could hear my mom from our spot on the back porch. She and Derek had gone away for the weekend to celebrate their sixth wedding anniversary. “You know we love having Lila. She’s like one of the family.”
It warmed me from the inside to hear those words. I liked thinking that I was one of the family, like I was a part of something bigger, and had a special place in the McCallister’s lives. It didn’t make me feel so lonely being an only child. Not when I had four boys who were like brothers to me.
Kate came out to the back porch and handed me the phone. I took it from her with a smile. My hands were sticky from the watermelon we’d just eaten so I set the phone on the picnic table. “Hey Mom.”
“Hey sweetie. Everything okay?”
“Yep. I’m playing poker with Jude and Brody.”
“Stakes are high,” Jude said, watching my face as I checked my cards. Ugh. It was the worst hand ever. I laid it on the picnic table, face down. I was going to lose. Again. “Lila’s about to lose her nuts.”
“Too bad she doesn’t have any. Now me… I’ve got nuts to spare,” Brody said, making himself and Jude crack up and me roll my eyes at their stupid, dirty jokes.
We were using monkey nuts for currency. Last week, we tried using M&M’s but we kept eating them and didn’t have anything to bet with after the second hand.
“That’ll be enough from you boys. Mind your manners,” Kate said, shaking her head as she walked back inside the house. She was always telling them to mind their manners. Not that they listened.
“We’re playing for peanuts,” I told my mom before she got the wrong idea. Nobody needed to hear another one of her talks on puberty. Lately, she’d taken it upon herself to give us sex education talks which were beyond embarrassing. “Are you having fun?”
“We are,” she said, her voice hesitant. “Derek and I were talking about his teenage years.”
Oh no. I’d heard a few stories about Derek’s teenage years and his early twenties. He’d been a biker and a bad boy with no real direction in life until he’d met an angel who had helped him turn his life around. Those were his words.
“When I get home, we need to discuss safe sex practices.”
My cheeks flushed and I squeezed my eyes shut, not wanting to see the look on Brody and Jude’s faces. One of the pitfalls of having a mother in the medical profession meant