Total pages in book: 155
Estimated words: 152045 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 760(@200wpm)___ 608(@250wpm)___ 507(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 152045 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 760(@200wpm)___ 608(@250wpm)___ 507(@300wpm)
Kade lifts my arms and slaps my chin to the side, inspecting me. “No cuts, no bruises. They’re treating you pretty good. You must be cooperating.”
Pretty well. Not ‘pretty good,’ I used to correct him. I’m going to let it go this time.
“I like it here,” I straighten my spine and look at him eye to eye. “No one gives a shit about my car. Or my dad. Wanna trade places?”
“Is there a Starbucks?”
I chuckle. Kade never apologized for his comforts. I really loved that about him. If anyone ever gave him shit about his preppy clothes, corporate coffee, or fitness tracker, he would simply say ‘who should I be instead? You? How much does that pay?’
He always knew that no one who’s coming after you is doing better than you.
And I think I finally understand.
“Think about it,” I tell him. “You could take my place for a day. I’m due for a visit anyway. I miss A.J.”
And my parents, everyone.
But he just grins. “That’s Hunter.” He looks at Stoli and Dirk standing just behind him. “Can’t breathe on my hill, so he suffocates on his own.”
They smirk, and I feel the car bounce a little behind me. Dylan is climbing up to the front seat.
“You’re right.” I swipe my baseball hat off the ground, having lost it at some point when they grabbed me from the car. “Leaving the Falls didn’t help a lot. I still think about you too much, and why you were such a godawful prick to me for so long.” His eyebrows dig deeper, and I fit the hat on my head, the bill at the back. “But the thing I just realized is that you’re obviously thinking about me, too, aren’t you?”
His jaw flexes.
“Does he talk about me?” I ask his friends, glancing between them. “He bitches a lot, I’ll bet.”
My brother’s eyes darken, and for once, he’s quiet. “And you know what else I found out?” I say, hearing Dylan roll down the window of the old car. “She didn’t sleep in her own bed that night. You were right about that.” I step in. “But she’s never slept in yours.”
“Hunter…” Dylan says.
“She sleeps in mine,” I go on, dropping my voice to lower than a whisper. “But you knew that.”
“What’s going on?” Dylan steps out of the car and looks between us.
“Do you want her?” I ask him.
“Stop it,” she tells me.
But I don’t. “You always acted like you did.”
Every time I was alone with her, he inserted himself. He talked down to me in front of her. Made fun of me.
“And you always acted like I was shit,” I say. “So, I left. And for what? What the fuck do you want?”
Dylan stands a little taller next to us in her skates. “What are you guys doing? What is this?”
I look over at her, hurt watering her eyes.
“There was so much you didn’t see,” I murmur.
It’s not her fault. As Hunter, I want her so badly. I always have.
As her family and her friend, I would tell her to get the hell away from both of us and meet new people.
“This is Hunter, Dylan,” Kade chimes in. “Still trying to be more than me. You’re never really alone with him. I’m always in the room.”
Tears fill her eyes, and I drop mine, knowing there’s a world of insults I could sling back at him right now, but nothing he said was a lie, either. I just wasted a fucking year being mad at the wrong people. None of this is his fault, either. It’s mine, because I wasn’t tougher.
Dylan pushes me away from the car and opens the back door, climbing in for her shirt. But before she crawls back out, Farrow and the guys are on the other side. He opens the back door and leans down.
“Come here,” he tells her.
He doesn’t wait, though. He grabs her and sweeps her into his arms. Tears are already streaming down her face.
“What do you think you’re doing?” Kade barks.
Farrow just shoots him a look. “Not tonight.”
He carries Dylan off. “Let’s get you fucking drunk, huh? You deserve it.”
Constin, Calvin, and the guys trail them, and in a second, they’re gone. Except for one. He stands there, staring at Kade, defiant. Almost like a warning. It takes a moment, but I recognize him from stuff I’ve seen online. Noah Van der Berg, Jared’s new protégé.
Kade’s eyes dart between him and me, and he must figure he’d rather not have Noah seeing or hearing more, because he leaves, charging away with his friends.
I turn slowly, unable to fill my lungs with air as I reach into the car and get my shirt too.
“Look, I know I don’t know you, but I do know brothers,” Noah says to me over the roof of the car.
I pull on my shirt, avoiding his gaze.