“You got stick?” Nate asks, one judgy eyebrow quirked.
“Yes,” I hiss, putting it into first gear.
Brantley gestures for me to wind my window down. “Follow us. We’re heading out to the cabin.”
I still. The same cabin Nate and I had our first fight?
“Yeah.” Brantley’s eyes fucking twinkle.
Oh god.
I gulp. “Yeah okay.” He zips forward and before the completely blacked-out Raptor can follow behind him, I zip between the two, giggling.
Nate chuckles, shaking his head. Just as we’re driving past the large garage, I watch in slow motion as the doors open and a crystal clean white Tesla peeks out from underneath. My breathing slows, my eyes and focus completely on the supped up Tesla. Then she’s standing there. Like she just stepped off the set of Game of Thrones, with her white long hair, small petite body and soft eyes. She watches me carefully, wrapping her cardigan around her body, then just like that, I floor it into third and zip out of the driveway.
“Did you see that?” I ask Nate, but his head is turned to the other side.
“See what?” he asks, his face turning to me.
“Never mind,” I grumble. I swear to God if this me seeing people thing is going to be a thing I’ll check myself into a fucking psychiatric ward.
His hand comes to my thigh. “You’re not going crazy, baby. Yeah, I saw her.”
Adrenaline crashes through my body. “Who is she?” I want to know everything.
Nate shrugs. “Don’t know. That was the first time I have ever seen her, but when we had that party, Brantley was acting on some next level feral shit. So I’m not very keen on raising the topic with him.”
I snort, turning the radio on. “SOS” by Avicii starts playing softly in the background. The deep base shaking through the car like small thunderbolts. These fucking lyrics. We all merge onto the main highway and I watch behind me as the Raptor’s angry front follows close behind me. I stick close behind Brantley.
“Whose Raptor is that?”
“Jase’s. We would tease him about the size of his cock, but we’ve all seen it.”
I laugh, just as a matte black Maserati flies past us and slips in front of Brantley’s car.
I roll my eyes. “What about Bishop’s?”
Nate laughs, leaning back in his seat. “Definitely not.”
The song moves on and Nate’s hand comes to my thigh. “No doubt we will be staying out here the night.”
“I wore Jimmy Choos!”
He rolls his eyes, sliding his phone unlocked. He presses his phone to his ear.
“Yo, can you bring Tillie some normal shoes, and a change of clothes, and her little pink lace panties with the letters S E C R E T over them?”
I shove him.
He laughs. “Oh, and her toothbrush.”
He hangs up his phone. “Done.”
“Who was that?”
“Relax, like I’d let any of the boys near your fucking panties. It was Bailey. She’s coming tonight too.”
I smile. “Really?” Excited I’ll have another girl with me—for once. I like Bailey a lot. I think she’s smart for a young girl, but I can see the bitch beneath the sweet.
“Yeah,” Nate murmurs and his head tilts. “And I’m pretty sure I saw two people in Bishop’s car.
Madison? “No,” he cuts into my thoughts. “It’s Abel.”
It doesn’t matter that he corrected me. Now my thoughts are with Madison. “Did she run with Tate again?”
Nate shakes his head. “Nah. Tate is getting ready to start NYU. I think, for the most part, their friendship is slowly drifting apart. Tate has new friends, friends of her caliber.”
Lucky Tate. Living a normal life and whatnot, but even as I think that, I feel guilty. I love my friends. “So she doesn’t give a shit that Madison has run again?”
“She doesn’t know. She thinks Madison is ghosting her.”
“Well,” I say, readjusting myself in my seat. “I’d be pissed at you guys for that.”
“You wouldn’t run,” he adds matter-of-factly.
“True, but in any case.” I can’t help but feel hurt that she didn’t at least try to reach out to me before she ran. I kept her secret. Through it all I kept it, but she still couldn’t trust me?
Then realization sinks in. “You’re acting rather blasé about the whole thing.”
Nate snorts, his finger running over his upper lip. “We know where she is, Tillie. Make no mistake, we will always know where either of you are.”
I lick my lips. “And?”
His jaw clenches. “She’s in New Zealand.”
We stay quiet the rest of the drive. Four hours later, we’ve pulled off the main highway and onto a private road. Trees burst out the soil that lines the perfectly manicured road.
“I don’t remember it being this well kept out here.”
Nate exhales as we all pull to the front of the cabin. The same cabin we were all at when Nate and I first got together and the same night I found out about my mother.