He’s paled as well now, unless I’m just freaking out so much that I can’t see rationally anymore. Either is possible. “Come on.” Garrett’s teeth are very tightly gritted together. “Let’s go and find out what’s happening.”
He grabs my hand, no longer caring who’s looking at us, and I have to admit that I’m not worried either. It doesn’t matter as long as I have him with me and I’m not alone in this situation that has very rapidly become a nightmare. He drags me and I go willingly until we are both in front of a stupidly intoxicated Warren.
“Where is my sister?” Garrett barks angrily at him. “You are her boyfriend, right? Aren’t you supposed to be taking care of her tonight?” The other soccer players make some stupid comments, but Garrett acts like he doesn’t hear them. Or maybe he does but he just doesn’t give a shit. “Or, are you too drunk to give a shit?”
“No, no, it isn’t that,” Warren stammers, trying to play down how wasted he is. “She went looking for you guys. Then I don’t know what happened. She said that she talked to Marissa and she needed to go look for you two.”
Garrett rolls his eyes. “And you didn’t go with her? You didn’t think to look out for her in this huge crowd? I mean, she has been drinking, right? So, as her boyfriend, shouldn’t you want to protect her?”
Warren’s face turns redder than I have ever seen anyone go before. “I… I didn’t think that… that I needed to because she was going to be with you guys. You care about her and you haven’t been drinking, so I thought…”
I don’t know how I feel about Warren not coming with Sadie. That whole mess was embarrassing enough without it being made worse by more of an audience, and an intoxicated one at that. But I am pissed off that he doesn’t know where she is now. I can see exactly why Garrett’s about to lose his shit. Warren is supposed to care…
But do I feel sorry for Warren as well? I suppose he didn’t think that he was doing anything wrong, and the poor guy does look like he is about to have a heart attack. Oh God, I don’t know what to do. I just want to cry. I want to go back in time and pretend like our relationship didn’t just get outed in the worst way possible, breaking my best friends heart.
“Well, as you can see, she isn’t with us, Warren, so where the hell else could she be?”
Garrett sounds threatening and I can clearly see that Warren feels it too. That thing in the air, it might be about to explode right here, right now. I’m not ready for that, I don’t want more fighting. This was supposed to be such a wonderful night, now I feel like I can’t breathe.
“She… she could be with her friends… she could be anywhere. I don’t know.”
“We need to look for her,” I whisper, not that anyone can hear me. I don’t know if they would be listening right now even if they could hear me. They seem to be locked in an alpha battle of wills. “We have to find her.”
I tug on Garrett’s arm but he’s too busy yelling at Warren. He’s screaming now, I can’t even hear what’s being shouted between the bass of the music, and the thumping of dread in my ears. He’s so angry… but taking this out on each other doesn’t help anyone. We all need to work together to find Sadie.
“Stop it, stop it, stop it!” My voice gets louder and more shrill with every yell and I know that’s because I’m getting anxious and starting to panic now. “Stop it you guys. We have to find Sadie. She’s angry and upset and we don’t know where she is.”
Finally, I don’t know how, but I manage to get through to someone. It isn’t Warren or Garrett though, it’s one of the boys who plays soccer. I don’t know his name, but I’m so grateful to him. He is my favorite freaking person at this party right now because he is shaking the guys apart and forcing them to actually listen to me.
“We need to find her,” I shout once again when both the guys are facing me and giving me their full attention. “She’s drunk and angry. We don’t know where she is, but she shouldn’t be alone. We have to find her.”
“Did I upset her?” Warren demands. “What did I do?”
“This has nothing to do with you,” Garrett snaps angrily. “But you can help the search. Go get all your friends. Your soccer boys too. We need as many people as we can.” Garret glances around. “This party is out of control, and it’s so big that it won’t be easy to find her right away. We need someone from the Miller family because they know this place better than anyone. I’m sure we are overreacting, but we shouldn’t leave her alone when she’s this mad.”