“Are you just going to storm in there and toss her over your shoulder and storm back out?” I ask, giving my seatbelt a small tug to make sure it’s on tight with how fast he’s driving. Which I’m not complaining about; I’m actually thankful for it. I want to get there as quickly as we can.
Emily has turned into a social butterfly over the past few years, but I wasn’t aware she’d been hitting the party scene. The girl is in every damn school club, and let’s not forget cheerleading. That shit is torture.
There have been a few parties here and there, but they’ve been at family homes I knew and that had tight security. As in, I knew the security teams personally. Now the McDonald brothers are a different story. I went to school with a few of the older ones. They’re all pieces of work, and Emily knows that, but still she’s there. I know it’s the end of the year blowout for the seniors. Graduation is days away, but I still don’t like it. Not one fucking bit.
My phone goes off, and I already know who it is. It’s Jericho giving me an alert on Emily. One I already know because she told her brother she was going to the party before she left the house. Irritation still fills me, but I know Jericho isn’t a fucking psychic. I just hate not knowing what she’s doing. I have to hear it secondhand. It hadn’t always been that way.
Once upon a time, Emily hung on to my every word. Then I went and fucked it up. What choice did I have? To this day, I still question what I did, but now all I can try to do is prove to her that things have changed.
Asher pulls straight up to the McDonald mansion, not caring that he’s blocking in a ton of cars. He doesn’t plan to be here long. That makes two of us.
The wait is over. Tick tock, Emily. Time's up. I don’t care if her brother is my best friend. She may be his sister, but she’s going to be mine.
2
Emily
I’m pretty sure I had one or two drinks too many at this point. I told myself I was celebrating graduation, but the reality is I’m in a shit mood. When my stepsister Molly said she was down to go to the McDonald party, I thought what the hell. I needed to get out of the house.
Molly is sweet, and we’ve slowly gotten closer. It’s been hard with my schedule. I keep myself busy, and she tends to be shy. I get the sense she tries to stay out of the way. As for me, the busier I am, the less time I have to think. Forget idle hands; it's idle minds that will eat you alive.
My mood went south when I overheard my brother on the phone with his best friend Chase. I’m guessing they’re hanging out and doing God knows what. They always hang out when my brother is in town. I never hear what they are up to, but a lot of men in this world are good at hiding their night lives. Some even carry NDAs on them in their back pockets. It’s insane and fucked up.
When I was younger, they’d always let me tag along. Asher was never one to shy away from having his little sister around. In fact, I think he went out of his way to take me with him if it meant getting me out of the house and away from our mother. He’s always been a good brother, but ever since our mother up and left, he’s been around a lot less. I guess he thinks I don’t need that protection anymore. Now he’s been keeping his butt in Japan since Dad remarried.
He’s being a dumbass about it. If he spent a few hours with Grace, he’d know that woman is not a gold digger and she and Dad are madly in love. So much at times I find myself jealous of it. It reminds me of how Chase’s parents are. I always loved hanging out at the Silverstein home when I was younger. It was nice to see how a normal family functioned. I always took comfort in their normalcy.
His parents are the cookie cutter perfect parents. Julie, Chase’s mom, always went out of her way to spend time with me. She taught me to cook and a million other things whenever I’d go over there with my brother when I was younger. She’d always tell me I was the daughter she never had. Chase is an only child. Not that his parents hadn’t tried. They always call him their miracle baby.
Then Chase went and broke my heart. I hadn’t only lost him that day I’d made my little confession to him—okay, maybe it wasn’t little—but I’d lost his parents too. His mom meant so much to me. She was the mom I never had. Isn’t that life, though? If I’ve learned anything, it’s that everyone comes and goes. No one truly stays.