He stepped forward, his lip curved in an arrogant smirk. “Just because I’ve had to tolerate you over this shit with Thatcher doesn’t mean we’re friends. That’s never going to happen, Hailee.”
“Fuck you, Jason,” I ground out, feeling my jaw tense.
His eyes sparked with something, but I didn’t stick around to find out what because I was over his shit.
So over it.
When Sunday morning rolled around, my mood wasn’t much better. Thanks to Mom and Kent, I was stuck with tickets to an exhibition I desperately wanted to see. But now they came hand-in-hand with Jason. God, he’d looked so smug last night when he revealed his grand plan. He had basically hijacked my birthday so he and his friends could go live it up in New York for the night because while Mom had gotten four tickets, I was under no illusion there wouldn’t be five of us making the journey.
I was toweling off my hair, when a notification pinged on my cell phone. I ignored it since it was probably Flick. But when it pinged again… and again, I finally reached over the desk and grabbed it. Unlocking the screen, I frowned when I saw the number of texts I had from my best friend. Opening the most recent, I felt the blood drain from my face.
* * *
Flick: Call me. Now!
* * *
My stomach sank, but before I could reply, Flick’s name flashed up on the screen, her ringtone cutting through the silence. “What the hell?” I murmured as I hit receive.
“Hails?” she sounded a little breathless.
“Yeah?”
“I’m outside.”
“Outside?” I went to the window and sure enough, pulled up alongside the sidewalk was her yellow Beetle. “Why are you outside my house?” My voice trembled as my subconscious slowly began to wake up, alarm bells sounding in the back of my mind.
“Just grab your stuff and come on. Oh,” she added. “And promise me you won’t look at Snapchat.”
“I don’t have Snapchat, you know that.”
“Good, that’s good,” she said, sounding distracted, as I shoved my feet into some ballet flats.
“I’ll be right down.” My heart crashed violently in my chest.
“Okay.” Flick breathed a sigh of relief. “And Hails?”
“Yeah.”
“I love you and I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry.” The line went dead, and I stared down at my cell phone, my fingers shaking. Before I knew what I was doing, I’d opened up the App Store and found the Snapchat icon. Promise me you won’t look, she’d said. Letting out a frustrated groan, I shoved my cell phone in my pocket and grabbed my purse.
Whatever it was, it couldn’t be any worse than Thatcher’s last photoshop prank.
Could it?
But as I left the house and saw Flick’s grim expression, I knew I was wrong.
I just didn’t anticipate how wrong.
Chapter Thirty
Cameron
Xander crawled over my legs, running his little car up and down, making all the noises to go with it. “Hang on, buddy,” I said, feeling my pocket vibrate. I managed to retrieve my cell phone without interrupting his game.
* * *
Asher: You need to see this.
* * *
It was a nondescript weblink. I hit open and my world fell away.
“Ameron?” My brother’s voice startled me.
“Hmm, sorry, buddy, I need to…” I swallowed over the huge fucking lump in my throat, moving him off my legs so I could stand. “I’ll be back, okay?”
“Kay, o,” he said. He’d learned a new word thanks to Asher, but since Xan couldn’t say his b’s or r’s very well yet, ‘bro’ became ‘o’.
I walked to the far end of the den and called Asher. “What the fuck am I looking at?” I hissed down the receiver as quietly as I could manage.
“I’m not entirely sure. Thatcher posted the link on his Snapchat story. It looked shady, so I checked it out.”
“It’s... her,” I almost choked on the words. “It’s Hailee.”
“Fuck,” Asher said. “I mean yeah, I thought... but, fuck.”
“Has Jase seen this yet?”
“I don’t know; he’s on his way over here.”
“Keep him there. I mean it, Ash, don’t let him leave.”
“Come on, man, you know he’s going lose his shit when he sees this, if he hasn’t already.”
My notifications started blowing up, the persistent bleeping making it difficult to concentrate.
“Shit, it’s everywhere,” Asher let out a long breath. “My notifications are going off like crazy.”
“Mine too,” I said quietly, glancing over at Xander who was still playing with his toys. “I have to go.”
“What are you going to do?”
“I don’t know, but Hailee...”
“Shit, she’s going to freak when she sees this, if she hasn’t already.”
Which is exactly why I needed to get to her. “I’ll call you later. Just make sure Jase stays put at yours, okay?”
“Yeah, yeah, I got it.”
“Hey, buddy.” I went to Xander and scooped him up. “Let’s go find Mom and Dad, shall we?” She’d spent the day at the hospital yesterday for monitoring, but they’d released her in the end, and this morning she’d seemed brighter.
“I’m Aze the Monster Achine.” He looped his car through the air as I carried him down the hall to the kitchen, where Mom and Dad were seated at the breakfast counter looking over some papers.
“Everything okay?” I asked.
“Everything’s fine.” Mom gave me a warm smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes as she pushed the papers to my dad and held out her arms for Xander. “And how is my favorite little man?”
“Mama, I’m Aze,” he shrieked with delight.
“Sure you are, baby.” She ruffled his hair, pressing her face closer to him.
“I need to go out, are you going to be okay—”
“We’re fine, Son.” Dad had collected the papers into one pile now. “You do whatever you need to do. We’re going to take this little monster out for ice cream and then to the park, but we’d like to sit down later to talk to you about some things, okay?”
My stomach dipped. “What things?” I looked between them, trying to read between the lines. But when Mom dropped her gaze, shielding herself behind my brother, I knew. And the pit in my stomach split wide open.
“I can stay,” I said. “If it’s important, I can—”
“Go,” Dad rose and came to me, squeezing my shoulder. “It can wait until later. Tell the guys I said congrats on the win Friday night.”
“I, hmm... yeah, okay.” My eyes flicked over to Mom and Xander again, and she gave me a weak smile. Something was wrong, something they needed to sit down and tell me about. I felt winded. I’d been waiting weeks to know and now the day they decided I was ready to know the truth, I needed to get to Hailee.