“But damn, girl, you make it look good,” Kellan murmurs, running a finger absently along my collarbone. It tickles like an insect, and I want to brush it away, but my attention’s on Tyler.
He looks pissed, or his self-contained version of it. I’ve never seen him lose his temper. He’s easygoing except when he broods, when whatever’s below the surface is carefully leashed and dealt with deep down, where he’d never let me. Where he’d never let anyone at this party, I’m willing to guess.
I’m genuinely at a loss for why he’s still standing here when he looks as though the last place he wants to be is poolside.
My throat is already burning, but I tip the cup back, swallowing gulp after gulp, and by the time I straighten, it’s empty and all I can taste is cherries and vodka.
“Your turn,” Kellan nudges.
I square my shoulders and deliver my challenge at the boy in front of me. “I’ve never lived in a pool house.”
I regret the words before I finish them.
They’re mean because they’re insensitive but also because they’re true.
Tyler reaches for his cup and lifts it in a silent, mocking toast. “You win.”
He turns and starts back across the patio.
You win.
It sure doesn’t feel like it.
I don’t know why I said that except I felt cornered and attacked, but my chest tightens unbearably.
“What’s his deal?” Kellan complains.
“What that boy has money can’t buy,” Carly purrs. “For every girl who’d give her allowance to lick your abs, there’s another who’d blow her trust fund to suck his dick.”
My entire body stiffens as she takes off across the patio toward the pool house. I can’t hear what she says when she catches up to him because Kellan says, “Fuck him. You look like a real mermaid.”
“Thanks,” I say, but my gaze lingers on Carly and Tyler talking at the door.
He’s going to reject her. Any minute.
I chew on my cheek.
Come on, Tyler. Shut the door.
Instead, he meets my gaze as if he can hear my words, holds it for a beat.
Then he lets her inside.
It shouldn’t hurt.
Still, after our talk the other day, I’d thought that maybe he was over being these peoples’ prince, that he saw through her bullshit.
I was wrong.
“Your house is amazing,” Kellan says when Jenna and the minions go to get more drinks. “I bet it’s even better inside.”
I flash him my biggest smile. “It is. You want to see?”
I pull Kellan through the side door of the house to avoid Uncle Ryan and Miss Norelli.
“This is the backstage tour,” I say under my breath.
We sneak past the living room, bending over at the waist to avoid being seen. My heart’s hammering in my ears by the time we get to the garage and I hit the lights.
“Whoa,” Kellan says.
My dad’s cars are here. There are also shelves of awards. “Take your pick. The Grammys live inside because my stepmom made him bring them in, but everything else is here.”
“Why does he keep them in the garage?”
“I don’t think he has a lot of respect for awards and formality. Your parents have this shit too.”
“Not like this.”
My head’s buzzing from the cup I drained outside, but it’s Kellan who looks drunk—on the surroundings. I know what that’s like. People get a hit of my dad, and they’re hooked. It’s why I don’t bring many friends here.
“So, we didn’t have a chance to rehearse.” Kellan shoots me a loaded smile. “You could show me your room.”
I’m not interested in taking Kellan there, even if he’s the only person in the musical who doesn’t have a raging hate-on for me. I’m not holding my breath for poetry and professed love, but I’m also not looking to punch my V-card with some lacrosse player who doesn’t even know my best friend’s name.
“I have a better idea.” I take his hand, and we trip toward the other side of the house and out into the gardens.
Torchlight bathes everything in a warm glow, but it’s blurring together. It’s a grid of flowers, waist-high but almost like a maze.
“That’s a shit-ton of roses.”
I can’t help smiling. “They came with the house, but my dad planted more. He likes building stuff, working with his hands.”
“I get that rich, I’m not touching anything.” He brushes a hand over a rose bush and snaps off one of the blooms. My heart kicks as he tosses it into the shrubs. “You into pain? Because if we fall into these, it’s gonna hurt.”
He snickers as he pulls me against him. I inhale, startled, and catch a hit of booze on his breath, his expensive cologne.
I push against his chest to get a few inches between us. “Whoa. Slow down.”
“Come on. You’ve been flirting with me for weeks.”
“Not flirting.” Desperation edges into my tone, the need to explain and be understood. “I mean, you’re attractive. Obviously. But you’re the only person who doesn’t think Carly should’ve gotten my part.”
“Good deeds should be rewarded, and I can think of a few ways for you to use that pretty mouth.” Kellan’s gaze flicks deliberately down to his pants, then his hand slides down to grab my ass.
Alarm has my throat tightening, my body stiffening. “Stop.”
He doesn’t. I duck under his arm but catch my toe on the rock edging the garden and trip.
I stick my hands out to brace my fall, wincing as I land in the rose bushes, their thorns scratching at my skin, but I push myself up and trip through the garden toward the patio.
“Annie, what the fuck?”
I glance back, but Kellan's lurching toward me. A muttered curse says one of the rose bushes bit him, too.
I round the back of the house, the pool coming into view. Laughter floods my ears. Cans litter the patio. I watch in horror as someone empties a bottle of liquor into the pool.
These people aren’t my friends, and there's nothing I can do to change that.
My stomach plummets, the ground tilting at a reckless angle beneath my feet.
I shove past bodies to the pool house and hit the code for the keypad. After two tries, the door opens, and I fall in.
The door closes behind me and a low, rough voice splits the darkness. “Party’s by the pool. Get out.”
I don’t move. The next second, I’m shoved up against the wall by something hard and warm.
Not something. Someone.
A hard chest crushes my breasts, and male hips dig into my stomach. I’m so thrown it takes me a moment to catch up.
But it’s his scent, cedar and sunshine, that keeps me from freaking out the way I did with Kellan.
“Annie?” Disbelief cracks the anger in his voice, his lips inches from mine in the dark.
“I know,” I whisper. “You didn’t recognize me without the garbage bag.”
Tyler steps back, and I sway.
He lunges for me, wrapping an arm around my waist.
Even though I want to shove him, I’d fall in a heap without his support. So, my fingers close over his hand, and as he helps me across the floor, I imagine away the heat of his body.