He kisses me back, harder. “Deal.”
We get lost in kissing each other again, when headlights from several large vehicles blind us from above.
Walker holds his arm up to shield his eyes.
“Who is it?” I ask, doing the same.
Thankfully, the lights shut off and the owners of the vehicles pile out one by one. The first person I notice is Johnny Tate. Sloan must have brought the party to us. I’m sure Perry is going to be thrilled about this.
The second thing I notice is how much Sloan is stumbling around. She can barely stand in her wedge sandals and shorts so short if she bends over any further we’ll all know for sure she’s not a natural blonde.
Johnny helps Sloan down through the yard while she obnoxiously calls for Perry. I stand up from my seat.
“He’s not here, Sloan.”
She sneers at me, pulling out a tube of lip gloss. “Well, where is he? I called like five times.”
I watch her smear the sticky pink goo all over her lips with surprising precision. Must be something girls like her are taught.
“I don’t know. He went somewhere with Jeremy. Should be back soon.”
She rolls her eyes. “Okay, then.” She turns back to the entourage of guys and girls she brought with her. “Put the keg over there and you can set up the table under the deck.”
I grab her arm and she turns back to me with disdain.
“What the hell are you doing?” I ask.
She laughs. “Having a party, duh.”
She attempts to turn away from me again, but I tighten my grip. “Perry is going to freak out you invited all these people here.”
She shrugs me off. “Please, Tess. I only invited the important ones.” She looks around the campfire with disinterest. “Besides, this party is looking pretty lame.”
“It’s not supposed to be a party, Sloan. We just came to hang out for the weekend,” I say through my teeth.
“Boring,” she says in a sing-song voice. She holds her hand out, and a cup appears, filled to the rim. “Thank you, Johnny,” she smiles back at him.
He gives her a once over. “Any time, girl.”
Okay, I’ve seen enough. We need to find Perry before this gets any more out of control. The last thing we need is for him to show up and catch his girlfriend falling all over some douchebag at his own party.
I grab Walker by the shirt and drag him down by the dock. “We need to find them.”
“I can’t leave you alone here.” He looks around at the increasing number of people showing up and then back to me.
I pull my phone out of my pocket. “Call Jer. He’ll know what to do.”
Walker nods and dials his number. I hold my breath while I wait. I’ve seen Perry lose his temper a couple times before and it’s not something you look forward to. Especially when it involves Sloan.
7
Breaking Bad
Perry- Then
The thing about good ideas is they usually get you in trouble. When I walked into the bedroom two hours ago, there was three pounds of weed on the bed. Now I’m riding back to the cabin in the golf cart with my pockets stacked and a few loose joints.
Jeremy got the idea when he overpaid for a bag last week. Not that we’re avid pot smokers, but we enjoy the recreational toke from time to time. Apparently he met this guy who could hook us up if we bought in bulk. I’m not very good at math, but I’m pretty sure he inadvertently made us drug dealers. We sold all three pounds in under an hour.
The lake was the perfect place to start this venture. It’s packed full of bored high school students on vacation with their parents, college students looking to have a good time before they go back to campus, and thirty-somethings looking to unwind before heading back to the daily grind.
It was easy. Too easy. The one thing you have to be careful of is the dreaded greed. We made just over four grand for very minimal work. Illegal work, but easy profit.
Jeremy’s phone rings non-stop when we’re almost back to the cabin. I nod to his pocket.
“You gonna answer that?”
He shakes his head. “No, it’s Walker.” He turns to me, conflicted. “Should we tell him?”
“Yes, we should fucking tell him. The only reason we did this without him is so he could look after Tess. She doesn’t need to be involved in this.”
He nods, still not convinced.
“Listen,” I say, gripping the wheel tighter. “I’m not saying this is going to be a thing now, but we do have something here. Maybe we ride out the summer, make a little cash, and move on. Sure as hell beats slaving for my dad all of senior year.”
Jeremy continues to stare off into the lake as I continue along the winding path. There’s something larger swirling around in that brain of his, and I’m wondering what it is. My thoughts are interrupted when I see the excessive amount of vehicles at the cabin.
“The fuck?” I mutter, pulling the cart along the gravel path just beyond the driveway.
“Looks like a party,” Jeremy says, with a grin.
“Yeah, but who invited them?”
As I step out of the cart, I get a pretty good idea who’s behind this. The first vehicle I recognize is Johnny’s. The first voice I hear is Sloan’s. Her high-pitched laughter travels from where she’s dancing over by the fire. Tess is sitting on the log with her arms crossed, clearly not amused.
When I make my way through the yard, Sloan spots me and lets out some sort of squeal.
“Baby!” she cries, throwing her arms around my neck. She kisses up to my ear and I laugh.
“You miss me, Sloan?”
“Always,” she slurs. I tighten my grip on her because she’s not too steady on her feet. I pull back to look at her face. “How much did you have to drink, baby?”
Her nose scrunches up and she attempts to demonstrate using her thumb and forefinger.
I laugh again. “Just a little, huh?”
She nods and blows out an unsteady breath, leaning into me more. “It was fun.” She smiles. “But I missed you. It’s not as much fun without you.”
I kiss the side of her head. “Well, I’m glad you’re here. I wish I could say the same about your friends.”
She waves her hand in the air. “Ah, they’re fun too.”
I raise an eyebrow when I notice Johnny giving me the eye from across the fire pit. I shove my hand down the back of her short shorts and he turns away, pretending to be engaged in conversation. If there’s one thing everyone in this town knows, it’s that Sloan Prescott is with me. Maybe not all the time, but even when we’re on the outs, she always comes back.
She grabs my hand and pulls me to the cabin. “Come on, I want to show you how much I missed you.”
I smile at her, but then glance back to Tess. She’s sitting with two girls from the senior class and their mouths are running a mile a minute. Drunk chatter is annoying to Tess, and I can only imagine how much she wants me to save her. If only Sloan’s ass wasn’t so tempting right now.
Flashing a wink back to Tess, I follow Sloan into the cabin. When we get to the bedroom, she practically throws me onto the bed and climbs on top of me. She pulls at the hem of my shirt and kisses a trail up my stomach. I want to push her head lower, but we have plenty of time for that.