Gabby was leaning on the wall beside the door. Her platforms were on. So were mine. But she was making no move to leave. Her forehead was a bit shinier than it had been earlier.
“Are you feeling okay, Gabs?”
“Just a bit hot. Sort of ick. It’s just warm up here, I think. I’m worried about my hair.”
If it was warm, I would know about it. I felt the heat harder than she did.
“We should go downstairs, then,” I offered and stared at her stomach. It couldn’t be what the little niggling voice in the back of my head was suggesting. It couldn’t be because she would have thought about that first.
“Mhmm.” She pushed herself off the wall and her heels raised her ten stories tall. “I need water.”
Click clacks against the stone floor followed our footsteps toward the staircase. Voices chattered from below. Ellie was onto something when she’d suggested that we meet our men at the bottom of the staircase. I felt like a princess.
I saw him before he saw me. His suit was divine. It was tailored to his tall frame. Snug. His tie was the same color as the rose gold on my dress. His soft leather shoes were something that would be seen on a red carpet. I was used to seeing him in casual street wear and Converse. But he pulled this off so well.
He looked up and his mouth dropped open. “Fuck. Me.”
I laughed and noticed Ellie watching him with disapproval.
“Someone’s taking a picture, right?” Drayton shouted, his gaze never leaving mine. “Because I’m in the moment but someone better get a photo of my girl.”
“All right, we get it,” Gabby’s monotone complaint droned behind me. “Drayton is obsessed with Dallas and he shows it. Cool.”
I peeped at Josh who was wearing a similar suit to Drayton’s but without a tie, and the shirt underneath his jacket was the same dark blue as Gabby’s dress. He frowned at Gabby.
“Gabby, you do look beautiful.”
When I reached the floor, Drayton’s hand took mine. It was warm, as usual. Butterflies caused havoc in my stomach due to his no-holding-back smile. It was the best one of all. Bright and bold.
“You look perfect.” His hold moved to my waist, the rest of the room forgotten.
“You look perfect.” I stored it to memory. His figure in this outfit. His perfection. The fabric of his suit was like butter beneath my fingertips. It was Armani—I’d been with him when he bought it, and while the thought of spending so much on one outfit made me sweat, I couldn’t deny that it was worth it.
Ellie was snapping photos, the flash reflected in Drayton’s soft green stare of admiration. “You girls look gorgeous,” she cooed.
The four of us stood in front of the water feature in the foyer. The sound of its fall was whimsical while we posed for Ellie, who was an enthusiastic photographer. We took group photos, couple photos, friend photos.
Ellie mentioned that she wanted to do a photo with Leroy and Drayton. Before she could run off to find Leroy, she showed me how to operate her big Canon camera, which I felt afraid to hold for the sheer fact that it was the equivalent feeling to watching a stack of cash burn in my palm. If I dropped it, I was going to die.
“Drayton!”
We all looked up at the entrance at the far end of the corridor, where a disgruntled and frustrated voice came from. Leroy appeared a moment later, holding a piece of paper in the same hand that his Rolex watch was on. If looks could kill.
Drayton watched his father approaching him with boredom. His hands were in his pockets and there was not a crease of concern on his face.
“You told me that you sent that goddamn letter of intent to Baylor.” He shoved the paper into his son’s chest but Drayton didn’t touch it. “The deadline has been and gone. You didn’t get the fucking scholarship. What the hell is—”
Ellie stepped between them and held a palm up to her husband. “Don’t talk to him like that. You need to calm down.”
My throat felt thick watching the tension. Drayton appeared calm but his chest was rising and falling and his jaw fluttered. Gabby and Josh discreetly pointed at the kitchen and tiptoed across the foyer. It would be preferable to follow them. And perhaps I should have, because this seemed personal. But I didn’t want to leave Drayton.
“I’m not going to Baylor,” Drayton said. His lips barely parted.
“Apparently, you’re not going anywhere now,” Leroy snapped. He took a step back and threw the paper at the ground. “I will talk to the coach and you will do a walk-on tryout.”
“No. It’s not happening. I told you. I’ll go where I want. Or I’ll go nowhere.”
Ellie remained between them. She was smaller than both, but determined to keep them apart. Leroy and Drayton glared at each other with identical scowls.
Leroy looked at me. “This is your fault.”
Somehow telling him that I was in favor of Drayton choosing the path that he’d planned to begin with seemed like it would make things worse. I didn’t know what to tell him. I stood tall and attempted not to crumble under his harsh glare.
“Leroy,” Ellie warned.
“There was not one issue until she arrived.” He pointed at his son. “I thought you were smarter than that. But well done. You screwed up your own future over a girl.”
“Don’t talk about her like that.” Drayton’s breathing became heavier, his hands were restless in his pockets. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Please, can we do this later,” Ellie said desperately. “The kids have to go. The limo will be here soon.”
“You screwed everything up.”
Drayton moved past his mother, stood in front of me, and squared his shoulders. “You’re fucking pushing me, man.”
“Enough,” Ellie shouted, once again intercepting and putting herself in the middle of a standoff. “Leroy, enough. You need to go and cool off. Now.”
Her face was flushed and her hand trembled as she pointed at the staircase. Without another word, Leroy turned around and went upstairs.
“Mom,” Drayton said.
“He doesn’t mean it, Drayton,” she mumbled.
“Didn’t mean to what? Force me into his old school because he’s on a power trip?”
“It’s where his father wen—”
“Yeah. I know. Where his father went and his father. I get it. But I can choose a new path, Mom. I don’t have to do the same thing as them. UCLA is a good school.”
“I know.” She nodded and leaned against the bannister as if she couldn’t hold up her own weight. “But it’s more complicated than that. You know that Grandpa Lahey died in that house fire when you were a baby, right?”
Drayton nodded.
“Well, before he died one of the last conversations that your dad had with Grandpa was about college football. He told Grandpa that you’d attend Baylor, their alma mater. It was a casual conversation over lunch. It was light and cute, but it was the last conversation that they had, Dray. He died that afternoon. And ever since then, your dad has been trying to keep his promise.”
Leroy had suffered so much loss. He might be cold and harsh, but it was unimaginable that he’d lost his parents and his daughter so tragically. The commiseration that I felt was immediate. I knew exactly what it was like to lose both parents.
Drayton exhaled and ran a hand through his hair. “Why did no one tell me this?”
“He didn’t want to use guilt tactics to encourage your choice.”
“Being an asshole was his preferred option?”
“I know that he’s gone about this all wrong, but he felt panicked. He knew as soon as Dallas stepped onto the scene that this might happen”—she looked at me and smiled—“which doesn’t put you at blame, honey. But Dray, you’ve never cared all that much about the college itself. He knew it was possible that being in love would have some pull on what you chose.”
“I still should have known the real reason he was so insistent on where I went to school.”
“I told him that. But
would it have made a difference?”
Drayton’s gaze moved around the room, thoughtful for a moment until he shrugged. “Maybe. Maybe not. At least I would have understood, and we could have saved ourselves all of this fucking bullshit.”
“Language.”
“Sorry, Mom.”
She inhaled a long deep breath. I couldn’t imagine the toll that it would take watching her husband and son fight with so much vehemence. “Forget about it for tonight if you can. Just have a nice prom. I’ll talk to Dad and we can attempt a civil discussion tomorrow.”
“Yeah.” He pulled his mom into a hug, his chin resting on her head. “Love you, Mom.”
Silver and pale-pink balloons full of helium dotted the entire ceiling. The hotel had opened up three separate banquet rooms to create a space large enough for our prom. A polished wooden floor was at one end of the room, along with a booth for the DJ. The other end of the room was made up of square tables draped in black cloth. Individual pink electric candles flickered in the middle of each table, and the chairs were silver steel.
It was dark but light was provided in the form of the aforementioned candles and twinkling lights zigzagging from one side of the ceiling to the other. It was elegant and enchanting. Beside the sliding door, which went out to a large patio, was a backdrop for photographs. Couples and groups were lined up, and the air was alive with laughter and upbeat music. The dancing was energetic, and although the start of the night had been less than ideal, the tension was slipping. The more that Drayton relaxed, the easier it was to be in the moment. Gabby and Josh disappeared in search of food the minute we arrived.
“Hey.” Drayton tugged on my arm as I absentmindedly headed toward the dance floor. I turned and let him pull me into a tender embrace, his hands fanning out on my hips. “Have I told you that you look beautiful? Like, breathtaking. The most stunning girl that I’ve ever laid eyes on.”
I giggled at the soft pecks he laid on my cheeks between each compliment. He was being careful not to smudge my makeup. I could feel a multitude of envious eyes boring into the two of us. People had accepted that Drayton and I were in a relationship, but that didn’t stop the girls from pining and wishing for what was mine.
“You’ve told me about”—I narrowed my eyes, tilting my head from side to side as I pretended to think it over—“a thousand times.”
“And I’m going to keep telling you because I cannot get over how damn incredible you look.” He stepped back and lifted my hand above my head so that I could do a twirl.
He kept his hand around mine and pulled me in close again, his sigh content. He led us onto the dance floor. A relatively slow song was playing, allowing us to dance intimately. His free hand rested on my lower back, just above my bum, and I held his shoulder. As we moved, slowly and sweetly, to the song, I looked up and felt inexplicably grateful for finding a love like his. He was so appreciative of all that he had, and it was uplifting. I rested my head on his chest and felt the beat of his heart. It was in time with mine.
“You know,” he said, “I remember the first time that I realized how gorgeous you are.”
“You do?”
“I mean, I always knew you were attractive. Even when we didn’t have anything to do with each other. But the moment that you first took my breath away, the first moment that you floored me was the night that I kidnapped you and took you back to my place. You came out of the bathroom wearing my T-shirt and I swear I almost lost it.”
“That was the moment?” I laughed. “Not when I was dressed up in my club outfit?”
“You looked hot as hell in that little rose-gold dress”—my heart skipped a beat at the fact that he remembered what I was wearing—“but there was just something so damn gorgeous about seeing you in my shirt, seeing you dressed down and comfortable. Seeing you in my clothing is a huge turn on, and I knew right then and there that I wanted to see it more often. It was definitely hard keeping my hands to myself that night.”
“Why did you?”
“You’d been drinking,” he stated with a lopsided smile. “Call me crazy, but I knew you were special, more special than a drunken hookup. I couldn’t leave you alone after that, though. But I wanted you to want me too.”
I laughed. “I can’t believe we didn’t just get it all out there in the beginning. We both felt the same way. Talk about a lack of communication.”
“I wasted so much time,” he said with a slightly more somber expression than before. “I fucked around, playing games and waiting for you to want me back when I should have just told you how I felt.”
His knuckles gently grazed the nape of my neck as his fingers fanned out and he locked me in an intense stare. “I’m doing my best to make up for that lost time, Cheer. I’ll tell you all day, every day, just how much you mean to me. Because I’m an idiot and it took me way too long to say it in the first place.”
I watched him, breathless. “I love you, Drayton.”
“I love you too.”
His hands, tender and gentle but powerful, held my face. As if I wasn’t close enough, he moved one hand a time, repositioning them on my back so that he could hold me tight. He was almost lifting me off the ground as his tongue lapped at mine and I wrapped my arms around his neck.
“Excuse me, you two.”
Drayton and I broke apart and found Miss Fowler’s disapproving glare. She towered over even Drayton, and she scowled behind her thin wire-framed glasses.
“Enough of that.”
The middle-aged woman tsked before moving back through the crowd of dancing teenagers. Drayton and I shared an amused laugh and continued to kiss as though we provided the air to each other’s lungs. If anyone wanted us to stop, they were going to have to physically keep us apart.
Good luck to them.
We danced for a while, never letting go of each other. Drayton studied me with a heated gaze, worshipping my every move with the most admiring expression that had ever adorned his face. Later, we found Gabby and Josh, and danced with them for a while before we all headed off to the photo area. We took group shots, friend shots, and couple shots. The poses ranged from cute and romantic to wildly outrageous and possibly somewhat inappropriate … but I hadn’t expected anything less from my man.
I let him go for a little while so that he could take photos with the team and his friends. Those photos ended up taking the longest, I thought. Everyone wanted a picture with their captain. Even I got in on a few of the photos with the cheer team. Emily looked beautiful. She didn’t care when I told her that, but when she turned around and didn’t realize that I was watching, she smiled.
“Should we go and wait for him on the balcony?” Gabby suggested while we sat at a nearby table, watching Drayton with his team. “I haven’t been out there yet.”
Josh and I nodded, and we got up, pushing our ribboned seats back under the table.
I was amazed at how big the patio was. It stretched from one corner of the building to the other and extended at least thirteen feet out in front. The railing had been wrapped with fairy lights that twinkled in a timed pattern, and there were a few scattered two-person tables and seats that were all occupied by various students who, on closer inspection, looked as though they were sharing a blunt.
Of course.
The night air wasn’t warm, but it was a welcomed refresher. I hadn’t realized how suffocated I was beginning to feel inside until I was able to inhale some of the fresh oxygen outside. We stood by the railing and looked out over central Castle Rock. There wasn’t a lot of traffic, but a couple of car roofs were idle at the red traffic lights. Store lights illuminated the footpaths.
“How is Drayton doing after that whole thing that happened earlier?” Gabby asked. She held her hand out to Josh, who seemed confused for a moment but then reached into his jacket pocket and retrieved a flask.
“He’s fine,” I answered, pointing at the object in her hand. “Where did that come from?”
“Josh had the flask.” She pointed at
her boyfriend, who leaned an elbow on the railing, watching the street below. “He filled it up with something from the liquor cabinet at home. What is it?”
“Bourbon,” he answered.
I watched her unscrew the lid and felt weird about it. She drank all the time. That wasn’t what the problem was. I looked at her dress, tight. I looked at her boobs, huge. I stood up straight, stepped forward, and slapped the flask out of her hand. It splashed a potent-smelling liquid and narrowly missed my dress as it flew over the railing and disappeared out of sight.
“What the …?” Gabby leaned over and I was worried that her addiction had got to the point where she’d jump to her death just to save her precious poison.
“You can’t drink,” I yelped, but lowered my voice as she and Josh stared, not able to understand what the issue was.
“Why can’t she drink?”
“Yeah, why?” Gabby threw her hands up.
This wasn’t the gentlest way of telling someone that you thought she might be pregnant. Hell, I shouldn’t have had to tell her at all. Surely, she’d suspected it herself. Surely? No, she wouldn’t have been drinking if she thought it was possible, which just brought me back to the disbelief I felt at the fact that she hadn’t even considered it.
“Can we talk?” I grabbed her wrist. “In private. Josh, find Drayton. We’ll be—around.”
“Okay?” He followed behind us, looking like a lost puppy as we stepped back into the stuffy banquet room. I felt a pang of disappointment because “I Like Me Better” was playing and I’d have loved to dance to it with Drayton. But I saw that he was still busy with photos and the team, so we split off from Josh and I dragged Gabby into the corridor and into the elevator.
“What. The. Fuck. Is. Happening?” Gabby banged her head against the lift wall while I aggressively smacked the ground-level button.
“I think you’re pregnant!” I blurted.
Her forehead remained on the wall, but she stared at me from the corner of her eye, her mouth open. Her chest rose and fell rapidly, and when the elevator doors opened with a bell, breaking the piercing silence, we both jumped in fright.
“Where are we going?” she mumbled as I once again grabbed her wrist before dragging her through the hotel lobby.
The QB Bad Boy and Me Page 31