As Jade pulls from my grip, leaning away, I clench my other hand around her jaw and force her to open her eyes. “Look at me. Wake up, J.”
Her brows lift first, and her eyelids struggle to follow. “Uhh,” she groans as her lids part enough so she can see me.
“What is going on with you?” I whisper.
A smile presses into the corners of Jade’s lips, and her hands lift from her lap, then fall onto my shoulders. “I’m soooo happy you’re here, but I think I’m a little drunk.”
“I can tell.” Jade falls into my arms, and rests her head on my chest. “Has she seemed upset or anything?” I ask the guys.
“I’m not too sure. She seems happy with her job, but I do remember her cussing out some guy named . . . Chip, maybe? That was a month ago, though, and she seemed over it within minutes, but other than that, I can’t say I’ve noticed anything else. Jade has sort of been this way since I’ve known her,” Cale says.
“Yup, this is the only Jade we know,” Jared follows.
Chip. Oh no. I grab her dangling hand from between her legs and hold it up in front of my face. No, no, no. “What? What is it?” Cale asks.
I hold Jade’s hand up higher and point to her left ring finger. “She was engaged to be married. The wedding is in September. This summer was supposed to be her last big adventure before tying the knot.”
“Without her fiancé?” Jared snickers and pinches at the bridge of his nose. “In any case, I don’t think there’s going to be a wedding in September.”
“Did she mention what happened?” I did find it a bit odd that Jade chose to be away from Chip for the summer, but when she gets an idea in her head, she kind of runs with it, so I’ve learned not to question her every move. Plus, it was an awesome idea, and she wanted to do it with me. I’m sure once she marries Chip—if she does—our girl time will be chopped in half. So, I’m going to take what I can get from my bestie while I can, even if she is passed out on my lap right now.
“We didn’t know she was engaged,” Cale says, sounding surprised.
“Jade, how is Chip?” I ask her, shaking her shoulders a bit.
“Chip can suck a dick,” she groans. “I told him I did.” She covers her mouth and snorts into her hand. “Ooooops. Do you suck a lot of dick, Julesssss? It’s funnnn.”
Oh boy, okay. “I should probably get Jade out of here.” Except she just passed back out on my boobs.
“Typical Jade,” Jared mutters. I can’t blame them for not doing something more to help her. They didn’t know her up until a month ago, and if they thought she was always like this, I’m surprised they still put up with it. No one likes the sloppy drunk girl in their group.
“Jade, can you tell me where you live? Do you have a car here? Where can I take you?”
“Home,” she barely mutters a slur.
“That is not helpful.”
“She’s renting a condo down near Perkins Cove,” Jared says.
I turn my head, looking over at him. “Where’s Perkins Perkins?”
“A mile or so that way.” He points in the direction we came from. Awesome. Either way, I have to get her to my car, and she’s no more stable than a rag doll at the moment.
I wanted to look rested and alive for my first day tomorrow. Instead, I’m going to look like a zombie who drove halfway across the country for two days and then switched gears into being Jade’s human carrying case.
I give up the battle for a minute, letting Jade’s head fall onto my lap. I’ve always wanted to camp out near the ocean, so it looks like I may finally get my wish tonight.
“Ohh, look who finally left work,” Jared hoots. I look toward the sound of shoes slapping against the paved ramp we walked down to get to the rocks and see a guy who looks to be the same age(ish) as the rest of us. He silently walks toward the rocks we’re sitting on, and I can’t see much of him since it’s pretty dark out and his face is in the shadows.
“Liammmmm,” Jade perks up for a literal second before she flops back down.
“Again?” he responds to Jade. “You said she was tame tonight. Doesn't anyone ever think to cut her off?”
Yikes. What crawled up his ass? “Dude, what is the story over there. Why do they have you pulling night shifts all the sudden?”
“It’s just this week. They had a massive party to celebrate the beginning of the summer last night. It’s a yearly thing they do. Plus, we just lost the last ‘helper.’ It’s fine, whatever.”
"B-o-r-i-n-g," Jade says, sticking her tongue out.
Liam ignores Jade and unbuttons the collar of his dark dress shirt, then the cuffs on his wrists before pushing them up to his elbows, revealing partial sleeves of tattoos on both arms.
“That sounds like a lot of party aftermath work,” Cale continues the conversation with Liam.
Liam takes a seat on the same rock I’m on, crowding me, and I feel the need to scoot over with how close he’s sitting, seeing as we have no clue who each other are, nor did he acknowledge me sitting here on this rock that’s not big enough for two.
“Saying it was aftermath is putting it mildly,” Liam says. “It was a disaster.” His voice seems strained, but maybe that’s how he normally sounds. As I’m sitting so close while becoming too personal with the back of his short, golden hair that’s purposely styled in messy erratic spikes, I can’t help but kind of wonder (only a little) what he looks like from the other side since he’s had his back to me from the moment he appeared on this dimly lit beach.
I’m listening to him tell Jared about the various tasks he had to complete tonight before leaving work, and maybe I’m the only one feeling this way, but this is becoming a little awkward.
“Hi,” I offer as he finishes talking. “I’m Julia.” I’d like to add in how rude he was to sit down beside me and not say a word to the only new person sitting here. Maybe people aren’t as friendly in this state as they are at home, but that would contradict everything Jade has told me about this area. At least a thousand times since she got here a month ago, she’s told me how friendly everyone is, but I’m not sure I’m buying it right now.
Liam swivels around to face me, making our closeness much too apparent. I can smell his breath, which isn’t bad considering he just got off an apparently long shift. I can also smell the cologne wafting from his body, mixing with the scent of sand and salty ocean water—also not horrible. He’s staring at me coldly with his deep-set menacing eyes, looking at me as if I offended him with just my name. “I know who you are,” he says. With his cold response clarifying his personality rather than just the mood he may be in, he turns back around and continues his conversation with Jared and Cale.
Um. Wow, okay. “Did I offend you with my looks or just my name?” I counter his rudeness, making sure he doesn’t confuse me for some pushover.
Andy may have been able to manipulate me with his charm at first, then the domineering behavior soon snuck out, but I promised myself never to let another man talk to me the way Andy spoke to me after his true personality came shining through.
Liam is absolutely nothing to me, but he has no reason to talk to me like I’m a piece of trash. We don’t even know each other. I suppose maybe I’m pissy after sitting in a car for almost two days, or the fact that I arrived to find my drunken best friend passing out, but there’s no need to greet a complete stranger that way.
Liam only turns toward me enough to show the profile of his face this time. “Nope, didn’t offend me, but you have interrupted me twice.”
“No, I didn’t. You weren’t talking,” I argue.
“I wasn’t done talking, though. Excuse me for taking a brief second to catch my breath.”
He’s truly rude, and I’m not sure I’ve ever met someone so crass during an introduction. I wonder what the hell his problem is? This is not how I planned to start the summer. "What's your problem?" I ask, shoving my fingers into his rock-hard shoulder.
He looks down at the spot I just touched as if I shouldn't have com
e into contact with him. "You're my problem," he says.
"You don't even know me," I argue.
"Yeah, and I'd like to keep it that way."
I'm completely bewildered by his behavior. Does he know me somehow, and I'm the one sitting in the dark here? "Good, well, the feeling is mutual. Dick."
"What was that?" he snickers rudely.
"I called you a d-i-c-k," I annunciate.
"Jade number two has a mouth on her, huh?" Liam asks Cale and Jared.
They both put their hands up, ignoring his question, which tells me it's time to get out of here.
"Can we go, please?" I ask Jade. She groans and pushes herself off my lap to stumble over me toward Cale. “Jade.” I take her arm as she’s balancing between two rocks while whispering into Cale’s ear, but she doesn’t budge. I want to leave, but I’m obviously not leaving her here like this.
With the slightest tug on her arm, she flies backward, into me. God, Jade. In a fit of giggles, she looks up with her big goofy doe-like eyes and smiles. “I loveeee youuuu,” she mouths, poking one of my dimples.
“I really want to call it a night,” I tell her while struggling to stand us up. “Come on.”
After keeping her steady for a second, I help her down the few rocks, somehow making it onto the few inches of exposed sand without tripping. “It was nice to meet most of you tonight,” I tell them, eyeballing Liam, who I’d rather not meet again.
“Goodnight, boyyyys,” Jade slurs through a holler.
“Thank God,” I hear Liam mutter. “The last thing we need right now is two Jades.”
“Dude,” Cale hushes him. “Give her a break, will you? We don’t even know her.”
As much as I’d like to turn around and let him know I hear him, it’s most likely what he’s expecting or wanting. I’ll be the bigger person and . . . ugh. I guess men are assholes in every state.
The walk back to my car feels much longer than it did when we walked to the beach. It could be because we’re on a slight incline and I’ve been dragging a hundred-and-ten pounds of Jade half of the way, or it could just be my exhaustion kicking in. “I’m sorry, Jules,” Jade says as we reach the car.
“You have a lot of explaining to do.” My tone sounds motherly, but how could she not have told me about Chip? We tell each other everything, and we’ve spoken almost daily since she left.
“I’m not with both of them,” she snorts. I don’t know who both of them are, considering there were three, but I let her air herself out. “Don’t worry, Jared and Cale are cousins, or no, brothers, something, but Cale only kind of likes me, and I don’t really have a thing for him. I’ve just been bored and had no one else to hang out with, but now my bestie is here.” She ends her lack of explanation in a high-pitched baby-babble as she runs her fingers through my hair. What about Liam?
I lift the passenger door handle and shove myself into the opening with Jade so I can drop her into the seat. “That is not what I was telling you to explain,” I groan with exasperation while I wrestle with her deadweight body.
“Fiiiine,” she slurs. “Liam isn’t always an ass. It just seems like he acts that way to certain women. It’s—ummmmm—he’s weird. I don’t know, you know?”
“Nope, not that either,” I tell her, though it’s good to know it’s not just me—but my type, rather. I wasn’t aware I could be categorized so easily without saying more than a few words, but clearly, it’s possible. “Want to try again or should I spell it out for you?”
“I want to go hommeee,” she whines, graduating from baby babble to the sounds of a small child begging for ice cream. With that in mind, I think it’s best to extract this information from her when she’s sober. Semi-drunk Jade swings one of two ways—happy and giggly, or angered and emotional, and seeing as she’s fully loaded, I think I’d like to keep things civil for tonight. I’m too tired to deal with an angry, drunk Jade.
“I cheated on him.” I glance over at her wide-eyed, pressing my foot firmly on the brake because Jade was madly in love with Chip. She had their future children’s names picked out and wall colors for a house they hadn’t bought yet. He was all she spoke about for years.
“Why?” Is all I can manage to ask.
Her eyes are closed, and her head is resting heavily against the back of the seat. “Jade?” What a perfect curtain call for her. Her eyes are closed again and I think she’s playing me this time. “Come on. I don’t know which apartment is yours.”
“122 Forester Avenue, Apartment B23,” she mutters before her breaths elongate into a comatose, inebriated state of unconsciousness. [Continue Reading Here]
* * *
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MANHANDLER
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* * *
PROLOGUE
Ten Years Ago
There are days in my life when I wonder how I got to exactly where I am. It’s not like when I’ve been zoned out while driving for a half hour and can’t figure out how I’m still alive; it’s more curiosity about what steps I skipped that landed me in certain situations where I don’t want to be. I’ve been told time and time again that if I do things the right way and don’t take shortcuts, it’ll pay off. Well, I’m calling bullshit on all that.
It’s Freshman Orientation day, and I’m standing in front of the school, looking up at this daunting, aged building as if it’s going to swallow me whole at some point in the next four years. I have this unsettled feeling of unease, at least partly because I’m not sure I made the right life decision, which sucks since it’s the first life decision I’ve been able to make for myself.
“Scarlett. You okay, babe? You look lost in that head of yours again, but um, I’m going to head over to my dorm and check things out. Are you going to be cool for a bit?”
“I’m fine, Teak. I’m going to check into my dorm too,” I tell him.
Overbearing boyfriend? Check.
“I’m so glad we did this together because I honestly think we’re going to have the best four years ever.” Teak kisses me on the cheek and jogs off toward the men’s dormitory, hooting into the distance. No one else is really making noises or shouting with excitement, but I think Teak has this idea of what college is supposed to be like, and he can only visualize the fraternity part of the experience.
A Stalker-like boyfriend, who wants to share every single college experience together? Check.
The moment I’m alone, a sense of freedom overwhelms me, and for the first time in my life, I know I’m in control, even if it’s only self-control.
My story is one of a girl who was raised with a silver spoon in her mouth. However, as soon as I learned what money could do to a person, I spit the damn spoon out and refused to follow in the footsteps of a man who only sees life in dollar signs. So here I am, the only person who would likely turn down a full ride at college in exchange for freedom. If I let Dad pay, it would only be an extension plan for his ownership of me, and there was no way I could feed into that any longer. I want to start my story at the beginning—my beginning, which means rejecting what looks easy and never turning back. In other words, having a smothering boyfriend at the beginning of my story is not going to work out too well. For him. I’ll deal with that shortly, though.
I use my paper map to search for the location of my dorm, finding it on the other side of the grassy quad. At least the dorms aren’t co-ed, which is pretty much the only thing working in my favor for this fresh-start thing I’m attempting. I realize I’ve done this to myself. Despite the fact that I’m not the—I want to be near you, next to you, taste you, breathe you in, and sniff your butt—demented part of the relationship I’m in, I haven’t taken the necessary move to break free from it. I was set to take off in my own direction to college … alone, but Teak insisted on going to the same university. Almost as soon as I (stupidly) told him I was going to Hartford University, he “luckily” got in too, and here we are … together, forever at last, or whateve
r it is he’s chanting in his head right now.
“Scarlett!” I hear from behind. “Babe, wait up.”
I turn and readjust the bags on my shoulder. “Did you forget something?” I ask him. I’m honestly not sure I could sound less interested if I tried, yet he doesn’t seem to pick up on this. He hasn’t picked up on it since I lost interest in him when I found out he was going to this school too.
“I just want to see where you’re living. Gotta check the place out and make sure it’s good enough for my woman,” he says with a wink that looks more like a twitch. Maybe it is a twitch. It would explain some things.
The caveman-type boyfriend who beats on his chest while claiming his woman? Check.
“Teak, I’m fine, really, but thank you.” I keep walking, but he follows.
“Is something wrong?” he asks. “You sound kind of cold. I can warm you up, babe.”
I sound kind of cold. Do I look cold? Because it’s a hundred degrees and 80 percent humidity. I don’t know. Maybe it’s just you.
A boyfriend who keeps using pickup lines a year after being a relationship with the same woman? Check.
“Oh my God,” I say through gritted teeth. I squeeze my hands into the sides of my head. “No, I just want to find my own way right now, okay? That’s all.”
“Oh,” he says with cynical laughter. Because clearly, I sound like I’m joking, as far as he’s concerned. “Ooh, I have an idea. Later, we choose a place to meet up and then pretend like we’re strangers. It will look like a typical Freshman instalove hookup, and everyone will think we’re like the hottest couple on campus for the rest of the year. Plus, that could be sexy and fun to pretend like we’re just meeting, right?” He pulls my hair behind my back and wraps his arm around my neck. “God, you’re so cute.” He just keeps talking and talking and talking, but all I hear is blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, I can’t live without you. I need you, I want you, give me more.
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