by Anna Katmore
Oh, good Lord in heaven— “Yes!”
“Your mom would like to talk to you again.” Her smile widening, she handed me Tony’s phone.
“Mom?”
“Hi, sweetheart. Is this what you really want?”
Unable to stop myself, I broke out in tears, sobbing heavily into the phone. My crying obviously unsettled Tony. He narrowed his eyes at me and mouthed, “Good tears?”
More tears spilled over as I nodded vigorously at him. To my mom I said, “Yes, I really want this. Please, can I stay here?”
“I would have loved to see you again. But I also want the best for you, my little darling. I’m going to call Pamela in a minute. Jack needs to cancel that flight.”
A ten-thousand-pound rock dropped from my chest.
I said goodbye to my mom and rang off, giving Tony his cell phone back. He slipped it into his pocket, then wrapped his arms around me, breathing a relieved sigh into my hair. “We’d better move your stuff here fast, before Chloe comes up with the idea of burning it,” he teased, making me laugh.
Mrs. Jackson agreed that we’d talk about everything, such as house rules, guardianship, and work with the horses, after I’d settled in. While Tony drove me back to town, he spoke to Ryan on his cell and gave him the great news. Even I could hear the gang hollering and hooting in the background. It made my heart flutter inside my chest.
When we reached my cousin’s house and I got out of Tony’s car, he came inside with me. As soon as I stepped through the door, Pamela rushed out of the kitchen, flinging her arms around me. “Oh, Sammy! Where have you been? We were so worried. I had to call Jessie Hunter to hear from her son that you were all right and not running away.”
I hugged her back briefly. “Did my mother call you?” I said in a chilled tone.
Pamela pulled back, studying my face. “Yes, she did. She told us you’re going to move in with your teacher. Do you think this is a good idea?”
“Seriously, Pam, do you think it’s a better idea to send me back to Egypt?” I snapped.
Slowly, my aunt shook her head. After a long time she whispered, “I’m glad you found a way to stay.”
I couldn’t be angry with her any longer then. She’d tried her best, I knew that. I squeezed her hand, letting her know I appreciated everything she’d done for me.
But I hated my uncle.
As he came down the hallway toward us, I squared my shoulders and kept my expression in check. “I’m going to pack my things now,” I said to my aunt. Striding past my uncle, I acknowledged him with a curt, “Jack.”
“Mrs. Summers, Mr. Summers,” I heard Tony say to them behind me, his tone as clipped as mine. He followed me upstairs, and when he stepped into my room, he gasped. “Holy crap!”
Looking at him over my shoulder, I smirked. “What? You didn’t believe me?”
“I did. It’s just—I didn’t think it was that bad.”
“It was a bit of a nasty shock for me too, when I woke up to this.”
Tony picked up my clothes. I folded and placed them on my bed, then smoothed them into the suitcase I had come here with. On top, I put my drawing stuff, my music, my toiletries, and the few books I’d brought. My school books went into my backpack, and I tucked my cell into my pocket. That would be everything.
When I turned around, Tony was inspecting my laptop. Most of the screen was gone, and booting it up was impossible. He caught my sad gaze. “Don’t worry. We’ll find you a new one.”
“That’s not it,” I said weakly. “All the pictures I had on it, files, documents. It’s like a whole lot of memories got lost.”
“I’ll have Frederickson take a look. He’s good with computers. He can probably retrieve your stuff and save it on a flash drive for you.”
I hoped so.
We carried my stuff down to his car and loaded it into the trunk. Then it was time to say goodbye. Tony waited in the car while I headed back to the house and met Pamela in the doorway.
I stopped in front of her, sucking in a deep breath. “Well, I guess that’s it. I’m ready to go.”
“Take care, Sammy.” She took both my hands in hers. “And if you need anything or somebody to talk to…let me know.”
“You still don’t believe me, do you?” It almost broke my heart again, but this time I didn’t let it get to me.
“I’m trying to. But we’re talking about Chloe. I can’t believe she would do something this terrible to you. Just look at her now. She even cut her hair and dyed it black. You mean so much to her that she wants to be like you.”
Yeah, right. And that’s where the bad influence from my side comes in.
I shook my head, giving up all hope. “Tell Jack I said goodbye, okay?”
Pamela nodded, releasing my hands. “I’ll miss you, Sam.”
“Take care, Pamela.” I turned on my heel. The sound of the door closing behind me made my heart twitch.
But the fiasco wasn’t over yet. Chloe’s car cruised up the street at that moment. She parked behind Tony, got out, and stalked over to me in her high heels that made her endless bare legs appear even longer. Folding her arms over her chest, she sneered at me. “Ready to go home, little cousin?”
I wanted to scratch out her eyes. But what good would it do me? I’d won. She just didn’t know it yet.
“Why did you do it?” I asked in return, my voice cold. “Why go to these lengths to get rid of me? Did you think you’d get Tony back once I was gone?”
Shock from my accusation gleamed in her eyes, even though she tried to hide it behind a nonchalant laugh. But then the hurt took over. “I don’t care if I get him back. I just don’t want you to have him. You came here—and stole everything from me. It’s time you leave, Samantha.”
I remembered tea parties in Wonderland. Dressing up as princesses with quilts draped over our shoulders. Pretending we were dolphins in their pool…
But this was not the girl I remembered. The happiness had gone from her laugh, the warmth in her eyes had disappeared. I could turn away now and not feel like I was leaving a beloved relative behind. But first she needed to know.
“I guess no one informed you yet. I’m moving in with Tony’s aunt. She’s happy to have me there.”
Chloe sucked in a sharp breath.
“What you did was so shitty. And now it turns out you failed to get rid of me after all. Goodbye, Chloe.” I whirled around, trying to rein in my shaking body, and walked to Tony’s car.
As soon as I sat next to him, he turned the key in the ignition and drove off. I didn’t look out the window at my cousin as we passed her. My gaze was locked on my hands clasped in my lap.
CHAPTER 12
We sat on the couch in Ryan’s beach house. All of us who had come together this morning, and also Allie and Sasha, who were officially a couple since last night. Like Tony and me.
I nestled my head under his chin, placing my feet on the couch, enjoying his stroking my hair and neck. Strange how much my life had changed in the past twenty-four hours. Everything had fallen into place. I was relaxed, happy, and awfully in love with the guy next to me. What he’d done for me today was beyond amazing.
When Ryan went into the kitchen, Tony shouted around the lollipop between his teeth, which he’d stolen from me a minute ago, “Bring me a Coke, please, would you?”
“Sure. Anyone else want one?” Ryan replied.
Susan and Alex shouted, “Yes!” Lisa started to order something too, but Ryan’s phone buzzing on the coffee table cut her short. She looked up with her brows knitted together. “It’s Brinna,” she said.
Ryan popped his head out from the kitchen. “Put her on loudspeaker.” Lisa pushed a button and set the phone back on the tabletop. “Hey, Brin!” Ryan shouted from the kitchen then. “What’s up?”
“Hunter! You gotta help me!”
Instantly, everyone in the room straightened at her tear-strained voice. Shock traveled through my every nerve. This was bad.
Ryan strode back to th
e living room and handed out the drinks as he demanded, “What happened?”
“It’s Chloe. She lost it!”
“What do you mean she lost it?” I shot out.
“Samantha? Is that you?” I couldn’t identify if she was glad to hear my voice or shocked. “Oh, it’s so terrible.”
“Tell me what’s going on,” Ryan said tersely, getting her attention back.
“Chloe’s trashed. She totaled her car.”
I clapped a hand to my mouth and struggled to listen to what Brin was trying to tell us between her violent sobs, as the image of Chloe squeezed in behind the steering wheel of a wrecked car came up in front of my eyes.
“She called me ten minutes ago and told me where to find her car. I’m here now. It looks so bad, Hunter. I can’t believe Chloe got out of it alive. But she’s gone.” There was more sobbing at the other end.
“Why is she gone? Where did she go?” Ryan’s demand was intense enough for Brinna to choke back her tears and speak.
“I don’t know. She won’t answer her phone anymore. But when she called me, I think she was at the beach. I heard the waves in the background.”
“Did you call her parents?”
“No. She said I shouldn’t. That everything was fine. But her car doesn’t look fine, and I don’t know what to do now. Maybe I should go to the police, or to her house and talk to her mom.”
“I don’t want her to drive in her current condition,” Ryan whispered at us. Immediately, Alex rose from the couch, pulling Simone with him. Ryan nodded appreciatively. “Winter and Simone will come and get you,” he said, louder again. “Where are you?”
As soon as Brinna had given us the location, Simone and Alex whirled out the door. I bit my nails as I listened to what Ryan said next.
“Now sit down somewhere and wait for the guys to meet you. Chloe crashed her car near Avila Beach. If she went down to the shore then we’ll find her.”
“Okay… I really hope she’s all right.” The panic in Brinna’s voice sizzled through me before she rang off.
Ryan turned to me. “Do you want to go and see your aunt and uncle? They need to know.”
Of course they did. But after everything that had happened, I wasn’t the right person to tell them. I rose from the couch, my knees suddenly trembling. “I’d rather come with you and look for Chloe.”
“I can go to your aunt’s,” Susan offered then. “With the crutches, I can’t jog down the beach anyway.”
“All right,” Hunter agreed, grabbing Lisa and his jacket, getting ready to go. “Frederickson, can you drive Susan?”
Nick nodded.
We all rushed out to the cars and headed off.
Darkness pressed against the windows. I concentrated hard on the eerie white circles that Tony’s headlights cast on the street in front of us, but my mind trailed off anyway. What if Chloe wasn’t all right? It looks so bad, Hunter! Brinna’s hysterical voice rang in my ears. Chloe had been such a mean bitch. But I didn’t want her hurt. None of us did.
A half-finished lollipop appeared in my peripheral view. “To soothe your nerves,” Tony said. “Maybe the sugar will bring the color back to your face.”
I felt cold and numb. My fingers trembled as I took the lollipop from him, put it in my mouth, and looked out the window again. I sucked the candy absently until finally I was chewing on the empty stick.
The taillights of Hunter’s Audi flashed deep red in the distance. We were there. Tony pulled up behind him, and we climbed out to meet the others.
A salty breeze wafted toward us from the sea. Cold crept under my hoodie. Tony tucked me tight against his side and spoke up. “Okay, guys, we’ll do it like this. Hunter, you and Liz walk up the beach. Sam and I will walk down. And Allie, you and Sasha search the street up here. Whoever finds her first calls the others. Let’s go.”
Without hesitation, we walked off, using the flashlights on our phones in the dark. “Chloe!” everyone called out at short intervals.
The voices behind us faded fast. At a pace that had me panting after a few hundred meters, Tony and I headed down the beach. There was no sign of her, and with the many footprints in the sand, it was impossible to tell whether someone had walked along here recently.
“Do you think she’s all right?” I asked, unable to keep the anxiety out of my voice.
“If she could walk away from the car and also call Brinna, it might not be too bad. But if she’s trashed, she might get into trouble down here. With the water and all.”
“It’s my fault she got drunk tonight.”
“No, Sam! It certainly isn’t your fault. With what happened last night, you saw that she has serious issues.” He paused. A sigh escaped him. “In fact, I think it’s actually got to do with me and not with you.”
Surprised, I looked at Tony, waiting for him to explain.
“I heard what she said to you today. About not wanting you to have me. I never told anyone, but from time to time, she still sends me messages.”
“Really?” I gasped. “What does she say?”
Tony cleared his throat, and I could be sure this was a subject he was really uncomfortable with. “Sometimes she just writes meaningless shit. Like where she’s at in that moment and if I’d like to come meet her. Other times, she asks for a second chance.”
Oh my God. My cousin was desperate. She loved Tony more than I’d thought. It must have hurt her unspeakably to see him with me now. No wonder she’d lost it. Maybe I would’ve reacted the same way, if it was the other way round.
No, I wouldn’t.
But in the end I could understand her actions and hatred toward me. “We have to find her,” I whispered with a frightened edge to my voice.
“And we will,” Tony reassured me. But the farther we got, the more hope I lost. None of the others had called yet. Where the hell was she?
“Maybe we should go back and look somewhere else?” I suggested. “If she’s really down here, we should have found her by—” The last word froze in my throat. The beam of my flashlight had landed on a pair of discarded shoes. Skyscraper-high heels.
“Chloe?” I croaked, turning around, lighting as much of the beach as I could.
“Sam,” Tony said calmly a second later, placing his hand on my forearm. When I looked at him, he pointed ahead of us.
I traced the direction of his arm and, holding my breath, I heard the sobs of a young woman. Chloe was sitting in the sand, out far enough that the waves brushed around her legs and waist. She’d buried her face in her folded arms, which rested on her bent knees.
Paralyzed, I stood and watched my cousin cry. When I found my strength again, I took a step forward. “Chloe,” I said, loud enough this time for her to hear me over the crashing waves.
She lifted her head and looked into the flashlight, squinting. A nasty cut sat over her right eyebrow and blood streamed down one side of her face. “Samantha—” she slurred. “What the fuck are you doing here?”
“You crashed your car. We came looking for you.”
Behind me, I heard Tony call the others, telling them where we’d found her. I concentrated on my cousin again. As I walked closer, my heart knocked against the base of my throat. “Come on, we’ll take you home now.”
“Oh no…” she almost sang. Then she jerked up and walked away from me, backwards, into the sea. “No! Go away. I hate you!” She stumbled, falling sideways into the water, but she quickly climbed to her feet again. “I don’t ever want to see you again.”
I stopped dead, afraid to scare her even farther out. She sure had lost control over her body. In the pitch-black night, we would never find her should she disappear into the waves.
“Chloe, you’re hurt. And confused. Let us take you home to Aunt Pam. Your parents will take care of you.”
“Nooo!” she screeched, almost deafening me. “They can’t know. The car is a wreck. Dad will kill me.”
“They won’t be mad. They’ll just be happy you survived. Now come out of the wate
r, please!” I took another tentative step toward her, but Chloe immediately lurched back, and this time, she tripped, lost her ground, and fell completely underwater.
“Chloe!” I yelled, running forward.
But she resurfaced before I reached the waves, spluttering water. “Go away, you bitch! You ass! Leave me alone! Why can’t you go back to Egypt and fuck off out of my life?”
My heart dropped to my feet. I didn’t take another step.
A gentle hand landed on my shoulder. Tony. I had completely forgotten he was there, too.
“Let me talk to her,” he whispered in my ear.
Shocked beyond words at my cousin’s reaction, I couldn’t answer, but just let him move forward.
Heartbreakingly softly, he said, “Hey, Chloe.”
“Tony?” She sounded like she didn’t trust her ears.
“Yeah.”
“What are you doing here?”
“I came with Sam. You had us worried.”
“Yeah, right.” She snorted a drunken laugh. “Like you’d ever care about how I feel.”
“Why do you think I wouldn’t?” He cocked his head and took a step forward. Either she missed it, or she was fine with him coming toward her, because she didn’t shout at him to stop. His feet were in the water now.
“Because you dumped me?” she said through gritted teeth, walking backwards again. “Because you never answer any of my calls or reply to my messages!” With clawed fingers, she raked her wet hair off of her forehead, pressing her palms to her temples, looking eerily insane. “Because you never fucking talk to me when we have practice together!”
Slowly, Tony waded deeper into the waves. This time even I almost missed it. “I tried to be friends with you after…we dated. But you made it clear that a friendship wasn’t possible for us.” Two more steps. The sea drenched his jeans up to his knees. He was only two arm-lengths away from her now.
“Yes. Because I was in love with you!” She started to sob again, her arms dropping loosely back into the water. “And I can’t make it stop, even now!”
I placed both my hands over my mouth, horrified by her confession. Trashed like this, she probably wouldn’t remember any of it later, but it still must have cost her a lot to come out with it. Right now, I wanted nothing more than to take her in my arms and calm her. But the chasm between us had grown too deep.