Total pages in book: 141
Estimated words: 134665 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 673(@200wpm)___ 539(@250wpm)___ 449(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 134665 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 673(@200wpm)___ 539(@250wpm)___ 449(@300wpm)
We enter the theater, and I see Austin at the concessions with Lilly. And I think back to the day Austin had that bomb dropped on her. The day she found out that Cole’s half-sister is also her half-sister.
Seven months ago
“I don’t …” she trails off. “Why would my dad want to hurt Cole?”
Cole stares at her but remains silent as he sits on the couch in their clubhouse. She stands next to me, and I silently cry. Deke filled me in on the way here about why Cole skipped school today. He found out that the car accident was no accident. The brakes had been tampered with. I almost fainted. Cole has kept my secret for so long. This was it. He’s going to out me right here and now that I was with them. That I was driving.
It’s going to ruin everything!
“We don’t know for sure, but we have a guess.” Deke sighs.
“Which is?” she asks.
“Lilly,” Deke answers.
Her frown deepens, and even I have a moment of confusion. What are they talking about? What does Cole’s little sister have to do with this?
She looks at Cole. “Why would he want to hurt you because of Lilly?”
But Deke is the one who answers her, running a hand through his hair. “Because Lilly is Bruce’s daughter.”
Bruce as in Bruce Lowes? Austin’s father? Holy fucking shit! Cole’s sister is somehow Austin’s sister too? I never knew this.
“Your mom and my dad had an affair?” Austin asks, trying to do the math in her head. Her dad and her stepmom have been married for ten years now. Lilly is six.
He fists his hands, and his jaw sharpens. “No.”
“Then how do you explain …?”
“Bruce fucking raped her,” he interrupts Austin.
That’s when things changed. She took on a new role of mother, and the rest was history. It was as if Lilly filled this hole that she didn’t even know she had. And her blackmailed relationship with Cole took a jump off the deep end. She walked out of that clubhouse with her head held high even though she had tears in her eyes. I was proud to call her my friend, even if she didn’t know my commitment to her wasn’t real.
I would betray her more than once. And even now, she would push me away if she knew the truth. What I’ve done. How much I’ve lied. Hell, I wouldn’t even be friends with me. But that doesn’t mean I’m going to turn myself in willingly. You don’t see any of the GWS shouting from the rooftops about all the illegal shit they’ve done. Why should I? They shouldn’t be the only ones who can cover their own asses. And that’s why Deke and I belong to one another. We are one and the same.
I just have to remind him of that.
I pull my cell out of my pocket and send a quick text to him.
Me: Can I see you this weekend? We need to talk.
Sometimes you have to swallow your pride, or a dick. And for Deke, I’ll do either.
It vibrates immediately. My heart begins to pound when I see it’s from him.
Deke: Sure.
Sure? What the hell kind of response is that? I take a quick look to see if my sister is watching me, but her eyes are on Austin and Lilly standing at the concession stand.
Me: I miss you too.
I read over the text three times and then decide to delete it. He had told me he missed me while we stood in the kitchen of Austin’s house. I didn’t tell him then, but now isn’t a good time. Instead, I write:
Me: Can’t wait to see you.
I watch him read it, and my heart pounds in anticipation to see how he responds. But after several seconds, I know he won’t when I don’t see those three dots jumping around. Then I look up at his activity, and it shows he was active one minute ago.
And it does nothing for my already sour mood.
He used to be the first one to text me in the morning and the last one to message me good night. And we’ll get back there. I just have to do what I did before—show him what I want him to see. The good girl who fell in love with him.
DEMI
“How about Skittles?” Austin asks Lilly as we come up behind them.
She shakes her head, blond curls bouncing.
“Hmm, okay, how about M&M’s?”
She shakes her head again.
“How about all of them?” Becky announces, and Austin turns around.
“Hey.” She smiles at us. “Demi, I’m glad you were able to come.”
I just nod at her.
“I thought you and Cole had plans tonight?” Becky asks her when she puts Lilly down.
“We did, but something came up,” she answers.
I look over her while she talks to my sister. Austin is pretty in that whole I-don’t-know-it way. Her dark brown hair is down and a little wavy as though she let it air dry and didn’t bother to straighten or curl it. It’s so long that it drapes over her chest, almost reaching her belly button. Her makeup isn’t caked on like my sister’s, but she doesn’t seem to need much. She has dark green eyes and a diamond stud in her nose. She reaches up to push some hair behind her ear and I run my eyes over her right arm, looking for what she had mentioned in her journal. And I see it. It’s faint, but it’s there if you know what you’re looking for. A cut about three inches long across her forearm. The very cut that Cole gave her that first night in the cemetery.