Page 101 of Malibu Rising

“Bridger! Big fan, man!” Vaughn said. “I saw you inRace Against Time. The scene where you scale that building was unreal.”

“Thanks, thanks,” Bridger said, nodding. “I didn’t see your new one yet but my agent said it’s funny as hell.”

Vaughn smiled, pleased. “One day, maybe I’ll do the action thing.”

Bridger laughed. “Better than me trying to do comedy, I’ll tell you that.”

One of Vaughn’s friends, who happened to be standing by the china cabinet, said, “Hey, Vaughn! Weren’t you saying earlier that you wanted to play Frisbee?”

Before Vaughn could respond, his buddy took a plate out of the cabinet and flung it across the room to the opposite wall. It smashed into chunks and shards before its pieces even hit the floor.

Everyone turned to look at the cause of the commotion. But when Bridger chuckled, so did everyone else.

“Fuckin’ A, man,” Vaughn said, laughing. He strode over to the cabinet, picked a plate up himself, and threw it at the wall.

Bridger grabbed two more and flung them in quick succession. The two high-fived.

“All right!” Vaughn said.

Bridger grabbed another plate. “Everybody, let’s do this!”

Nina walked into her bedroom and locked the door behind her.

“Cheese?” she said to Casey, offering her the tray.

“I’m good,” Casey said. She felt sort of embarrassed to still be up there, in Nina’s bedroom. “Sorry, I didn’t know where else to go,” Casey added, by way of explanation.

“Don’t worry about it,” Nina said. “But, listen, Mick is downstairs.”

Casey looked shocked. If Nina had wondered whether Mick being here had anything to do with Casey, the expression on Casey’s face cleared it up.

“What do you mean Mick’s here? Like right now?” Casey said.

“Yeah,” Nina said as she walked into her closet. She kept the door open so she could continue to talk. There, she took off her gauzy shirt and her tight skirt and her oxygen-depriving tights and her torturous high heels. She stood in a bra and thong and then took both of those off, too. She grabbed a pair of white cotton underwear and pulled them up her legs and then put on a jock bra. She put on a pair of heather gray sweatpants, elastic at both the waist and the ankles. And a faded neon blue T-shirt that saidO’NEILLacross the chest.

Men were bullshit—peoplewere bullshit—and Nina was not going to live through bullshit while wearing high heels a single second longer.

“I don’t know why he’s here,” Nina said. “But he’s here.”

Casey felt a rush of anxiety. She wasn’t even sure she wanted to meet Mick Riva yet, let alone figure out what to say to him.

Nina threw herself onto her bed and lay on her back, staring at the ceiling. “I suppose you could go downstairs right now and ask him if he’s your dad,” Nina said. But even as she said it, she felt a twinge. It bothered Nina, the idea that Casey might manage to havemore of a direct relationship with Mick than she did, that Casey might be unafraid to do the very thing Nina was avoiding. Saying hello.

Nina watched as Casey sat down on the bed next to her. “What is he like?” Casey asked.

Nina continued to stare up at the ceiling and answered as best she could. “I think he’s an asshole. But I can’t be sure. I don’t actually know him well enough to say.”

Casey watched as Nina continued to stare at the ceiling and breathe deeply, her chest rising high and falling.

“He sounds like a real winner,” Casey said as she lay down on her back next to Nina, staring up at the ceiling, too.

Nina turned to Casey. “Listen, I’m not sure … I mean, if you’re looking for family, there might be better ones to pick.”

Casey turned to Nina and smiled gently. “That’s not exactly how family works, is it?”

“No,” Nina said, shaking her head. “No, I guess it’s not.”

Mick reached the sliding glass door to the lawn and looked out at the crowd. He could tell someone was beating the shit out of someone else. But it wasn’t until he made his way to the edge of the circle that had formed around them that he suspected it might be his sons.

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