Page 113 of Hush (Fighting Fate)

I glanced over at her. I was a little surprised actually. I’d just assumed that she and Ryan had already gone there considering they’d been going out for as long as Mia and Jace had.

“No way,” Jess said, shaking her head to reiterate. “If you’re not ready, you’re not ready. I haven’t found anyone I’ve wanted to give it to either.”

Amy raised her eyebrows at Jess. “You haven’t? I thought you and Cain…”

Jess shook her head. “Everyone just assumed, and he never bothered to say otherwise.”

“Neither did you,” Amber said, folding her long legs onto the lounger.

“No one asked,” Jess retorted.

Mia eyed Amy. “Jess is right. You have to wait until you’re ready. Ryan’s okay with waiting, isn’t he?”

Amy looked down into the water, her eyes growing a little cloudy. “He’s getting frustrated with me I think. I guess I can’t blame him. We have been going out for as long as you and Jace have, which he likes to remind me of every time I say no. But…I don’t know…it’s just that when we get close, something stops me.” She shrugged.

Mia gave me a knowing look. I didn’t know Amy as well as I knew the others, but I did know she had pretty strict parents. Her dad was a lawyer, and her mom was a very successful realtor. They were high society, and they expected Amy to act accordingly.

Amber put her soda on the table beside her and leant forward. “Look, Amy, take it from a self-proclaimed slut. Your virginity is yours. No one else’s. Yours. When you decide to give it to someone, remember it’s the biggest, most personalized gift you could ever give. If someone is in a hurry to take it off you, then they obviously don’t understand the significance of that gift, which means that they’re probably not worthy of it.”

We all stared at Amber for a few heartbeats, surprised by the heaviness of her words, but then she simply shrugged and sat back, picking up her soda like it was no big deal.

“Yeah,” Jess said, breaking the silence. “What she said.”

I laughed. Damn I loved these girls.

After that, we made sure any topic of the heavy kind was left out of conversation, and I swear I had the most fun I’d ever had. We swam, we danced, we joked, we sang. We had good food, good music, and good company. It was perfect.

It was dark by the time we started to wind down. The music was turned down to a low background noise, and we were happily floating around the pool on blow up mats, laughing at Amber’s stories of her search for adrenalin.

The only thing that marred it was the constant barking coming from the next door neighbor’s little yap yap dog. With the bushes occasionally rustling, we knew it was most likely a cat, but still. I wished the owner would just shut it up already.

I was just climbing out of the pool when I heard my phone ping with a new message. Not able to stop myself from smiling with anticipation, I quickly dried myself a little before picking it up.

The second I opened the text the smile fell from my lips.

It was a picture from an unknown number. Of me. Tied and bound to a chair.

My blood started pumping too fast and my hands shook. I knew exactly when that was. I knew who had taken that picture.

Aaron.

Before I could get my brain to form a coherent thought, another picture came through. This time it was me, in my bikinis, holding my cell. Right where I was standing now.

I felt the blood drain from my face as I struggled to get my breathing to cooperate.

“Kaeli?”

My head snapped up to see the girls surrounding me. “We need to get inside.”

Without waiting for an answer, I turned and hurried inside, automatically rushing to lock every door that led to the outside. When I came back out to the living area, the girls had everything inside and were looking at me with panicked expressions.

Locking the door, I pulled the curtains and scrolled through my cell for Noah’s number. “Aaron’s out there,” I said, hitting call and lifting it to my ear.

I didn’t look to see what their reactions were, I just walked back out to the lounge room.

Noah answered on the second ring. “Hey, gorgeous.”

“Noah…” I’d hoped my voice would come out strong and sure, but unfortunately, it didn’t. It shook, and quite frankly, sounded panicked.

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