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“Thanks. I need a warning before her.”
Blaire and I both laugh. “I agree.”
“What’s funny?” Cooper comes down carrying four margarita glasses with Dani trailing behind him.
“I just told her that Raidne is coming.”
“Shut the fuck up!” Cooper lowers himself down onto the sand near us, handing me a glass.
I take it happily. Getting out in the water was exactly how I wanted to start my birthday. These are what Cooper calls pre-birthday days. He likes to be wild the day before to party into every birthday. It’s his thing.
“She’s coming? I fucking love that bitch.”
“Who is Raidne?” Dani asks, sipping on her margarita.
I watch as she tries to brush off Cooper’s excitement.
“She’s a friend of ours.” I smile at Dani.
She blushes, and I’m about to shake my head at her when Cooper barks out a laugh, leaning back on the sand on his elbow. He can be such a blind asshole sometimes. I’ve noticed the shift between both him and Dani a lot lately. She’s touching him more, looking at him a little differently.
“Are you kidding? You three were more than friends.”
“Shut up, Cooper.” I kick sand onto his lap, and he taps his sunglasses down the bridge of his nose.
“What! Where is the lie?” Cooper grabs Dani by her waist and shuffles her between his legs. “But just saying, girl. Ruin is this close to slapping a label on whatever you have, so I suggest you figure out what’s happening with your other three playthings.”
“Playthings, huh?” Blaire taps my shoulder with hers, wiggling her brows. “Should I be jealous that you’ve replaced me?”
The sun melts the water off my belly, but I swipe it away anyway to distract myself from answering yet another accusation.
“Never.” I sip my marg, shooting lasers at Cooper.
“Okay, so drink that because we’ve got to get you ready.” Cooper tips his back in one shot.
I shake my head, swiping my lower lip. “No! I don’t need to. I’m happiest in a bikini with salt water in my hair and no makeup. You know this!”
“Same, but no.” Blaire sips on her drink, shoving her glasses over her head. “We’re getting dressed up, and I have to see these new playthings.”
I shuffle uncomfortably as Cooper bursts off into a tyrant of gossip about my private fucking sex life leading up to this point. It doesn’t bother me with Blaire. He knows that she and I are closer than sisters, so there isn’t a thing that I have done, do, that Blaire doesn’t already know about…but it’s the who. I’m not sure what she’s going to think when she finds out one of them is Dion fucking Quinn. Not just because it’s Dion and he’s an asshole who bullied a girl into jumping into the ocean of Hades without her knowing what to do, but because he’s Dion. He has always been a fucking asshole. When I told her that he and I slept together when we were fourteen, she didn’t stop bringing it up for months. She was pissed. I never thought much into why it upset her so much. Dion was the hottest guy at our school. He had this whole bad boy persona about him and gave no fucks about anything. His mother was bone dry poor, but that didn’t stop him from being the biggest ho of our generation.
“Fine! Let’s go and get ready!” I stand from the sand, swiping it off the back of my ass and collecting their empty glasses.
Dani follows behind me as I make my way back up the trail with Blaire and Cooper behind us.
“Hey, so I wanted to ask you.” She hooks her arm with mine. The sand beneath my toes turns to grass as we hit the back—well, front—yard. “I know that I’m new here, but I’ve always thought your eyes were strange. No offense. Like you just don’t hear about eyes being lilac!”
She follows our trail before lifting her head to mine when we hit the front patio of the surf club. Everyone has spread out now, most likely because Cooper kicked them out so he could decorate the club for tonight.
“But Blaire’s are kind of similar! Like another shade.”
I blink past her question. “Yeah, I guess so. We don’t really know, though. And wait until you meet Raidne.” I chuckle, shaking my head as I take the steps up to the patio. “It was the first reason why Blaire and I took her into our little friendship group.”
“No way!” Dani gasps, and for the first time ever, her questions annoy me. I can’t even say why. “There’s got to be a reason.”
There isn’t. We’re sure of it.
I climb the steps quickly, desperate to get out of this convo, when an arm wraps around my belly, and I’m being lifted off the ground.
