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Winter snorted with laughter, and Caiden shook his head.
“Back me up here, Z.”
“I’m not getting in the middle of this.” Lifting my hands in the air, I started backing away, but Cade stopped me with a look.
“Wait. Can you meet us on the terrace in an hour? Bring Fallon.”
I gave him a nod. Oh, yeah. Tonight was the night. “We’ll be there.”
* * *
“Dinner next Thursday?” My dad looked between Fallon and me with a small smile.
I gave him a nod. “We’ll be there.”
“Good. Good.” He held out his hand and then ended up awkwardly patting me on the arm before giving Fallon another smile. We were still a work in progress, probably would be for a long time, but everyone was trying. I now had Nina therapizing me through a series of excruciating Zoom calls—okay, they were a little less excruciating now than they had been in the beginning when I found it too fucking hard to even say anything—and every time I interacted with my dad, I had her voice in my head, forcing me to make more of an effort than I normally would. It was slowly but surely improving our relationship, though. I could admit that, however grudgingly.
“See you Thursday, Dad.” I threaded my fingers through Fallon’s, leading her through the crowd and outside onto the terrace. It was almost time to meet Cade.
Leaning back against the stone wall next to the doors, I wrapped my arms around Fallon from behind, tugging her into me. “What did James want earlier?”
“Oh! He had a gift for me.” She paused. “From Joseph, actually.”
I kept my voice neutral. Despite the fact that I hated the guy, he was still her brother, and it was up to her to choose whether she wanted to reconnect with him or not. If she asked for my advice, yeah, I’d give it to her, but I wouldn’t try to influence her decisions. “What was it?”
“It was a photo album. Our mother…she’d sold most of the stuff in the house before Joe could go through it, but he found the album when he was clearing out the attic. He printed out other photos and added them to it, too. It’s…there are so many photos, Z. Pictures of Tim, of the three of us as kids, selfies from our social media accounts.”
Nothing could ever make up for what he’d done to Fallon, but I knew just how much something like that would mean to her. “I’m glad that he sent it to you,” I said honestly.
“He…he included a note, too. Apologising for everything. I don’t think we’ll ever be able to get past what he did, but…” She sighed. “You know.”
“One day at a time, baby.”
“You’re right.” Her fingers curled around my wrists, pulling my arms more tightly around her.
“I love you,” I murmured with a kiss to the soft skin just below her ear. The words came more easily now, and I meant them with everything I had.
“I love you, too, Zayde.” Turning her head so that our lips could meet, she smiled. “Always have, always will.”
“Me too.” Just as I was losing myself in the hot slide of her mouth against mine, we were interrupted by a throat clearing loudly. I raised my head to find my best mate staring at us with a raised brow.
“Finished?”
I lifted one hand from Fallon’s waist to give him the finger, and he gave me one of his shark-like grins. “I’ll take that as a no, but come over here for a minute.” We followed him to the centre of the stone terrace, where Cassius, Weston, Winter, Lena, and Jessa were all gathered. Cassius handed us each a champagne flute, filled to the brim. When everyone had a glass, Cade clambered up onto the low stone wall in front of us.
“We—me, Cass, West, and Z—wanted to make this official. I’m no good at speeches, so I’ll keep it simple. The Four—that’s no longer just a number. Our family now includes four more people. Jessa, Lena, Fallon, and my girl, Winter. We’re the future of the elite, the future leaders of this town, and we’re gonna be fucking amazing at it.”
“Yeah!” Cassius fist-pumped the air, sloshing some of the champagne out of his glass.
“Our bond goes deeper than blood. We have each other’s backs, and if any one of us has a problem, that means we all have a problem. I said it already, but I’ll say it again. We’re. A fucking. Family.”
As if it had been choreographed—which it probably had, West moved, hitting a small control pad in his hands, and suddenly, the darkness was lit up. Drones spelling out IV in red, the colour vivid against the inky blackness of the night sky. He pressed something else on the control pad, and the drones changed direction to sweep across the sky, coming together again to spell out the number 4, and then EVA.
“That forever bit was my idea,” Cassius said loudly. “We didn’t have enough drones to spell out the word properly, so we had to go retro.”
“I love you all,” Winter said finally, her voice cracking. “We’ve been through so much, and here we are now.”
Caiden jumped down from the wall, pulling her into his arms. “Everything we’ve been through has made us stronger. We’ve had some dark fucking times, but we made it through.”
Fallon cleared her throat, and everyone fell silent. “You all—we’veall faced things that no one should ever have to face, but do you know what? Even after the darkest of nights, the sun will always rise. And it’s beautiful.”
“Yes.This.” Stepping forwards, Winter lifted her glass. One by one, the rest of us moved, forming a circle, our glasses meeting in the centre.
“To the Four,” Caiden said.
THE END
