AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Clemmie bursts into messy tears.
Christ.
I take a deep breath. “So, about Hugo Chambers,” I begin again, but the girl just weeps harder, hiccupping sobs and smearing her mascara. “If you could just tell us where he went…”
“Jesus, Fraser, don’t be so insensitive,” Jolene interrupts, elbowing me out of the way. “It’s OK,” she coos, putting an arm around the wailing blonde. “He’s trash. You’re so much better off without him.” She gives me a glare and steers the girl away.
Goddammit.
I rake a hand through my hair, trying to keep it together. Clearly, I’m going to have to navigate a minefield of raging hormones if I’m going to get Hugo’s location and keep this bloody movie from falling apart.
Nothing’s ever simple.
I take a deep breath, and follow Jolene’s path through the party, until I find her in one of the bedrooms, sympathetically rubbing the blonde’s shoulders. “It’ll be OK, I promise.”
“But Kyle’s the love of my life!” she sobs. “I thought he was theone!”
“There’ll be other ones,” Jolene reassures her. “You’re young! You deserve someone who appreciates you,” she adds, giving me another glare. “Someone who worships the ground you walk on and who would never hurt you like this.”
“Or maybe you shouldn’t write this off so quickly,” I interrupt, trying to keep things from spiraling. “I’m sure you can patch things up. Just sleep it off and talk in the morning. There’s no need to get all het up over nothing.”
“Nothing?” Jolene echoes, scowling. “You think betraying her is nothing?”
“No.” I grit my teeth. Doesn’t she realize we want to cool things off, not get the poor girl even more worked up? “But melting down like this won’t help anything. They need to have a calm conversation, that’s all.”
“Yeah, well maybe he won’t talk to her,” Jolene snaps. “Maybe he’ll never speak to her again, and she’ll just have to pick up the pieces and move on alone!”
“Kyle’s never going to speak to me again?” the girl echoes, looking stricken.
“No,” I say loudly.
“Maybe.” Jolene glares. “That’s the shitty thing about love, you never know if the other person really feels the same, or if they were just pretending, and they’re going to turn around and disappear and leave you to pick up the pieces of your broken heart.”
She’s talking about me.Us. Except she didn’t exactly look brokenhearted that summer, galivanting around with every idiot with a goatee all over her social media posts.
I fight to keep my focus.
Finding Hugo, that’s what really matters right now. Everything else, all the history with me and Jolene, that will just have to wait.
I get on my knees beside the weeping blonde. “How much?” I ask.
She blinks at me, confused.
“How much for the information on where Hugo went?”
The girl crosses her arms loyally. “I’m not selling him out. I promised!”
I pull my checkbook out. “Five thousand pounds,” I announce, writing it in. I leave the name blank, sign my name, and rip it out, handing it over. “Good enough?”
The girl’s mouth falls open.
Jolene gives me a disapproving scowl. I match it with my own, ‘Any alternatives?’ stare. “Clock’s ticking,” I murmur, reminding her, and just like that, Jolene puts on a big smile.
“See?” Jolene coos, “You can have the most amazing mini break, all on your own. Or take a friend. Take two! Show Kyle exactly what he’s missing out on.”
The girl wipes her eyes. “I could totally thirst-trap him.”
“That… Is something you could do, yes,” Jolene agrees, mouth twitching in a smile.
