Chapter 1
Everly
One Month Earlier
“Everly?”
The voice sends adrenaline pulsing through my veins, an electrical shock to every nerve ending.
So much for my leisurely stroll through Pepperdine’s library before I catch my flight back to Blue Lake.
Turning, my hand frozen on the door handle, I fake a smile at a face I haven’t seen in months.
That she’s here in Malibu, on this campus, is strange and frankly unbelievable.
“Taya. Hi. What are you doing here?” I force the smile to stay as I ask. But she asks the same thing at the same time, so my nervous laugh is real.
“What are you doing here?” Laughing, she answers, “I go here. Law school.”
“Ah, I didn’t know.” I nod, still smiling. My face is plastic.
“No, why would you?” Her smile is kind, friendly. “My parents went here, my dad’s dad. Not sure I had a choice.” Her self-deprecating laugh makes me try harder.
I laugh nervously again, annoyingly. “I, uh, had some content filming here in Malibu and decided to spend my last couple hours here in the library before I fly home. It’s my favorite place on campus and why I wanted to come here.
” She didn’t ask, but I’m trying to make conversation.
“Ashley—his studio is close by. I motion in the general direction of his house, but I realize too late she may not even know who Ashley is.
“Right. I remember Jay—Julian saying that. How . . . how is he? And you? The business?”
“Great. All good.” She’s nodding at my answer. Could this conversation be more awkward?
“Well, I won’t keep you. Good seeing you, Everly. Tell J—Julian hi for me.”
“Of course. Take care, Taya. Uh, good luck with . . . law school.” Painful!
That whole exchange was painful. Just as I pull the door open to walk inside, a male voice calls her name.
An angry male voice. I’m already through the doors, so I let it close behind me but turn to peer through the reflective privacy glass, knowing I can’t be seen.
“What the fuck, Taya? You ghosting me?” The voice fades as the door swings closed.
The voice belongs to a half frat/half surfer looking guy, tall lumbering build, broad shoulders and sun-streaked tousled hair like he just strolled in from catching a wave.
At first glance he gives laid-back, but the way he grabs her bicep and yanks her against him, blonde brows pinched together, prickles the back of my neck.
I reach for the door, ready to push through it and intervene.
Before I can, Taya shoves him with both hands on his chest, which doesn’t budge him an inch.
Whatever she’s hissing in his face, I can’t hear. It pisses him off further though, because he grabs her other arm and yanks her chest to his and pushes his face into hers, noses touching, and speaks through clenched teeth.
I don’t wait or think twice. I burst through the doors.
“Hey, Taya,” I call jovially and force the plastic smile back into place.
That there are no other students around pulling out phones to video is frankly unbelievable and lucky for this frat clown.
My head swivels anyway, looking for it, expecting it.
Convinced there’s no one, I turn my forced cheer on her.
“Great, you’re here. The study group is waiting.
We’re the last ones. You ready?” I lean on the door like I’m holding it open for her.
The guy glances at me, drops his hands, then zeros back in on her.
Without looking my way, she arches one brow at him and answers, “Yep. Coming.” Shoving off him, she purposely knocks shoulders with him on her way inside. Before she steps over the threshold, she stops, turns and calls out, “Hey, Brody?”
He hasn’t moved but clamps his lips together, jaw popping in answer.
“Don’t ever fucking call me again. In other words, fuck all the way off.” She doesn’t wait for a response and stalks inside, hooking her arm in mine and dragging me with her. Once we’re through the vestibule, she turns to me. “Thanks, Everly.”
“Sure. What the fuck was that?”
“Just some rando who thinks he has a claim on me because we hooked up. Men!” She huffs and rolls her eyes.
That’s the only explanation I get. I have more questions, but it’s not my place, so I nod instead like I understand perfectly.
“Don’t tell Jay.” That she forgets to use his chosen name, Julian, tells me she’s more shaken than she’s showing.
Since she reappeared from the dead she’s been trying, out of respect for him or me or both, not to call him Jay, the nickname she gave him when they were kids—teenagers.
“Okay. But if you need help with that douche of a frat boy, I’m sure he’d have no issue with that.”
“Oh, Brody isn’t a frat boy, or even a student. Just some local surfer on a power trip. He’s nobody.”
I nod again. “Okay. Will you be okay? I’m kinda ruined for browsing now. Think I’ll just head to the airport early.”
“Sorry about that.”
“No, it’s all good. Probably best if I don’t dwell too long anyway.
Makes me miss what could’ve been. But it’s all good.
Remote learning is convenient.” I trail off because I realize I’m oversharing with Taya, the ex.
We’re not friends. Although I do sense in another life we might’ve been.
She acknowledges my comment with a sad smile I don’t want to analyze.
“That’s two all goods in one breath, but I get it.”
That she doesn’t push makes me like her a little more. And she does get it—what could’ve been—on a whole other level. After her dad lied to her and Julian, it altered everything.
Then she adds, “Hey, I’ll be home for the Lanterns and Lights Festival. Maybe we can . . . Maybe I can help with the setup and stuff.”
“Sure, I’ll tell Julian. Take care, Taya.
” I realize I mean it literally. That encounter spiraled my nervous system.
I push through the doors again and pull out my phone to text Sean, Ashley’s driver, to pick me up sooner than planned.
I just want to be inside the car where I can breathe.
I look around before I focus on the screen.
No blonde unhinged surfer in sight. I hurriedly tap out the message, stuff my phone in the side pocket of my leggings and head toward the guard shack to save Sean a trip up to the library, the fresh salty air helping me breathe.
What the fuck was that? My phone vibrates at my hip.
I slip it back out and see Julian’s face filling the screen and slide my finger to answer his FaceTime.
“Hey, pretty girl. How’s the library?” As he asks, his brows pinch together when he takes in my outdoor background. “No library?”
“I changed my mind.” I decide on the spot not to tell him about Taya and feral Brody until I get home.
Does he know she goes here? I know he’s checked in on her a few times in the last month or so since she reappeared in his life.
He never gives me any reason to feel jealous or doubt his love for me, so I know he’s just looking out for her.
Honestly, it makes me love him more. His heart is so kind, despite his shitty upbringing.
He stays quiet, waiting for me to elaborate.
“I’m just anxious to get home. Maybe the pilot can take off earlier if I show up sooner. ”
“Okay, love. Everything good? Filming go well?”
“Totally. All good. Promise.” I ignore my third all good and smile into that gorgeous face, those penetrating blue eyes, and wonder for the millionth time how I got so lucky.
This beautiful man never fails to make me feel like his world begins and ends with me.
Fuck, I love him so much. “Love you, Julie.”
“Me too. Miss you, sweet girl. See you soon.”
“Kay, bye.” Before I tap the end button, I shamelessly blow a kiss to the screen for which I’m rewarded with the little wink that always flips my stomach.
My nervous system gives a giant exhale as I reach the guard shack and see Sean approaching.
Couple more hours and I’ll be kissing my gorgeous man for real.
As if he’s getting my ESP, my phone vibrates with an incoming text.
Julian: Sleepover at my place tonight? I’m cooking.
Me: Depends. What’s on the menu?
I add the wink emoji so he knows I’m teasing.
Julian: Plot twist?
He adds the smiling devil emoji to his response.
Me: Sold.
I shove my phone into my leggings as Sean opens the back door of the Escalade for me.