Broken Trust A Dark High School Romance - Tate James Page 0,87

The result of our last fuck was still running down my thighs, and I couldn’t help but want him again. I was addicted and not ashamed to admit it.

28

At Eddy’s shriek, I pulled away from Beck. “Your car,” she yelled, dashing forward, an expert at running in heels. She smirked at Beck. “Look at you being all sentimental. Definitely not like you, Sebastian Beckett.”

I pressed my hand into his firm chest, knowing that there was a ton more going on under his hard-ass outer persona. Eddy had clearly never been in the inner circle before, so she didn’t know. But I did.

Eddy admired the butterfly for a moment before spinning around to hug me. “Happy birthday, bestie. My present is upstairs. I didn’t want to drag it to school today.”

I sniffed. “I’ve never had this much attention on a birthday before. Even Dante forgets it most years.”

“Dante is a fucking idiot,” Beck growled. “He’s got more than one thing to atone for.”

I blinked at him. “What does that mean? You keep hinting at these things with Dante, but you never come right out and say anything.”

Beck shook his head, but I didn’t let him get away with it this time. “Tell me, Sebastian. What do you know?”

He cupped my face. “I won’t lie to you, Riles. But I also don’t have the evidence yet to prove my suspicions.”

I shook my head. “Dante can’t be involved in Delta business, right? I mean … how?”

Beck’s lips were close to mine as he leaned down. “You’re blind to his faults. You love him unconditionally. I’m just not sure he deserves it.”

Eddy popped her head up near ours. “Dante is a decent guy,” she said seriously. “I have a pretty good eye for assholes, after spending my years around you all.”

Dylan appeared to be on Beck’s side with this though. “I would keep an eye on him. There’s something there. I noticed it the first time we met him, and it was even worse when he was taken to ensure Riley’s cooperation. He … wasn’t surprised by that. Like he knew it was coming and was way too accepting of his part in it all. I’ve never seen someone react that way.”

Beck nodded. “He wasn’t surprised at all, and he took my beatings like a man with sins to atone for.”

“Who suggested Dante be the one?” I asked, having assumed all this time it was Beck. He’d known better than anyone how much Dante meant to me.

“Catherine,” Beck said. “She insisted that only Dante would convince you. I argued against it, because he was all you had in the world. I told Catherine that you’d save anyone innocent and that it wasn’t worth using Dante and pissing off his gang, but she wouldn’t budge.”

Catherine. I should have shot her that day. Something I’d regretted many times over the past few weeks.

Eddy looked between the three of us with confusion, and I realized we’d just openly talked about Delta business in front of her, but she was smart enough not to ask questions. Eddy definitely knew more than she let on … more than she should.

The four of us remained there, silent and somber.

“We should head upstairs,” Eddy finally said, and no one disagreed.

I followed along, Beck at my side, and as I turned back for one last look at my butterfly, my phone buzzed in my pocket. Pulling it out, there was a text.

Dante: Will be there tonight, Riles. Wouldn’t miss your birthday.

Normally that would have made me happy as fuck. He was visiting. I’d have my best friend by my side on my birthday. But now I was filled with doubt and worry. Could Dante know more than he was saying? Had he known about this Delta bullshit before my parents died? I mean, he’d never kept it a secret that he was interested in Militant Delta and their rise to riches, but I’d thought that was more along the lines of “I watched a Netflix documentary and now think I’m an expert,” not an actual real life connection.

I was so lost in thought that when I walked into my apartment, I missed the initial “surprise!” shouted at me, and it wasn’t until Jasper lifted me off my feet and twirled me around in a hug that I noticed the room.

It was full of balloons, hundreds of them, floating across the ceiling, in a wash of gold, silver and pink. My dining table was set up beautifully— on top of the gold tablecloth