Defying Destiny (Afterword Academy #3) - Katie May Page 0,62

with short hair don’t do it for me.”

“Don’t knock it till you try it,” Auston said with a grin.

Braxton gulped down his drink and stood up abruptly. “I’m getting us shots,” he announced, storming away.

Auston cupped his hands over his mouth and shouted, “Not for me!”

Brax waved him off, and Auston plopped down on the lounge chair. A scantily clad woman in a very sheer bathing suit kept batting her eyes at us in the most annoying way.

“Is something wrong with your eye?” Preston asked, concerned. “Do you need help?”

Auston and I cracked up, the knee slapping kind of laughter that only siblings can understand.

Braxton came back a few minutes later, holding four shots in plastic cups. The green liquid smoked inside the clear container, and I snatched mine greedily from his hand.

Auston tried to push his away, but Braxton was insistent. “Come on bro. Just one shot won’t kill ya. Tonight, we’re celebrating each other, the quad. We’ve finally all made it, even you, pretty boy.”

We all laughed as Auston punched Brax in the arm with a scowl then seized his own cup. “Fine. Just one. Tomorrow is a big day for me.”

“And how does it feel to be Veronica’s Secret’s first male angel?” I asked jokingly, a wry grin on my face as I purposely fucked up the name just to piss him off.

Auston’s scowl shifted to me. “I’m not an angel, you cocksucking bastard,” he growled, though a smile tugged at his lips.

“Who cares! Let’s drink!” Brax exclaimed, raising his shot glass.

“To the quad,” I offered.

“To the quad!” my three brothers said in unison. We all touched shots and then downed them in one gulp. At first, the burn sliding down my throat felt normal. I’d drunk Everclear and knew what pure alcohol tasted like.

But after a few minutes passed, I knew something was wrong.

“We need to leave,” Auston growled, as if reading my thoughts.

“You probably shouldn’t be driving,” Preston slurred at Auston. “We can sleep in the Jeep and get up early to drive home.”

Auston stood up, but staggered to find his balance after sitting so long. “I’m not staying. You can come with me, or I’ll leave your asses here.”

“I’m not staying,” I slurred, feeling my eyelids already closing. “You sure you’re okay to drive?”

“I’m fine,” he stammered, glowering at me. “Get in the fucking car.”

And so we did.

Each step I took felt harder than the next, as if I was walking through cement that latched on to my feet, sucking me back down. My legs felt heavy, my head groggy, my heart slamming inside my chest.

“Something’s not right,” I attempted to say, but my lips felt puffy, my tongue thick.

Finally, we reached the Jeep, and Auston shoved Braxton and me in the back. We didn’t even grab our coolers loaded with beer. Preston slumped in the passenger seat as Auston buckled himself in and turned the key, revving the engine.

“We shouldn’t be doing this,” I tried to say again, knowing if Auston felt even half of what I did, that this was a bad idea. But he also didn’t drink the rest of the night, so maybe he wasn’t as bad as me.

Right?

The Jeep pulled out and we started driving down the gravel roads, the thumping sound of the music fading in the darkness. I rolled down my window, needing the fresh air on my face, when Auston and Preston started to bicker about the music.

“It’s hurting my head. Turn it off,” Preston griped, wincing as Auston increased the volume.

“Fuck you. It’s my car,” Auston yelled back. “It’s helping me concentrate.”

“But my head!” Preston whined, grabbing the volume and turning it off.

“I said leave it on!” Auston shouted, slapping at Preston’s hand. “We never even should have come! This was a shit idea, Karston!”

“It was Brax’s idea to take shots! Be mad at him!” I defend.

“I wanted to be safe and stay,” Brax countered. “But noooo. Auston needs his fucking beauty sleep.”

The next few moments happened in a blur.

“I said turn it off!”

“It’s my fucking car!”

“It’s your damn fault!”

“You had to give us shots, didn’t you?!”

None of us saw the headlights in the distance swerving into our lane. We were too preoccupied with winning a losing battle, and the price—our very lives. None of us could have reacted fast enough to avoid the car even if it hadn’t been, the drugs we never knew we consumed altering our ability to reason, to react, to fucking think. We were all too busy blaming each other