his head, eyeing me. “I’m wondering if you’re starting to catch fire and if it’s because of her.”
Nobody ever said Cole fucking Perry was dishonest. We’ve been best friends all our lives, got into trouble together. Set shit on fire together and in all that time, he’s one of the two people that tells me shit as it is. Even when I wish he wouldn’t.
“I’m wondering the same about you,” I counter, the words clipped.
“This isn’t about me.”
“It might as well be, Cole.” I glance at him. “You don’t talk about her, it’s like she doesn’t exist.”
“She exists just fine,” he grits out, his features tightening with tension beside me.
“Really?” I counter. “When was the last time you—”
“Fucking drop it,” he clips out, crushing the empty can of beer in a snap but I don’t move nor am I surprised. Cole’s cool and all that but underneath that shit is a guy who’s in the grips of his own hell.
“Drop it too,” I murmur, and he shakes his head slightly.
“No.”
“Drop. It,” I grit out and he shakes his head.
“Aiden’s gone. Matthews is out for blood. She’s an issue.”
“She’s not an issue,” I deny, but we both hear the lie as loud as the TikTok famous song “Lottery” by K Camp, blasting over the speakers. Over-played and over-done. This summer will be long, I can feel it in my bones.
The truth is, Mia Montague turned my life upside down three years ago. I haven’t forgotten the way she put my family through a paparazzi shitstorm, with headlines of Aiden plastered all over the papers, on screen and everywhere else.
I remember how John blamed me but after he read the papers he dropped it, seeming to focus his anger on someone else. Meanwhile, Mia Montague lived her life while my brother died slowly.
Then she fucking kissed Liam right in front of me. She deserves to rot in garbage. She makes me so damn livid I can’t think straight.
“Okay, fine.” I sigh. “She is an issue.”
“Whatever you’re planning to do man, just remember, Aiden—”
“Don’t you dare speak my brother’s name in defense of her!” I growl, standing up now, the urge to set this world on fire taking over me, clawing my insides up. “He wasn’t there for him, and now he’s changing our whole lives, for who? For his new wife?”
Cole sighs, shaking his head. “I’m not defending big John, but I do think you need to keep a level head here.”
I don’t bother responding to that. I’m sure he saw that when I’m around Mia all common sense flees out the fucking window.
“Liam shouldn’t race tonight.”
“He’s already gone.” Cole points out. I notice Shane pressing something in Mia’s hand and she smiles, then stands back, watching him go. He turns around to say something and she nods, then glances down at something in her hand.
Then Shane glances at me, a smirk on his fucking ugly face.
Without thinking, I start walking just as Scotty gets up on the little makeshift raised platform, with his trusty but shitty mini-microphone in his hand.
“Come on, J.” Cole is right behind me. “Leave him be.”
“I was supposed to race tonight, Cole. With Sean.” I keep going, but the noise, the music, the dancing has my mind racing. “The change was made last minute. Why is fucking Shane racing?”
“Unless there’s something cooking.” Cole meets my gaze. Without even saying it, we rush to the front of the crowd just as Scotty announces the race. In that moment, I notice Sean, his eyes widen when Liam’s name is announced.
“He seems surprised that Liam is racing.”
That doesn’t sit well with me. Without care, I start pushing people out of my way, shaking off girls that want to touch me, desperate for me to fuck them. But when I get to the track, it’s only in time to see my brother smile at me, already in my car.
“Go!”
And they’re off!
“Julian!” Someone calls, a girl. I look back and meet her gaze. Mia.
She’s frantic, trying to get to me, but through the cheers and the screams I can’t make out what she’s saying. She looks terrified and shaken.
“Julian!”
But as I look into her beautiful eyes, everything that happens in the next seconds is an agonizing, unending sequence of events that I caused.
There’s a loud pop, making me turn around but I don’t do it fast enough. The next thing I hear is a loud burst, and the smell of burnt tires on asphalt.