Right before I’d found Jax with them.

Sitting up, I looked around my street.

Goddamn him.

Trying to bring back the calm, I focused on the neighborhood view again. The square, green lawns looked jagged around the edges now, the green less vibrant. All of the houses seemed dead, and my breathing started scaring me.

And then I looked up.

Tate’s feet, propped up on the railing outside her French doors, sat angled, and I focused on her. The rest of her was hidden, but I watched her anyway. Knowing she was there. Feeling the energy that always rolled off of her. Call it hate. Call it lust. It wasn’t love, though.

But if was enough, and I needed it.

The breath leaving my body got quieter and quieter. It started pouring in and out like water instead of syrup, and I finally stood up and headed back into the house.

Dialing up Zack Hager, who organized the races at the Loop, I clenched and unclenched my fist, trying to get the needles out.

“Hey, can I race tomorrow night?”

“Well,” he paused, “I’ve got three races going already. But Jones just backed out, so Diaz needs an opponent.”

“Put me on the roster then.” I’d need the money. After I bought the car with the money from my grandfather’s house, my mother had made good on her promise to tie up the rest of the money in a college account. The only cash I had was what I made from my job, and that wasn’t enough to keep Thomas Trent in his cigarettes and extra snacks.

After I hung up with Zack, I texted Madoc to get a party together at my house for that night and pulled my car out of the garage to double-check the oil.

Since I didn’t have anything else to distract me until the party started, I drove out to Weston to get my brother. His new foster parents were pretty cool about letting him spend time overnight at my house, so I brought him up for parties and races sometimes.

“Look at baby Jared!” Madoc shouted as we climbed out of the car. Madoc had arrived at my place early to set up, and from the looks of it, the party had already started.

Jax rammed his shoulder into Madoc’s chest, laughing. “Yeah, I hear you like young boys.”

“Only if they’re as pretty as you, princess.”

And I rolled my eyes as Madoc wrapped his arms around my brother and dry humped him from behind.

I had no idea why Madoc called Jax “baby Jared”. It had nothing to do with our looks. Our eyes were different, our hair styles were different, and we both had different personalities. Jax was wild, never afraid to smile and seize the moment.

We were almost the same height, though. He was a little leaner, but he was still only sixteen.

I’d better enjoy the female attention while I could, because, next to him, women weren’t going to even notice me in the room in a few years.

Not that I cared. I wanted Jax to have everything, because he deserved it.

I scanned the neighborhood as I walked up the driveway and took in the glow of life and noise around me. When my father had called earlier, the pulse of the street had decayed before my eyes. Everything looked sick.

But now, looking up at Tate’s window, seeing her light on, the thump in my chest carried me higher.

“Hey, think we’ll see some action tonight?” Madoc wrapped his arm around my neck and jerked his chin over to Tate’s house.

He was referring to the last time she broke up my party.

I smiled, looking up at her window. “I think she’s out of tricks.”

And we strode into the loud frenzy of underage disorder known as my house.

“Oh, man you know how to kiss,” she gasped out as I left her mouth and kissed a trail to her neck.

This girl—she’d said her name was Sarah—seemed sweet but completely corruptible. Thankfully, no one had invited Piper, so I was left alone tonight to enjoy everything the party had to offer.

I pressed her up against the back of the bathroom door, and I was feeding like I wouldn’t ever be satisfied.

I didn’t know her. She showed up as a friend of a friend and went to school two towns over. Her hair was soft, her lips were softer, and she acted like she had a brain.

I’d spent about an hour getting drunk and catching glimpses of her moving to the music in her hot, strapless black dress, when I’d finally decided to make my move. It didn’t take long to get her in here, and I wasn’t in any hurry to get out, either.

My lips caressed her neck, sweet-smelling and smooth, as my hand glided down her slim body. Her nipple hardened as I lightly brushed it on my way down to her tight stomach.

I ran over her hip bone and reached behind to take a handful of her ass, pulling her up to meet my c**k as I kissed her slow and deep. The taste was good. She wasn’t drunk, and she didn’t smoke.

“I’m not a slut,” she said softly, and I held my head up to look at her.

Yeah, I was used to this part. Girls usually felt guilty about being “too easy,” like there was some f**king double standard that a guy could enjoy sex but not girls.

And what’s worse? Girls were the ones who perpetuated this standard. Guys didn’t use the word “slut”. We didn’t judge. She didn’t need to reassure me of anything.

She looked up at me thoughtfully. “I just…want to get lost for a while.”

And then she dropped her gaze, like some story was going to break through her eyes that she didn’t want me to see. I knew how she felt. I didn’t want anyone to know mine either.

“I’m good at getting lost,” I offered. “Come here.”