I look him over and take in his features. Usually, after sex, he’s completely at ease, just happy being in the moment, but right now, he’s fallen back inside his mind. My fingers splay on his chest. “Are you ok?” I question softly. “What are you thinking about?”

  His fingers squeeze on my thigh, probably not even having realized that he was lost inside his mind. “I heard something today,” he tells me.

  “Yeah?” I question slowly.

  “You know Maxen?” he asks. “He’s Nate and Jesse’s cousin.”

  I think back to the group of Broken Hill guys. Nate and Jesse are easily memorable for me, it’s just the other guys that I don’t really remember. I should start learning this shit. I try to put a face to the name. There’s Puck, Tyson, and Maxen, and considering Noah just said he was their cousin, I go with the one who has the same dark hair and eyes. "I think…” I say, making myself scoff with my own idiotic ways. “What about him?”

  “I heard today that he’s going to open a killer racetrack on his property in Broken Hill.”

  “Really?” I question, propping myself up on my elbow. “No shit.”

  “Yeah, rumor has it that he’s going all out.”

  “How do you mean ‘all out’?”

  “He’s a trust fund baby, remember? Guys like him sneeze money so I can only assume it’s going to have everything you could possibly imagine. I’m thinking of seeing if he needs any help making it happen.”

  A smile pulls at my face. “I think that’s a great idea,” I tell him proudly, happy to see him wanting to get involved in something although it’s completely illegal, whatever it is, I’m just happy that it will hopefully take away from the time he spends with Anton. Hell, I’d even sacrifice my own time with him if it meant less time for that asshole. “If it’s as big as you say it’s going to be, he could probably use all the help he can get.”

  “I didn’t think you’d be so on board with this considering it’s illegal,” he says.

  “Usually, I wouldn’t be, but I think it would be good for you, especially with the way things are with Rivers right now. It’ll give you some guys to hang out with who don’t care about getting on your good side or sucking up, hoping for some kind of favor. And besides, I have a feeling you’d really enjoy it.”

  “I think so too,” he tells me.

  “Then what are you waiting for?” I question. “Go call the guy and make it happen.”

  He grins down at me. “Have I told you that I love you?”

  “You sure fucking did,” I laugh. “But feel free to do it again, and again…and again.”

  “Yeah,” he says, his lips coming down on mine with that sparkle in his eyes that makes my breath catch. “Maxen can wait. There’s something else that I’d rather do again.”

  Damn. There’s no way in hell I’m about to say no to that. Bring on round two and then hopefully, he’ll take me for round three, four, and five.

  Chapter 6

  The noise I’ve been waiting for all morning finally happens and I groan as I fly out of my bed. Why this early? Couldn’t she have waited for another hour or three? There’s a creak in the hallway and I grin to myself. Gotcha, bitch.

  Nobody gets the drop on Henley Bronx…apart from that one time that I got jumped, but I’m choosing to pretend that shit never happened and if the rest of the school was smart, they’d pretend right along with me.

  I grab the Nerf gun that Noah had given me as a ‘please forgive me for being an ass’ gift, throw a few pillows under the blanket, and situate myself right in front of my bedroom door as I double check that the Nerf gun is loaded correctly. I’d done it late last night and while I checked over it a hundred times already, one can never be too sure.

  It’s still dark outside and the need to hurry over to my bedside table and check the time on my phone flutters through me, but I don’t dare move. It’s too risky.

  I hear her hand on the door handle and I grin to myself. Never in a million years would she expect me to be out of bed, ready, and waiting for her. The door handle turns and I smother a laugh at her attempts to be extra quiet.

  As the door quietly releases from the latch with the sound of her smothered snickers behind it, I hold onto the Nerf gun a little tighter. The door is kicked open and Tully barges into my doorway holding up a massive supersoaker with Aiden right by her side, both of them looking like the baddest bitches in their camo and face paint. “HAPPY BIRTHDAY, BITCH,” Tully yells out.

  Not wanting to give me a chance to escape, Tully faces the direction of my bed and instantly takes fire, soaking my bed from top to bottom, clearly too excited to have stopped a second to realize that I’m not in my bed. Though, that’s partially because I haven’t turned on the light, giving me a chance to get the drop on them.

  I step towards them and Aiden notices me a second later, he turns his water gun on me but I’m already two steps ahead. I let the Nerf bullets fly.

  I hit Aiden right in the chest and upper arm before he even has the chance to take proper aim. I screech out as the water soaks me but with my bullets flying around the room and both Tully and Aiden desperate to get out of the way, their aim resembles something a little similar to a little boy toilet training.

  Tully screams and water goes everywhere. Within the space of two seconds, my room is drenched and bullets line every available surface within sight. I’m going to be cleaning those bad boys up for days. I can just see it now; when I do the laundry, I’ll find one in the bottom of the basket, when I do my makeup, there will be one hiding beside my mascara, when I climb into bed, I’ll feel one rubbing against my toes. On and on. It’ll take me years to find every last one. Hell, I found one last week hidden under the couch from when Noah and I had our fight all those weeks ago.

  I distantly notice Dad and Aria standing in my doorway. Aria laughing and squealing as she gets splashed while Dad just gawks at the state of my room, probably at a loss for how to handle the situation.

  When all the bullets disappear and the water runs out of the guns, we all fall into uncontrollable fits of laughter. “Holy shit,” Tully roars. “Look at your room.”

  “Yeah, thanks. I’m trying to ignore that right now,” I tell her, wiping the tears off my face before finding a towel and drying myself off. “You’re cleaning all of this up, by the way.”

  “Hell to the no, motherfucker,” she grins.

  Aria eyes go wide before she booms out with laughter. “Tully said a bad word.”

  Tully’s eyes go just as round before horror flashes across her face. “Shit,” she panics before slapping a hand over her mouth. “I did it again.”

  Aiden walks forward and grabs the towel out of my hands before pulling me into a tight hug. “Happy eighteenth,” he sings before releasing me and getting busy wiping down my all my electronics before anything gets destroyed.

  “Why, thank you,” I say with a beaming smile as I turn to my best friend. “How the hell did Noah allow you out of bed to do this?”

  “Please,” she scoffs. “As if giving him the slip was hard. I’ve been practicing for this very moment since I was a kid. I think the more important question is how the hell you knew to be prepared?” Tully side eyes Aiden as though he gave me some kind of warning and his hands shoot up before he starts pledging his allegiance to his fake girlfriend.

  “Are you kidding?” I laugh. “You’re Tully Cage! I’d be an idiot to assume you weren’t going to pull some ridiculous bullshit on my birthday. I’ve been prepared for this for months. The water guns though…that was definitely a surprise.”

  A devilish grin rips across Tully’s face. “Speaking of surprises,” she says slowly.

  My heart races as terror takes over. That’s not something anyone should ever want to hear come from the mouth of Tully Cage. “What did you do?” I demand, straightening as I search out my closest exits.

  Her laughter overtakes her grin and fear grips me. “It’s nothing bad,” she promises, waving her hand around.

  I raise a brow. As if I’d be stupid enough to believe that.

  “No, really,” she tells me before grinning at Aiden who’s clearly in on the secret. “You’ll like this surprise. At least, if it was my birthday, I’d definitely like it. In fact, I’d love it.”

  “Oh, geez.”

  “Come on,” she says, reaching forward and grabbing my hand with her good one. “Trust me, you’ll thank me later.”

  Tully pulls me out of my bedroom and starts heading towards the front door, leaving the mess in my bedroom behind. Though, to be honest, I don’t really care. A mess is a mess and it’s still going to be there for me later. I can clean it up tomorrow, but maybe I should fix my bed so I don’t have a wet mattress when I climb into it tonight.

  Tully gets me to the front door before turning to me and holding onto both my shoulders. “Remember when the boys tapped us to the lamp post?”

  “Yeah,” I laugh, remembering the fond memory of being stuck there for over an hour while the boys pretended we didn’t exist. “How could I possibly forget that?”

  Tully goes to push open the front door. “Well, consider this payback.”

  I step over the threshold and uncontrollable fits of laughter instantly take over me as I find my boyfriend, duct tapped to the tree that resides outside my home. My eyes rake over him. His arms are taped way above his head and he wears only a pair of sweats. His fine body is on display and from the less than impressed look on his face, I’d dare say he’s not happy about it, and he’s probably cold too.

  There are about ten balloons stuck to his body and I find myself walking towards him, a grin plastered on my face. As I reach him, my hand falls against his chest and I push up onto my tippy toes to brush my lips against his. “Happy birthday, Spitfire,” he murmurs.

  I smile up at him. “Do I even want to know how you ended up in this situation?”

  Noah lets out a sigh. “They hijacked me in bed.”

  “Oh, no,” I laugh, looking back over my shoulder and taking in a very proud Tully as I slap a hand over my mouth to try and control myself. I turn back to Noah. “How though? Surely you can overpower them.”

  “Usually, yes,” he says. “But they tied my ankles and wrists while I was still sleeping then tossed me in the fucking trunk like a hostage. I didn’t even get a chance to fight them off.” Seeing my face, a heavy scowl sets itself into his features. "It’s not funny."

  “Yeah, it kind of is,” I laugh before running my fingers over one of the balloons and squeezing it. “What’s with the balloons?” I ask.

  “Don’t pop it,” Tully yells eagerly. “It’s a game.”

  I spin around to face her with excited eyes. “Game?” I question, hurrying back to her. “I like games.”

  She reaches around herself and pulls out a slingshot from her back pocket. “Do you like games where you get to use one of these?”

  I look at it a while before laughing. I mean, apart from ‘Bart Simpson,’ who the hell uses slingshots? “What the fuck, Tully?” Noah groans from behind me, clearly not being let in on her little secret. Though, that just makes it all the more exciting.

  I take the slingshot from her hand and study it as she pulls out a pile of little rocks that she must have collected. “So,” she says, looking up at Noah. “Each of the balloons has a piece of paper inside containing a present. You get five shots and for each balloon that you pop, that’s a present you get to keep.”

  “And if I don’t pop any balloons?”

  “Then no birthday present for you,” she grins. “And just a little hint, that balloon right there by his junk, that’s the best present of all.”

  “Well, damn,” I laugh, reaching for a little rock and testing out the slingshot.

  “Babe,” Noah grunts. “I know it’s your birthday and all, but you’re not seriously going to play along with this, are you?”

  “How could I not? I like me some presents!” I slip the rock into the back of the slingshot and hold it up, closing one eye to aim. “You better hold still,” I warn him.

  “What? Are you worried I’m going to run away?” he shoots back at me. I silently test the elasticity of the slingshot. “Babe,” he panics, low. “Come on.” All I can do is grin. “Just…fuck. Just don’t aim for my balls.”

  “As if I would aim for them,” I laugh. “They’re my favorite part of your body.”

  “You’re lucky I love you,” he tells me.

  “No,” I grin. “You’re lucky that I love you. Otherwise, this could be so much worse. Now, shut up and let me concentrate.”

  I focus on the balloon that’s taped to his chest. My eyes narrow on it, wondering what could be written on the little slip of paper inside. All I know is that it better be good.

  I stretch the slingshot back and with a final grin, I let the little rock fly as Noah cringes before me. I watch as it sails straight for a little while before it starts lowering. I suck in a breath. This isn’t good.

  The little rock slams right into the inside of Noah’s hip. “Fuck,” he grunts, scrunching his face up in pain.

  “Shit, sorry,” I cringe, hating how bad that made me feel, but damn, I really want those presents.

  A little red mark instantly appears on his hip and I promise myself to make it up to him later, as for now, he better be preparing himself for round two.

  I grab another rock and Noah lets his head fall back to the tree, deciding to take it like a man.

  I send another rock shooting towards him, only this time, I pull back on the slingshot a little harder and aim just a smidge higher. The rock goes flying high as I watch as Noah’s eyes lock on the little thing, terrified of where it’s going to land.

  The rock hits his chest, just above the balloon and I let out a long, drawn out groan. “Damn it,” I whine as Noah tries to school his features, not letting his pain show, but let’s be real, that couldn’t be comfortable. “Sorry,” I grin.

  He narrows his eyes on me. “Are you actually aiming or just shooting and hoping you hit one of the damn things?”

  “Geez,” Tully laughs. “Look who’s got their panties in a twist. You can sit through hours getting tattooed, but you bitch about a little rock. I thought you were tougher than that.”

  “I’d like to see you tied to this fucking tree.”

  “For fuck’s sake,” I groan, closing one eye and aiming again. “Both of you bitches shut up. I’m trying to concentrate.”

  Tully rolls her eyes beside me as Noah zips his lips. Finally, a little peace and quiet so I can focus on not hitting my boyfriend in the balls.

  I pull back on the slingshot and the rock instantly sails through the air. A grin rips across my face as I watch it fly straight towards the balloon on his chest. Noah jumps as the balloon bursts and I throw myself in the air. “Fuck, yeah,” I cheer before racing forward and scrambling around in the dirt for the little slip of paper.

  My fingers curl around it and I pull it up to read. “What?” I scoff, looking back over my shoulder at Tully. “Are you kidding?”

  She laughs out. “Which one is it?”

  “Your undivided attention.”

  Tully bursts into uncontrollable laughter as Noah shakes his head beside me. “Did I seriously just get hit with three fucking rocks for your undivided attention?”

  “You sure did, and you’re about to get hit with two more, so man the fuck up.”

  I lean in and press a kiss to his lips before flicking the balloon on his upper thigh. “I’ll be going for this one next.”

  “Fuck.”

  Precisely three minutes later, I’ve earned myself Tully’s undivided attention, a new tub of fish food for Frog, and my very own Kindle.

  I give Tully a massive hug while Noah demands that he be released. I hurry over to him and enjoy ripping the tape off and love it, even more, when he sucks in a sharp breath and groans. The second his arms are finally free, he pulls me in, holding me tight against his chest. “Happy birthday, Spitfire.”

  I instantly melt into him, wrapping my arms around his body and burying my head into his warm chest. “Thank you,” I murmur as my smile completely overtakes me.

  This might just be the best birthday I’ve ever had.

  “Alright,” dad says, drawing my attention away from my boyfriend. “Now that we’re all positively freezing, can we head back inside and eat?”

  Seeing as though Noah didn’t get the chance to put a shirt on, he’s the first to agree and drags me inside with Tully, Aiden, and Aria following behind. Noah grabs a blanket off the couch and wraps it around himself before continuing in to the kitchen.

  Dad, Tully, and Aiden get busy cooking breakfast while Aria runs around trying to steal Noah’s attention. Aria hasn’t mentioned the fact that Rivers is missing and despite her absolutely adoring him, I get the feeling that she’s used to people walking out of her life.

  We get breakfast over and done with and before I know it, dad is hauling me up out of my chair and dragging me through the house. “What are you doing?” I demand, tugging back on my arm.

  “Would you shut up and come with me?” he throws back over his shoulder, hardly sparing me a second glance as everyone at the table seems to get up and follow along.

  I roll my eyes and reluctantly follow him. “You realize that if I don’t start getting ready for school, I’m going to be late, right?”

  “And how’s that any different from any other day?” he grumbles. “It’s not like you ever ‘remember’ to go.”

  Noah chuckles behind me and I roll my eyes. Dad has a point. “Yeah, but…it’s my birthday,” I whine.

  “Man up, Squish,” he tells me as a proud grin lights up his eyes.

  Dad leads me towards the front door and I start wondering what the hell this is about when he stops and turns to face me. “Alright, kid,” he starts as Noah comes to a stop behind me and places his hands on my shoulders. “You only turn eighteen once and I want it to be a memorable day for you. You’ve been not only an asshole but an absolute joy to raise and despite all the times you gave me hell, I wouldn’t have had it any other way. I love you, kid.”