An hour later, we are in the plane, taking off. It’s a forty five minute flight to the coast, then we’ll take a boat to the island where they are filming.Fortunately, it’s such a small island that it only has three hotels. The second hotel that I called asking to leave a message turned out to be the one he’s staying at. I’ll figure out how to get to him when we get there. “So, he told you about Claire?” Cole asks me after takeoff.“Not much,” I say. “We ran into her at a hotel at the coast three months ago. He told me they have history.” “I can’t believe he has been working with her all this time,” Cole says.“What happened back then?” I ask him. The fact that Cole agreed with the necessity of this impromptu trip means he agrees with me that an inebriated Jude cannot be left alone with Claire. Jude insisted that Claire did not take advantage of him, but if Cole’s reaction is anything to go by, I must have been right. “I don’t think it’s my story to tell,” he says.“Did he swear y
Jude’s POVTen minutes, fifteen seconds.That’s how long it’s been since she left.She must be gone by now, right?It’s too late to go after her.How fast can I get a boat, and how fast can I get to the mainland? Maybe they’ll be delayed before leaving on the plane. Maybe the plane needed refuelling, or is awaiting clearance.It’s only been ten…eleven minutes. I can catch up. I can catch up and take back every stupid thing I just said.God, what the fuck is wrong with me?Everything.I groan and bump my forehead against the window. That was the right thing to do. It was the right thing to do. It was the–A knock on the door interrupts my mantra. I straighten instantly, my heavy heart racing. That’s her, right? She is back to give me a piece of her mind. She is not the kind to walk away without a word.I race to the door like I didn’t tell her to basically get out of my life twelve minutes ago. I open the door.My excitement dies the moment I see Cole’s face.What is he doing here? Did
Jude’s POV“No,” I say, reaching out and wiping her tears away. Cole’s right. I’m an asshole. Shithead. Dumbass. As if I haven’t made her cry enough times. After everything I’ve put her through, I should spend the rest of my life making up for it by making her smile every single day. Instead, I go and do this.Her eyes fall shut, and her body trembles as she takes a deep breath. I jump to action, pulling the comforter over her.“What are you doing?” she asks, confusion palpable in her voice. Her eyes remain closed.“I don’t want you to be cold.” I sound lame even to myself.Her throat moves as she swallows. Her eyes open and stare right into mine. They are shiny with tears but lacking their usual brightness. “Do you hate me?”I blink. What? Why would she–Yeah, right, buddy. Why would she ask that? Can’t possibly think of any reason.So it isn’t working for you?No.Like a bona fide idiot.“No.”“Then why…” she trails off and lifts her hand to her face. She covers her eyes, but I can
I wake up to an empty bed. The sound of the shower running comes from behind the bathroom door. He is in the shower. Should I take this chance to run? Not run. Go back to my room. This is his room. I should not be here in the first place. This is either going to turn into nothing, something, or…a colossal mistake. What if this was a mistake? We’ve been waiting so long for the right time to get together but put us together at a wedding and suddenly it’s like we can’t wait. It’s the stupid wedding fever.All those flowers and lovey dovey-ness and suddenly everything was all rainbows and the next thing you know we are sneaking upstairs in the middle of the night while everybody else partied hard…Everybody else.Holy fuck.The last thing I want is for everybody else–or just one of them, really–to see me sneaking out of Jude’s room early in the morning. I’ll never hear the end of it. Ever.I push away the covers and then just as quickly pull them back over me when I realise I’m star
Trey bumps shoulders with Simon the moment we show up to breakfast. That’s how I know they know. They probably figured it out when we left together last night. Still much better than one of them catching me sneaking out of Jude’s room, though. Not that it matters now. Now, we are together. There’s nothing to hide.There’s only four people at the table; Trey, Simon, Sam, and Liam.Simon looks at us and a slow grin takes over his face.The look on his face promises a load of questioning later. I would like to say I don’t look forward to it. But I think I do. I need to shriek. In excitement. And have someone shake me and tell me I’m not dreaming. And then roll a hundred times on the beach and shout to the ocean. Simon is the perfect company for all of that.Right now, I’m biting down on my bottom lip to hold back the eternal smile that has wanted to take over my face for a while now. My cheeks already hurt. Even my head aches. I didn’t know it was possible to get a headache from being
We don’t go up after breakfast. We go outside, drawn by the ocean. There aren’t many people on this part of the beach at this time. There’s a bit of an empty stretch of land between our hotel and the next, then some more to the next one. It’s quiet for now. I can only imagine how it’ll be at night while people gather for the beach parties that are bound to be rampant at this time of the year.We hold hands as we walk down the beach, talking about everything and nothing. We talk about school, and work, and our families. Jade recently got engaged to her boyfriend of two years. Jude doesn’t like it. He says he has a bad feeling about the guy, and thinks Jade is too young anyway. She is in medical school, going into her fifth year. Jude thinks it’s the wrong timing, with the wrong guy. I don’t know much about Jade’s fiance, so I don’t know whether Jude’s reservations are based on fact or whether it's just him being an older brother who’ll never think any guy is good enough for his li
The moment the house comes into view, my breath hitches in my throat. I’m not the only one who looks totally captivated, though. Beside me, Simon curses softly. On my other side, Maria whips out her phone for a photo. Yeah, that must be one amazing shot. I’m sure she is glad she didn’t bail out. She would have regretted it. Because the party is on a private island.Isaac only let us know about that amazing bit like an hour ago. He said like everyone else, he thought the party was going to be at the hotel the band was staying. Only for the manager to reveal at the last minute it’d be offshore.We are not even there yet–the boat is about to dock, though–but this is already the best party I’ve ever been to. Not that I’ve been to many, but yeah. Seriously, what can beat a private island party with your favourite band?From out here in the ocean, we can see the lit-up mansion, a few cottages, the palm trees, the party lights set up outside, and people walking around. By the time we get t
Jude is waiting outside the bathroom when I get out. I ignore him and walk right past him, but he rushes ahead of me and blocks my path.I glare up at him.“I’m really sorry, that was dickish of me.” He rakes his fingers through his hair and blows out a breath. “I’m fucking this up already, aren’t I?”I move my eyes from him and stare at the wall next to him. I don’t want to spend the night mad. I really don’t. We obviously need to talk about stuff–we jumped in too eagerly. Just because we slept together last night doesn’t mean we should get back together. It was a heat-of-the-moment kind of thing, and maybe that’s all it was meant to be. If we had done this the right way, we wouldn’t be all over the place not even a day into the relationship.I look back at him. He looks like he feels real shitty, so I’ll let it be.He was jealous. I get jealous too. But it’d be great if he didn’t say hurtful things while at it.“Let’s go look for the others,” I say, sticking my hands in my jacket