I’m off the bench and grabbing my pack, making my way out of the isolation chamber I’ve been living in for too long.
I don’t send a text. I’d rather not give her the head’s up. I just go straight to her room.
When Vee answers the door, I drop my defenses, prepared to grovel if I have to in order to see Ari. “I’m a douchebag,” I say, my opening line. “And I’m willing to perform any humiliating task necessary for you to just let me talk to her.”
With a quirk of her eyebrow, Vee widens the door, revealing a comfy looking Gavin stretched out on her bed. My shoulders sag.
“Nice speech,” she says, leaning against the door. “If she was here, that probably would’ve earned you at least two minutes. But you’ll have to give Ari the ‘I’m a douchebag’ apology when she gets back.”
“Where is she?” I can’t wait to give it to her later. I’ve been waiting long enough. It feels like if I don’t get to her this second, she’ll slip right through my fingers.
Vee nods me into the room. “What the hell did you do to her, anyway?” she asks, ignoring my request, I guess, until she gets a few answers of her own.
Gavin sits up and pats the space next to him. “I saw Jake,” he says, his mouth pulling down at the corners. “He was all pissed off and storming off campus. I thought maybe… Did he do something?”
Groaning, I run my hands down my face. “What does he not do?” But I shake my head. “It’s not his fault, though. I just need Ari to believe that I…” Hell. I was about to say love her, but that sounds so weak, like a platitude. And not at all enough to convey just how madly I am in love with her.
Plopping down on Ari’s bed, Vee says, “She’s really a mess.” She frowns. “She like…went out and got highlights in her hair and bought all new makeup. Those are the signs for seriously hurt, my friend. Like, breakup rebound shit.”
That might actually worry me if I didn’t understand Ari’s logic. It’s not a breakup makeover; she wants to set herself further apart from the girl of my past. Pain slices through my chest, and I rub its fire-hot path along my breastbone. Fuck. I need to get to her before she can build this into something we can’t come back from.
“We’re not broken up,” I say firmly. “Can you please tell me where she is?”
Vee and Gavin share a look. My stomach practically bottoms out. What the hell aren’t they telling me? I feel like I’m about to come out of my skin.
“Gavin, man,” I say, standing and facing him.
He holds up his hands. “I don’t know shit, bro.” He points at Vee.
“Real nice,” she says. “See what you get later…”
Gripping my hair at the roots, I groan. “Guys! Please.”
They snap out of their playful banter and look at me. Vee says, “Look, all I know is what I overheard. Ari’s not the most transparent person, so it might all be a mistake. But she was really disgruntled with her stepmom.” She stands and takes a couple of steps toward me, a wary look pulling at her features. She feels sorry for me. Pity. I can see it in her eyes. “Ari went to a big dinner event at her parents’ place in Wisteria.”
I widen my eyes, nodding. “Yeah, I knew about it. So?” But I’d forgotten about that damn dinner. With all this drama taking up mental space, it just didn’t register.
“I heard her stepmom going on about some guy.” Vee averts her gaze away from me. “Apparently her parents are from the Victorian ages or something, because they’re announcing her engagement tonight. To this guy who Ari barely knows!” She shakes her head, indignant.
She prattles on about the injustice of it all, but I’m no longer listening. My pulse careens against my arteries. A dull pounding builds in my ears. My heart is beating the fuck out of my chest wall. Then I’m stalking toward the door.
“Wait!” Vee snags my arm, pulling me to a brief stop. “You can’t go there, Ryder. Just wait until she gets back. I’m sure this will all work itself out. I mean, she can’t really marry this guy.” Her mouth tightens into a frown. “At least, not tonight.”
I appreciate what she’s doing. Assuring me that I can win Ari over this guy—that I have a fighting chance. But I won’t be fighting for Ari’s choice. Her parents are my competition, not whoever this guy is. And there’s no way I’m letting Ari give in to them.
As far as I know, she loves me. I’ll choose to cling to that reality until she tells me otherwise. And the hell if I’ll allow her to get engaged even for a night. This madness has gone too far.
“Where do her parents live?” I ask Vee.
With a resigned sigh, she pulls out her phone. “This is a mistake, Ryder. You should wait until the debris settles.” She glances up at me quickly. “She’s stressed to the max. You might just push her too far right now.”
“She needs me,” I say simply. And I mean that. Vee must see the desperation in my eyes, hear it in my voice, because she nods. Relieved, I release a tense breath. “And I need her.”
She gives her shoulders a small shrug, then hands me her phone to take down the address. “Then go get our girl.”
* * *
Ari’s parents live in the wealthy community of Wisteria. As I drive past plantations with rich landscaping and accent lights illuminating trees and signs, I grip the wheel, trying to keep my pulse under control.