Mason dropped me at home and took off for his practice right away. As I lugged my bags through the mansion and up to my room, I found a note on the kitchen table.
‘Hi, honey! James and I are in the cities, gone to the Bangor for dinner. We’ll be back tonight! Love you! XOXO’
I dropped it back on the table and fought the urge to tear it up.
Since I knew I’d do my homework later, I pulled out my running shoes and laced them up. Then I hit the pavement hard. I ran for two hours, three would’ve winded me too much, my body was wheezing too much when I rounded the last curve to the mansion. Panting, with sweat streaking down my body, I went back to my room and as I got into my shower, I was tempted to lock my door.
No one was home yet, but I didn’t want to deal with Analise when they did return.
An hour later my phone vibrated and I answered, “Hey, Becky.”
She groaned on the other side. “I can’t go out for dinner.”
“Really?” I tried to hold back the disappointment.
“Yeah, my mom is all furious at me. She said I could go as long as I didn’t miss school, but she found out that I missed half the day today. I didn’t do it on purpose and she found out that it’d been a Kade party we went to. I had no idea how she found that out. I told her I was going with you and your family to a cabin. She likes you, but now she knows all about your parents’ divorce and everything. I could murder whoever told her that stuff.”
I crawled onto my bed and rolled on my back. “Gossip’s pretty rampant. I’m sure it got out somehow about the party.”
“Not to mention that your mom’s hooked up with James Kade. My mom seemed pretty bent about that one for some reason.”
I frowned into the phone. “Does your mom know mine?”
“Your mom used to be in some committee at the country club with her, but I think my mom’s more mad because of your dad. You know everyone loves Coach Strattan.”
“Yeah, there is that…”
“Anyways, so I was just calling because she won’t let me go out to Gino’s with you.”
From the way her voice quieted, I felt a kick in my gut. I knew something else was going on and I sat up. “She won’t let you go to Gino’s or she doesn’t want you to go with me?”
“Both.”
I could imagine the glower on her face.
Becky added, “Oh gawd, I’m so sorry. My mom doesn’t want me to be friends with you anymore. I guess she called a bunch of other moms and they were told by their kids that you’re tight with the Kade brothers. My mom’s scared of them, everyone’s moms are. My dad was ecstatic. He wants to meet them; he wants to talk football with Mason. Yeah right, like that’s going to happen.”
I drew my knees against my chest and hugged them tight. “So we can’t talk at school?”
She snorted. “Forget that. I’m still going to be friends with you. My mom can’t tell me what to do with that, but she won’t let me go to Gino’s tonight. I’m sorry, Sam. I know you wanted to go so you didn’t have to go to that Elite dinner thing.”
“You knew about that?” I grinned into the phone. Of course, she knew
“Of course I knew. Who do you think I am? It’s not my first day on the gossip pages. Everyone knows that Miranda invited you to the Elite dinner tonight. Only I knew that you weren’t going to go.” She paused for a beat. “Are you going to go now?”
