Page 47 of Battling the Enemy
“Of course, dear,” she replied smoothly. “I’ll set up your tour and email you all the information later today.”
“Okay,” I muttered. “I need to go, Mom. I’m going to be late for school.”
The smile in her voice told me she thought she won this round, and I suppose she did. “Oh, certainly, honey. Talk to you later.”
“Bye, Mom.” I hung up not waiting for her to say bye back, and I felt absolute retched.
I felt…the entire conversation felt like…betrayal of some sort. Even though I knew I was done with Winston, just agreeing with my mother made me feel…underhanded.
The toast had popped up out of the toaster long ago and was already cold, so I threw the two slices in the trash and hoped Ava had her ever stash of granola bars in her bag. The crazy girl said she always had granola bars because you never knew if kidnappers were lurking about or not, and you needed food to survive after escaping their sex trafficking ring. I gave her the kidnapping, because…well, we were the children of the One-Percent, but sex trafficking? Kidnapping for ransom was more likely.
With my sore body exiting my house and getting into my car, I wondered what I was going to tell Deke. I’ve never had to answer to anyone before or take someone else into consideration when I went somewhere or did something, so it felt weird.
But…Deke couldn’t get upset with a college tour, right?
I mean…right?
Chapter 29
Deke~
Ilet Delaney go on that stupid weekend tour to Dartmouth because I was in love with her, and I was quickly realizing that love equated to stupidity on a grand fucking scale.
She had sounded so excited when she told me Tuesday that her parents had set up a tour for her at Dartmouth, I hadn’t had the heart to tell her she was already enrolled in Blaineview, and she’d be going to school with us. I had also made a mental note to find out what Ava’s college plans were. If we could get her to go to Blaineview with us, I knew Delaney would feel much better about going.
Another reason I let her go was because she said her parents were meeting her at Dartmouth and she wanted to use this opportunity to talk to them face to face about our relationship. She had told me all about the conversation she had with her mother Tuesday morning, and her mother sounded like a real piece of manipulative work.
The fucked-up thing was that I didn’t care if Delaney’s parents liked me or not. Their opinions had no impact on Delaney’s future with me. I just wanted her universally happy, if possible. I knew it was going to be a hard sell because any parents willing to physically harm their child for the sake of money had to be evil. I had no doubt they would fight tooth and nail to convince her to still marry Reynolds, but it wasn’t going to happen. I just had to stay back until she called on me to help.
It’s one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do.
“Uh…Deke,” Emerson’s voice broke through my thoughts, but it was more her tone.
We were all at Ramsey’s getting ready to spend the day at the cove for another day party with a barbeque and all that shit. The only person missing was Delaney as I’m sure Ava would be in attendance.
With everyone in the kitchen grabbing drinks and shit, I turned towards Emerson. Roselyn was standing next to her and they were both looking at something on her phone. “Yeah?”
I watched the girls share a look before Emerson’s silver eyes landed on mine. “Uhm…did you say Delaney was meeting her parents for her tour of Dartmouth?” I nodded. “Justher parents?”
Before I could answer, Linnie breathed out, “Oh, shit.”
I was at their side, plucking Emerson’s phone out of her hand before they knew it, and there on the screen, was a picture of Delaney, Winston, and their parents with the caption reading ‘New school. New Beginnings. New Family. Congratulations, Delaney & Winston!’ It had been posted to social media and somehow landed on Emerson’s notifications.
No fucking way.
“Now, Deke,” Linnie said softly, like a trainer approaching a wounded tiger at the zoo, “we have no idea-”
My eyes shot towards her. “She said she was goingalone, Roselyn,” I bit out. “She said she was going alone and meeting her parents there. She didn’t say fuck all about Reynolds and his parents.”
“Deke,” Emerson joined in, “for all we know, she did. Her parents could have ambushed her, you know.”
After that disaster between Ramsey and Emerson when Ramsey had jumped to conclusions without letting Emerson explain, I knew she was just trying to give Delaney the benefit of the doubt, but that picture didn’t display a girl who was upset about being ambushed.
“Emerson, look at the fucking picture!” I spewed, Ramsey taking his rightful place behind her by the time I was done hissing at her. She took her phone back, studied the photo, and just bit her lip, saying nothing.
She knew I was right.
“Maybe you should call her and-”
