Page 4 of Shattered Dreams

“You were right. As always,” I say.

“Did you hear that, Mav? I want it in writing and notarized,” Ezra jokes. I can see the twinkle in his eyes as he looks at Maverick.

Maverick’s phone vibrates in his hand. He looks at it as his face falls and all the color leaves his cheeks. “I have to go,” he says, looking at Ezra.

“Are you serious? You can’t. You’re bailing on our plan?” Ezra asks him angrily.

“I have to. I’m sorry. I’ll explain later. I just . . . I have to go,” Maverick says before rushing away.

“Fuck!” Ezra yells before stomping off. I quickly follow him, grabbing his arm to stop him.

“Ez, talk to me. What was that?” I ask, looking around to make sure no one else followed us.

“We were supposed to come out tonight. Together. We were going to tell all our friends we’re together. And he just left me,” Ezra says as he looks up into the night sky.

“Maybe he had a good reason,” I say.

Ezra looks at me like I betrayed him. “You’re on his side?” he asks in a voice so still that it scares me. “His dad caught us making out and was disgusted. He probably decided I wasn’t worth it.”

“No, I’m on your side. Always. I just think you should talk first. I saw how you looked at each other. I don’t think he just left you or even cares if his backwards thinking father is disgusted by you,” I try to tell him, but he just scoffs and walks away from me.

Ezra is the most emotional out of our group, and I know better than to keep trying when he’s like this. So instead of following him, I walk back to find Willa and have a good time. He’ll calm down and we’ll talk about it later.

“Have you seen Ezra?”

I look up from the rock I’m sitting on and nursing a warm beer in my hands.

“Not recently,” I tell Kai. I mingled with Willa for an hour and then made my way to this rock so I could look out over the river. I can only take so much social interaction before my battery drains.

“Are you going to help me find him? Or are you planning on sitting here by yourself until Cal drags you home?” he asks with more anger than I’ve ever heard from him.

“What is your problem, Kai?” I yell as I jump up to my feet. “You’ve been angry with me all night, and I don’t understand what I did to earn it.”

Kai takes a deep breath and stares at me. Then he sighs. “You didn’t do anything. I’m just in my head. I’m sorry,Belle,” he says, pulling me into one of his warm hugs. The kind I was looking for earlier, and he denied me. I melt right into him like I always do. His smell of mint and sweat surrounds me and calms me like it always does. Damn him, I wanted to be mad at him.

“I forgive you,” I say as he pulls away and runs his fingers through his messy hair.

“Always and forever?” he asks. I’m annoyed with him, but that makes me smile. We’ve been saying it to each other since we were kids. It’s been our easy way of saying we’ll always be there for each other, no matter what.

“Always and forever,” I agree.

“Can you help me find Ezra? I haven’t seen him in hours, and he isn’t answering his phone.”

I frown and look around. Ezra was angry and upset when I saw him earlier, but he usually gets over things quickly. Now I’m worried I let him go off and get lost in the woods. I tell Kai where I saw his brother last, leaving out the part about him arguing with Maverick. As far as I know, I’m still the only one that knows about them.

“Which way did he go?” Kai asks. I lead him to where we were, seeing Cal and Willa looking for him along the way and signaling them to follow us.

We pull out our phones and use the flashlights on them to look around as we call his name. Kai keeps trying him on his cell with no luck.

“Where is he?” I ask anyone and no one.

We keep searching, and as the minutes pass, the worry increases. Cal runs back to find more people to help and before I know it, we have an entire search party looking.

“Do you have Maverick’s number?” I whisper to Willa.

“Maverick Wolfe?” she asks, confused. I don’t have it, but she might. Willa talks to significantly more people than I do.

She nods and hands me her phone. I type his number into mine and call.

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