The sky is muted with clouds, hinting of encroaching rain. I pull out my cell phone and send him a text: I can’t get into concert. Not on list. But I know he won’t answer. He’s onstage, performing...and I’m missing it.
Unfamiliar songs and gorgeous melodies sift out into the night sky. Clear white spotlights shoot upward from the roof, swirling and revolving like fireflies against the clouds, a beacon to the outside world that something big is happening inside the stadium tonight—Tate Collins has returned.
Anger burns behind my eyes, and I listen as Tate plays straight through three songs. I’m missing everything. I’m stuck out here and there’s nothing I can do.
TWENTY-THREE
I PUNCH IN THE CODE to the security gate when I pull into Tate’s driveway. I still have it saved in my phone from the night he texted it to me.
The rain falls heavily now, splatting across the windshield as my wipers work furiously to push them away. It’s an early spring rain, a momentary respite from the normally dry California heat. Tate’s house is dark as I pull around the circle drive and kill the engine.
I run up the front pathway in my heels, my hands over my head, and check the door: locked. I ring the doorbell, even though I know Hank will be with Tate at the concert, and there are no butlers or maids or staff to answer the door. I look back at my car. It might be another hour or more until he finally makes it back home. Then I remember the sliding glass door.
I push through the gate at the left side of the house and hurry along the stone path, which is lit with tiny solar lights. I emerge beside the pool—awash in a pearly blue, the surface vibrating with every pelt of rain. I’ve never been here without Tate, and the darkness feels suddenly foreboding, but I shake off the feeling.
I hurry to the glass doors, touching the metal handle, and the door glides easily open, folding back like an accordion. Inside, I breathe in the dryness of the living room and stand with my back against the glass, dripping water onto the floor. My hands fan across the wall to my right, feeling for a light switch, but find nothing.
My foot slams into the coffee table and I stumble back. “Crap.” I touch my right toe, exposed in my black high heels. I’m still not used to wearing these things. I kneel down, gripping the edge of the coffee table for support, and feel a large remote control. As soon as I touch it, all the buttons illuminate, and I notice one larger button marked FIRE. Sure enough, the fireplace directly in front of me sparks to life when I press the button. It’s enough light that I can actually make out the features of the living room.
I pull out my cell phone. No missed calls or texts from Tate.
He must still be onstage, or doing post-concert interviews, or signing autographs, or just trying to get out of the stadium without being mobbed. I stand up, moving to the stairs, my heels clipping on the hard stone.
On the second floor at the end of the hall are two wide double doors—the master bedroom. I’ve only been here with Tate, that one night. I blush at the memory, touching the triangle bracelet he gave me just before he led me here to his room.
There is a faint, recessed light rimming the ceiling that provides enough of a glow to see the entire room. I run a hand across the comforter, the fabric smooth and silky beneath my fingertips. A wide set of sliding doors look out onto a patio. I touch the glass, watching the rain. Waiting.
An hour passes. I sit on the edge of his bed, then flop back on the comforter, listening to the rain pound against the roof. I consider texting Carlos, but I haven’t told him yet about my decision to defer Stanford. I can’t even imagine his reaction.
Instead, I send another text to Tate, the phone held above me as I type: Where are you?
Every few minutes, I sit up and click my phone on again, certain I’ve missed a call or text. But there’s nothing. Why hasn’t he called yet? Then an idea slips into my brain. I pull up a new web browser on my phone and search for Tate Collins. Social media posts instantly pop up: girls tweeting about being at the concert, grainy Instagram photos of Tate onstage. I cycle through the images, scrolling down. There are shots of him leaving the Staples Center through a throng of girls, unfazed by the downpour as they crowd around a black SUV, Tate climbing inside.
And then the photos change. They’re still of Tate, still in jeans and a black shirt, but the background is different. He’s at a club, sitting in a booth, lights blazing over his face. And surrounding him...are half a dozen girls.
Frantically, I open several more images, all tagged as being posted tonight: Tate downing shots of clear liquid, his platinum watch glinting in the light as he tilts his head back to swallow the shot; Tate with a red-haired girl pressed against his side, whispering into his ear. Tate partying, Tate not here... Tate not with me.
What the hell is he doing?