Hazel nudged me gently. “And you’re not alone in it,” she added. “That’s the point of us.”
I believed her.
23
LEVI
We piled into an oversized SUV—something heavy and ridiculously expensive, all black leather and tinted windows—and it was like we were kids again.
Everyone talked over everyone else.
Caleb was giving Jacob shit about something that happened last month. Jacob fired back with a story about Caleb getting his ass kicked in a bar fight somewhere. Lucas was laughing so hard he had tears in my eyes. Gideon just shook his head, grinning like he'd seen this movie a hundred times and still loved it.
Ethan drove in silence, smiling and nodding along, occasionally catching my eye in the rearview mirror.
Our Shield.
That's what we'd always called him. The biggest, the steadiest, the one who didn't need to say much because his presence said enough.
"Where are we going?" I finally asked, raising my voice over the chaos.
"It's a secret," Jacob said.
"A very important secret," Lucas added.
"Life-changing," Gideon said.
"You're all assholes," I said.
They laughed.
We ended up at a beach.
Private. Pristine. The kind of place that probably didn't exist on any public map.
Smooth sand stretched out in both directions, bordered by dunes and sea grass. The water was calm, the kind of blue that made you want to dive in and never come back. A volleyball net was set up near the waterline, the poles sunk deep into the sand. There was a full bar—actual glass bottles, a cooler stocked with ice, two servers in white polo shirts standing by like they'd been teleported in from a resort.
And a dining table.
A long, low table set up under a canopy, already loaded with platters of something that smelled like heaven.
"What the hell is this?" I asked.
Caleb grinned. "Meghan insisted we play in style. Volleyball, then a crawfish boil."
"This is how Danes do it now," Lucas said, clapping me on the shoulder.
I stared at the setup. The bar. The servers. The table groaning under the weight of food.
"Is the money real?" I asked, suddenly serious.
The laughter died down.
Ethan was the one to respond. He stepped closer, hands in his pockets, that steady gaze locked on mine.
"Yes," he said. "There are billions. And yes, they belong to you, too."
I couldn't believe it.
