A moment later, I’m standing in front of the group of little shitheads. My heart is pounding, but on the outside, I am cool, giving them my best disinterested bartender stare.
They stop talking, looking up at me while I continue to stare at them. I point at the guitar on the ground.
“Did you do that?” I ask them.
“Fuck off,” one of them says, the one with a skateboard.
My eyebrows go up. I hate this kid. He has an unfortunate rat face.
I lean in, hands on my knees, smiling. To bystanders, it looks like I’m just having a pleasant conversation.
“Listen, you little rat-faced fuck. If no one was watching, I’d take your shitty little poser skateboard and crack it on the ground until it was in pieces.”
The kids stand around, unsure of what to do. They think I’m weird. I don’t care. They fucked with Bea, so they’re going to get this version of me that I didn’t know existed.
“Instead, I’ll tell you this.” Furious anger knots in my stomach at the sneer on his dumb face. “If you ever touch Bea’s guitar again, if you ever make fun of her or laugh at her or talk to her or evenlookat her,” I’m inches from his face, “I will find you, break your skateboard, and ruin your life.”
I straighten up with a pretty smile.
“All clear?”
Rat Face mumbles something, his face going red.
“Great,” I chirp. “Have a fantastic day, Rat Face.”
I scoop up Bea’s guitar and carry it back to her like nothing happened. “Let’s go, Bee.”
A bad feeling wavers through me as I realize what I just did. Tate would never do something like this. He’s probably going to be furious. He’s never going to let me pick Bea up again.
Once Bea is safely buckled up in the back seat, I drive away. First stop, ice cream. Second stop, the music store to have her guitar restrung.
“You okay?” I ask her, glancing at her in the rearview mirror.
“Yeah.” She shoots me a big grin. “That was awesome.”
CHAPTER 75
JORDAN
That evening,I’m staring at my laptop on the kitchen counter in my guesthouse, trying to focus on game tape, but I just keep thinking about those fucking kids from today.
My phone chimes with a text from Tate.Can you come here, please?
A nervous groan slips out of me, and I toss my phone onto my bed before turning back to my laptop.
Ten minutes later, there’s a knock at my door. I don’t move.
“Jordan.” His low voice comes through the door and my stomach dips in a bad way.
He’s mad. Furious, probably. He’s so rarely mad that he’ll probably trigger a thunderstorm or something, like a Greek god.
“Not home,” I call back.
I’m not fit to babysit Bea anymore. He’s disappointed in how I behaved today. I embarrassed him and Bea and the team.
“Open this door, please.”
The deadly calm of his voice makes the hairs on the back of my neck rise. With my heart in my throat, I head to the door.
