“Secret admirer?” Dani says. “Is that Asher trying to be funny? Do you even like this song?”
I stand up, suddenly feeling dizzy, looking all around the outdoor bar and dance floor for Miles. Could he have followed mehere this weekend? He did threaten to show up at school, so who’s to say he isn’t here?
When Annica and the boys come back from the more intense version of skiing/snowboarding, I grab Asher and pull him aside.
“I think Miles is here,” I say in a panic.
He crosses his arms, his hunter-green jacket crinkling beneath them. His face is flushed from being outside for hours and indents from his goggles mark his face. “What did we just talk about in the airport yesterday?”
“The DJ got a request to play a song aboutmurder, and said it was for me from my secret admirer. Who else would it be?”
“How do you know it wasn’t for a different Sloane?”
“Oh, do you think there’s more than one of us being set up?” He doesn’t say anything. “That’s why!”
He puts his hands on my shoulders. “Okay,” he says. “Just—”
“Do not even tell me to relax or calm down,” I say.
“It could’ve been one of the guys who requested that as a joke. Honestly, I bet it was Jake,” Asher says. I mean... I guess that’s possible, but my gut is telling me danger is lurking somewhere in these mountains. Asher can tell I’m still not convinced. “Okay, say Miles is here. Graham is in Boston right now, your guy Tristan is in Europe, and Wes is here with us at a resort with top-notch security. Same with my grandpa’s house. I’m telling you, you don’t have to worry.”
“She doesn’t have to worry about what?” Annica interrupts, looping her arm around mine, and Asher lets out a long sigh. She turns us away from Asher. “What’s going on? Is it about the bartender? Because I’ll throw a drink at her if you want me to.”
I can’t hide the twitch of my lips at the thought of Annica throwing a drink at Brandy, and for what? Technically she has done nothing to me. “No, no, it’s fine. We worked it out.”
“Are you sure? I’d really do it, you know. No one flirts with my best friend’s... whatever Asher is to you, and gets away with it,” she teases as we make our way toward the resort’s steakhouse restaurant.
“I’m sure.” I huff a laugh, wishing I could tell her that Brandy isn’t the real threat here. Not by a long shot.
“Everything okay?” Wes asks when we sit down at the table with the rest of them.
“Yeah, she’s fine,” Asher answers for me. “Sloane just hit her head one too many times on the bunny hill.”
I glare at him.
“We did fall down a lot,” Dani says.
“You’re feeling better now, though, aren’t you?” Asher pointedly says to me with a hand on my knee.
“Yes,” I lie.
Chapter 20
“Let’s play Truth or Dare,” Annica says, opening her drink. We’re all seated in the large hot tub situated in the back of the house, where we have a picturesque view of the mountains.
I laugh. “I feel like we’re too old for—”
“Charlie, truth or dare?” Jake says, cutting me off. I guess we’re playing, then.
Charlie claps his hands together. “Oh, dare, for sure.”
Jake looks around, thinking of a dare. “I dare you to dip your balls into the snow for five seconds.”
“Or it’s five shots of whiskey if you don’t complete the dare,” Annica adds. We’re already off to an insane start. Five shots of whiskey if you don’t want to do something? I’ll be vomiting everywhere.
“Fuck,” Charlie says, but he gets out of the hot tub and goes over to the snow-covered area that isn’t part of the heated stone flooring. Facing away from us so we just see his ass, he drops his trunks and does a squat. I look away as he lets them drop and lets out a howl. The group cheers him on. Jake counts to five, very slowly, and when the time is up Charlie sprints back to the tub.
“All right.” Charlie looks around at us for his victim. “Annica, since this was your dumb idea, truth or dare?”
