“I would have preferred if you came home last night. What were you really doing at the De Bellis house? Since when did you become sleepover buddies with Cara?”
“What are you accusing me of, exactly? Cara is starting at my old school. She wanted to talk about it.” I shrug.Not a total lie.Sheisstarting at the school I just left, and she did ask me some questions about the girls there.
“And that talk led to you kissing Ares De Bellis in the car out front just now?” my dad growls. Yes, growls. “I’m pretty sure I told you to stay away from him.”
My shoulders straighten. “You can’t tell me who I can and can’t see. If I want to kiss every boy I walk past, I can and you can’t stop me!” I yell.
I’m digging my heels on this one. I am not giving up Ares. Not now that I’ve finally come to terms with the fact that being with him might not end in as much devastation as I thought. I really like him, and the last thing I want to do is hurt him.
“Actually, I can. It’s part of being a parent, Zara,” my dad says.
“You know I’m eighteen in a couple of weeks,” I remind him.
“I’m aware of how old my daughter is,” he grunts.
“Then maybe you should stop treating me like a little girl and start seeing that I’m grown.”
“You think you’re grown. You’re always going to be my little girl, even when you’re fifty. I don’t care how old you are. I don’t ever want to see you with that De Bellis kid again.”
“I’m not going to stop seeing him. I like him.”
“What are you two arguing about now?” My mum walks up and hugs me. “You okay?”
“Dad is telling me I’m not allowed to see Ares.”
“You’re seeing Ares?” Mum asks with a huge smile on her face.
“She was kissing him in his car out front of the house this morning,” Dad says.
My mum turns and glares at him. “Dominic, we are not telling our daughters who they can and can’t date. If Zara wants to kiss Ares, then she can.”
“Thank you,” I direct to my mom while giving my dad a look that saysyou got told.
“Little Bee, she’s seventeen. We can and will tell her who she can date, and a De Bellis kid isn’t ever going to be good enough for her. She’s a fucking McKinley.”
“Don’t be such a snob, Dom. Besides, Ares is cute and we know his family. She could do a lot worse.” Mum shrugs.
“This is your fault.” My dad points at Mum.
“How so?”
“If you weren’t so fucking beautiful, our daughters wouldn’t be either and they wouldn’t attract the attention of the wrong type of boys,” he explains.
“Then maybe you should have found someone ugly to obsess over and stalk all those years ago.”
“Pfft, like it was a choice,” Dad groans. “We don’t choose who we fall in love with, Little Bee. But if we did, I’d still choose you.”
When my dad pulls my mum into his arms, I take that as my cue to leave. My parents love hard and are never shy of showing it. “Right, well, I have homework to do.”
“We’re going for lunch at your sister’s in two hours. Be ready,” Mum tells me as I walk away.
Great, there goes my day of hiding out and drowning in my own sorrows. At least all of my dad’s energy will be aimed at how much he hates my sister’s husband and not on my dating life.
The minute I step into my sister’s house, she takes hold of my wrist and drags me up the stairs. “I need your help with something,” she says loudly, making sure our parents hear her.
“You need me?” Mum calls out.
“Nope, it’s a sister thing,” Kyla replies. She pulls me into her bedroom and closes the door. “Okay, first, are you okay? I mean, with what you saw last night? Second, what the hell were you doing sleeping over at an apartment with Ares De Bellis? And third, was it good?” She waggles her eyebrows up and down suggestively.
