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“I know that you’ll be away for a long time. But I’ve gone longer without seeing you.” She paused for a long beat. “These last two years, the Sloan I grew up with has been missing. I was afraid she was buried at Forest Lawn with Brandon and I was never going to see her again. Then you decided to live, and you know what? My Sloan came back.” She shook her head. “I missed my friend. And if I thought that you were only okay because you have a man in your life again, I’d tell you not to go. But I think you have a man in your life because you’re okay. I don’t think this is some rebound thing. I think what you two have is real. And goddamn it, if he wants you to go on his tour, go. Because I haven’t seen you this fucking happy in a very long time.”

The tears were falling before I even knew they were coming. “Thank you,” I whispered.

“I’m glad he finally figured out how bad it would suck if he went without you. Honestly, Josh and I were worried about what might happen when he left, and we were wondering what was taking his ass so long to ask.”

“Seriously? You guys talked about it?”

“We’re your emergency response team. Of course we talked about it. Did drills and everything.”

I laughed out of relief and hugged her. This made it real. It gave it validation to have her support this—both of them, her and Josh. They saw it too, what I had with Jason.

“Sloan, it makes me so happy to see you make these choices. Go, have adventures, fall more in love, shake a tambourine, be a fucking groupie and say cliché shit like, ‘I’m with the band.’”

I snorted, wiping at my tears.

“I’ll be here when you get back. And so will you. Finally.”

* * *

Kristen and I walked for forty-five minutes, talking about the tour and Oliver. Then I had to get back to the house and get started on my to-do list. I hugged her goodbye and made my way up the stairs to the parking lot.

I was texting Jason. He’d just sung “Name” into my voicemail on the way to the airport. The song we had our first kiss to. I melted.

I was typing with my head down, telling him I loved him, so I didn’t notice my car until my feet were already crunching over glass. I looked up and froze with a hand to my mouth.

My windows were broken. All of my windows were broken.

My windshield was caved into the front seat like someone had stood directly on the hood to smash it in.

All four tires had been slashed. My side mirrors had been broken off and lay scattered in the parking lot like candy from a busted piñata.

And the words Jaxon’s Whore were spray painted over the door that didn’t match the rest of the car.