Broken Hill High (Broken Hill High #1)(58)



I don’t know if I’ll believe anything you say.

Ouch. That one stung.

I still don’t know if I believe it either.

Believe what?

Promise me you won’t freak out?

Brooke looks across at me and narrows her eyes and I have no doubt whatever she’s about to write is going to be a nasty stab.

I don’t make promises to liars.

Fine… I’ve been sleeping with Nate for the past week.

I cringe as I slide the note across to her and study her reaction.

Her eyes widen.

A gasp is ripped out of her.

Her jaw falls to the desk.

She re-reads the note.

She looks to me with wide eyes.

She looks back at the note.

She looks to me again.

And then finally, she swivels right around to Nate who grins at her, knowing exactly what’s just passed between us.

She shoots to her feet with her hand over her stomach and her other covering her mouth. “Shit,” she calls out. “Mr. Miller, I’m going to throw up.”

He gasps and looks absolutely horrified. “Ugh. Get out of here. I don’t want to clean that up.” With that, Brooke runs out of the room and Mr. Miller looks to me. “Tora, go with her. Make sure she’s alright.”

I nod and race out of the room after Brooke and find her waiting for me in the hallway with a grin. “Works every time,” she laughs.

I can’t help but laugh as well as we walk down the hallway and out to the parking lot. We head straight for her car and climb in before peeling out of the parking lot and heading for my place where we can be alone.

“So,” she finally says. “You’re sleeping with the enemy?”

“Yeah,” I sigh. “I’m sorry. I really wanted to tell you but I didn’t know how, especially when I don’t even understand what’s happening myself.”

“What is happening?” she asks as she leans out her window to put in the code for the gate. “Shit, it’s not working,” she tells me.

“Oh. I changed it. 0306.”

She keys it in and the gate begins to open. “Why’d you change it?”

“To stop Nate from kidnapping me.”

“Didn’t work, did it?”

“Not even close,” I laugh before letting out a deep sigh. “I really like him,” I tell her. “I know it’s wrong and I shouldn’t feel like that about him, but over the last two weeks, he’s been a completely different person.”

“How do you mean?”

She pulls up out the front of my house and we get out before walking up the stairs to the front door. “He’s been sweet,” I say, hardly believing the words as they come out of my mouth. “He taught me to drive and was patient with me and then he rescued me from some loser who was coming on way too strong. He holds my hand and he cuddles me every night. He makes my lunch. He tells me I’m beautiful. He looks out for me. He-”

“Are we talking about the same guy?” she questions, cutting me off as we fall into my couch. “Nate Ryder? Nathaniel Ryder, king of the twats?”

“Yeah,” I laugh before looking up at her. “He really cares about me,” I tell her.

“Are you sure?” she questions. “He was with that girl on Friday night.”

“He had his arm around her,” I clarify. “But the second you left, he was making sure I was ok and offering to drive me home.”

My phone vibrates in my pocket and I pull it out to see a new text.

Nate – You ok? Let me know if you need me.

“See what I mean,” I say as I turn the phone around to show her the screen.

“Shit,” she sighs as she reads over the text. “So, this is really happening.”

“No,” I sigh. “Maybe. Yes. Oh, I don’t know. He treated me like shit for five years. It’s not like I can just forget that.”

“Good,” she grunts. “I was worried about that for a bit.”

I roll my eyes before replying to Nate’s text to let him know I’m fine and at my place. Brooke’s silent for too long so I look back up at her with a grin. “Well, go on,” I say. “Ask away.”

“Oh, thank god,” she sighs with relief before letting it all come out like word vomit. “What was it like? Is it as good as they all say it is? Is he like, hard and fast or a slow and gentle kind of guy? Oh, oh,” she says with a wide grin. “Is it big?”

Rather than answer all her individual questions, I tell a recap of how it all happened, starting with the very first night at dinner where I threw up, though, I tell her it was food poisoning. I know I’m all about sharing right now, but that secret will be remaining my own for now.

I tell her how we fought in the hallway and how I had gotten the best of him the next morning. I tell her how he had snuck into my room that night and was gone in the morning. She even goes as far to put together the fact that I was in a foul mood that day and is proud that she pieced it together.

I tell her everything, right up to the talk we had in his car on Friday night and how he said he’s liked me since we were twelve.

“So, what happens now?” she questions.

“I don’t know. I haven’t spoken to him since then, apart from this morning at my locker and all he was doing was making sure Josh was leaving.”

Sheridan Anne's Books