Broken Hill High (Broken Hill High #1)(68)

When the sun finally peeks in through the window, we both crash down into the pillows and I fall into a deep sleep in the arms of the man who I’m quickly falling in love with.





Chapter 23


The sound of my phone blaring to life has me bolting upright in bed. What the hell? My head aches and I know instantly that I probably shouldn’t have drunk quite so much last night. I reach over Nate and grab my phone off the bedside table and find a text from Brooke.

Brooke – MAX ASKED ME OUT!!!!!!!!!!!!

A grin rips across my face as I pull the sheet more firmly up under my arms.

Tora – Holy crap!! Wow! Congratulations!!!!

Brooke – I know! I can hardly believe it. Where’d you stay last night?

Tora – I’m at Nate’s. We’re all still in bed. Come over later and tell me all about it.

Brooke – You’re on!!!! Can’t wait!

I throw my phone back down beside me and squish myself into Nate’s side. His arms come around me before they start trailing up and down my back. I smile into my pillow, loving the feel of his skin on mine. My eyes close and I relax into him, but he has other plans for our morning.

Within the blink of an eye, he grabs my waist and roll us until I lay on top of his chest. “Stop it,” I laugh before a yawn is ripped out of me.

“Geez,” he laughs. “You’re really not a morning person.”

“I am,” I argue. “I just didn’t get enough sleep because some idiot kept me up all night.”

“Hey,” he defends. “That was all you, babe. I was just along for the ride.”

I can’t help but grin as I nuzzle my face into his strong chest. He’s right, I screwed him until I physically couldn’t screw anymore. It was great, though I’m a bit sore now.

He runs his fingers up and down the length of my back and I close my eyes as I listen to the steady rhythm of his heartbeat. “You know,” I murmur into the quiet room. “You called me your girl yesterday… twice.”

“Aren’t you?” he questions. “If you were any other girl, I’d deny it, but not with you. No matter how much you hate it, you’re my girl and you’re just going to have to get used to it. No refunds or exchanges.”

I sit up and look down at him as his hands come to a stop on my waist. “Are you sure?”

He doesn’t reply just keeps watching me until he rolls us back over and hovers above me. My legs wrap around him as he props himself up on his elbows and looks down at me. “It’s about time I let you in on the secret,” he tells me.

“What do you mean?” I ask as I search his dark, dreamy eyes.

“I don’t know if you remember it, but when we were twelve, you came over here with your parents and it was a really hot day so we were swimming,” he says with a cringe.

The memory hits me like a lightning bolt. That was the day it all started. “I remember,” I tell him. “That was the day you first said you hated me.”

He nods and hangs his head as he takes a deep breath. “Yeah,” he says, full of regret. “Do you remember what happened before that?”

I think back but come up with nothing. All I remember was running around the pool with the boys, having a great time and then all of a sudden, things changed. I shake my head as my hands roam up his arms.

Nate lets out another breath before looking back at me. “We were playing some stupid game in the pool and you’d stopped to get a drink. I came over and you smiled at me and it blew me away. I’d had a crush on you all summer and I thought maybe you were liking me the same way, but instead, you wanted to tell me how my best friend Simon had asked you on a date to the movies. That was my first heartbreak,” he tells me.

I gasp as I search his eyes and hold onto him a little tighter. “I didn’t know,” I tell him as my eyes pool with tears.

“I know,” he says as he wipes the tears away. “I was angry at you and I wanted to hurt you like you’d hurt me. So, I was mean, I told you nasty things and you went home crying. You didn’t talk to me for days.”

“Then you went on your date with Simon and I hated it. It made me furious and I didn’t know how to handle it. I was a dick to Simon and I refused to be his friend, which is why I lost my shit when you tried to use Parker against me,” he explains. “I was a dick to you. Every single day, I would do something to hurt you and eventually, you started to hate me.”

“I did,” I whisper.

“I know,” he says. “I hated that you hated me but it made me feel better. I never got over you and eventually, you refused to talk to me at all. Once I got over the hurt, I’d realized that I’d fucked up and lost you as a friend, but you were done with me. There wasn’t anything I could do that would have made what I did alright.”

I watch him, unsure of how to feel or what to say. “I-”

“No,” he says, cutting me off. “There’s so much more. You need to hear it all.”

I nod my head and wait as he takes another slow breath. “By the time we were thirteen, I missed you so bad. I hated that you weren’t in my life anymore and I was still so caught up on you that Jesse had worked it out,” he says. “I needed to be around you but I’d already done such atrocious things that I didn’t stand a chance at making it up to you. So, I became a twisted version of a bully.”