It’s been years since my mother was in my life.
I healed.
I learned to accept love.
I lived.
That’s all done. She was away, and now she’s back.
I’ve avoided her for a year and a half, but I can’t hide anymore.
Mason has an internship in Fallen Crest, so we’re heading back for the summer.
And when we got there—no one was prepared for what happened.
FALLEN CREST HIGH
BOOK ONE
CHAPTER ONE
It was a Friday night, two in the morning, and my two best
friends were shrieking in drunken laughter behind me. I sighed as I pulled into
the gas station. My little Corolla had been chugging near empty for the last
few miles. And I’ll admit that I’d been worried we would’ve broken down on the
side of the road, not for my car’s sake, for my sake. I didn’t know if I
could’ve handled walking with Lydia and Jessica. And on cue, Lydia rammed her
elbow in the back of my head.
“Oh, Sam!” Muffled laughter. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—” She
dissolved in laughter once more.
Jessica wrapped her hands around the passenger seat and
leaned forward. “Can we go to another
party?”
“Puh-leaze?”
“No.” I unclipped my seat belt and started to get out.
They scrambled out, or tried. Lydia tripped and was nearly
clocked by my side mirror. Jessica
tumbled after and leaned her weight on
Lydia’s shoulders so she wouldn’t fall while she sidestepped
over her.
What a friend.
“Why not? It’s our last Friday night before school. Come on,
Sam!”
Lydia stood and straightened out her skirt and top. When her
boobs were back in place and the skirt
barely covered her ass, she turned her
pleading eyes on me too. “It’ll be fun. Come on! I know where
a public party
is.”
Jessica whirled to her. “Oh! That sounds awesome.”
They bounced together. Both wore flowing skirts, tight tops,
and brown curls that flung everywhere.
When one hit me in the face, I swatted
it away.
“I’m taking you guys home. You’re both drunk.”
“Come on, you’re such a loser tonight,” Lydia moaned.
Jessica frowned and flipped her hair over her shoulder.
“Yeah, you are. What’s going on with you?”
“Did you and Jeffrey have a fight?” Lydia’s eyebrows wiggled
up and down. She peeled over in laughter once more.
I gave them my polite fuck off smile and each rolled their
eyes. Then Lydia lifted her nose and got a
whiff of gas station pizza. Her
stomach growled and off they went. As I watched them skip together,
holding
hands, and giggling over the fact they were drunk, I leaned back against my
car.
While the gas was guzzling into my car, I heard Jessica’s
question again. Was something wrong with
me? And I sighed. Only my whole world
had changed that afternoon. I could see my mother’s face
when I had left
Jessica’s house and went home for the afternoon. We’d all been so happy to go
out
that night. Even me. Yes, Jeffrey was usually an ass, but a small part of
me had wondered if tonight
was going to be the night we slept together. He’d
been my boyfriend for three years now. He was
nice, well, he was a douche at
times, but he still seemed to like me. And I liked him too, but while my
mother
had been happy jumping from bed to bed before she got knocked up with me, I
didn’t want to
end up like that. So I had taken everything slow with Jeff, but
when I got home to get ready for the
party that night, little butterflies were
in my stomach.
They died and burned in flames when I opened my front door.
Boxes upon boxes were lined inside
and in the middle of them sat my mother. A
bottle of wine was half empty beside her as she sat in her
silk bathrobe. Tears
coated her face, but when she saw me a bright smile was forced out.
“Hey, honey.” Hiccup. “How are you?”
I let the door go and it slammed shut behind me. “What
happened?”
“Oh.” She gave me a dismissive wave. “Nothing. You don’t
need to worry about a thing.”
“Worry about what?”
“We’re going to be fine.”
I hadn’t moved. My purse still hung from my arm. “Mom, what
happened?” Boxes were everywhere,
even in the kitchen. I saw two empty wine
bottles in the sink.
“You and me, honey. We’re going to be just fine.”
“Where’s dad?”
Her hands froze. She’d been taping up a box, but she sucked
in her breath and held still.
“Mom?”
She finished the rest of her wine and she almost fell backwards
from the effort. When she set the
bottle aside, I asked again, “Mom, what’s
going on?”
She started sobbing. “Oh honey. I’m so sorry about this. I
really am.”
“Mom! What’s going on?”
“Ifellinlovewithsomeoneelsean dwe’releavingyourfather.” She
hiccupped again and swiped at some
of her tears.
“What?”
She took a deep breath. “I…we’re leaving your father.”
My insides screamed at her. My hands curled into fists and I
wanted to launch myself at her. I wanted
to pound the hell out of her, but I
didn’t do any of that. Instead, I collapsed on one of the couches and
I
listened to everything she said. She’d fallen in love with someone else. She
wanted to be with him.
She told dad, he kicked us out, and tomorrow we were
going to move in with this boyfriend of hers.
“Who?”
“Huh?” She lifted tear-stained eyes to me.
“Who?”
A soft sob and she whispered, “James Kade.”
“James Kade?”
She nodded and wiped her arm over her face. “He has two boys
your age, honey. You might know
them.”
Know them? Everyone knew them. Mason and Logan Kade. While
they were rich, their dad owned
five of the factories that our town thrived on,
they chose to go to public school. Everyone knew the
Kade brothers. They
could’ve gone to the private school, where most of the rich kids went, or where
I
went because my dad was the football coach, but they’d shaken everything up
when they chose
public school.
And now I was going to be living with them?
As I watched my mom, who sobbed as if she’d been the one
cheated on, something shriveled up inside of me. I would never be like my
mother. Never. And sorry, Jeff, but that meant he wasn’t going
to be getting
laid by me for a very very long time.
However, after I had spent most of the afternoon and evening
packing my things, he wasn’t excited to
hear my change of plans when Lydia and
Jessica waited for me to go to the party that night. In fact,
he’d been a jerk.
Not surprising. A few choice curse words, a few beers guzzled, and he wiped his
mouth clean of me.
“I’ll get someone better, bitch. You’re not the only hot
chick here.” And off he went. His jeans rode
low, a beer in hand, and his hair
gelled into badass spikes.
I rolled my eyes and went in search for my friends.
Heaven help me, but Jeff would be back. I was at the point
where I wasn’t sure if I cared or not.
An Escalade wheeled into the slot beside mine. At first I
didn’t pay attention, lost in my world-ending
daydreams, but when someone
shouted all my attention snapped back to reality.
Four boys spilled out of the vehicle and two passed by me.
I sucked in my breath.
“Fuck that, man. Let’s go to Molly’s instead,” one boy
laughed as he hung on his friend. He threw his
head back and laughed on a
carefree note. His brown curls danced and he seemed invigorated.
“You’ll get
pussy there. Promise.”
He laughed another maniacal laugh before the two disappeared
inside.
My hands clenched the gas nozzle tightly and I couldn’t take
my eyes off of him.
Logan Kade, my soon-to-be-roommate. While I watched through
the window, he laughed at
something his friend said. Lydia and Jessica saw who
was in the other aisle and quickly went to flirt
with them. The friend looked
interested, but Logan skimmed a bored eye over them and went back
for something
more inside the store.
I hadn’t seen the Kade brothers up close, not in a long
time, but I’d heard plenty about them. Logan
was a junior, like me. Mason was a
year older. Both were good looking and Mason was rumored to be
six foot one
with a muscular build. He played defensive lineman for a reason on his football
team.
Logan had the leaner build, but he was an inch shorter.
I snorted to myself. I couldn’t believe I even knew these
details. As I cursed my friends inside for
their gossiping ways, I glanced back
at the Escalade and froze once more. Two green eyes stared back
at me.
Mason had been filling up his vehicle and watching me the
whole time.
I swallowed painfully and was barely aware that my gas was
done. I couldn’t look away from him.
Logan was handsome. There was no doubt about that, but he
had nothing against his older brother.
Now I understood why so many gossiped
and whispered about the Kade brothers. The hairs on the
back of my neck stood
straight up and my eyes were locked with his in some sort of battle.
I couldn’t look away. I just knew that.
His friend rounded the vehicle and leaned beside him. Both
watched me and I saw the grin come to
his friend. He crossed his feet and
looked like he was at the movies, popcorn and all.
Then he said something and Mason smirked at me.
“Mase, dude. Candy flavored condoms.” Logan leapt across the
lot and did a small dance when he
handed a box to his brother.
I knew I shouldn’t have been watching, but I couldn’t stop
myself. I was riveted by both brothers.
Logan was bobbing his head in rhythm
with the music that blared from the gas station’s speakers
while Mason hadn’t
taken his eyes from mine.
That’s when I knew without a doubt that he knew who I was.
I sucked in my breath and my knees trembled for a moment.
What’d I do? Did I do something? Then
I remembered my mom sitting in between
all those boxes, tears down her face, and an empty bottle of
wine beside her.
Fuck them. And fuck their dad.
My mom wasn’t a saint. I knew that for sure, but she’d been
with my dad for the last seventeen years.
Now she cheated? Now she decided we
should move in with her new boyfriend and his family?
Fuck them all.
My eyes hardened. Mason’s narrowed. And I sneered at him
before I went inside to pay. When I
came back out, Lydia and Jessica were still
in the bathroom; Mason passed me to pay inside. He wore
a black leather jacket
over a black shirt and jeans. His black hair was cut short and his eyes held
mine
in some form of trance as he passed by me. His jacket rubbed against me,
he passed so close, and we
both turned to watch the other.
My heart faltered for a moment.
The same hatred I felt for him was in his eyes.
Fuck him.
I lifted my lip to sneer at him and I knew he read the
message because he narrowed his eyes, but
shouldered inside the store.
I sighed and went to my car to wait. Logan and their friends
were inside the Escalade, laughing about
something. Then the door pinged its
exit and I stiffened. I knew who’d be coming again.
I looked, I couldn’t help it, and met Mason’s gaze as he
neared me. He paused close to my car and
looked like he was going to stop. I
lifted my head up, ready for whatever he was going to lay on me,
but two cars
screeched to a halt not far from us.
His eyes snapped up. “What the hell?”
“Hey losers!” a guy yelled and cursed at them as he ran from
the car with something smoking in his
hand.
“Oh hell!”
“Mason!”
Logan and their friends were out of the car in an instant.
Mason rushed past me and I stood there,
shocked, as all four dragged the guys
from the other cars. Logan grabbed the smoking thing from the
guy’s hand and
gave it to his brother. Mason took it and threw it in the first car. And the
rest of the
doors were flung open. Guys from that car poured out. Then another
smoking thing was produced and
Logan flung it into the other car.
Their two friends were still punching some of the other
guys. Mason and Logan started punching the
rest. It wasn’t long before the cars
were filling up with smoke and I got the first whiff of fire.
“Oh no,” I muttered to myself and dashed to the store. After
I flung open the door, I screamed,
“Lydia, Jessica, get out here now!”
They rushed from the back section and stared, dumbfounded at
me. “Sam, what’s going on?”
I latched onto Lydia’s arm and dragged her out with me.
“We’re leaving. Now.”
Jessica followed behind, but braked in the middle of the
lot. Her eyes were wide as she took in the
sight before her.
I shoved Lydia inside the car and twisted around. “Get lost!
The cars are going to explode.”
Mason and Logan’s friends heard me and stopped. They grabbed
Logan first, but all of them dragged
Mason away from the guy he was punching.
Fury lit up his face, but when Logan said something in
his ear, he turned and
leapt for his Escalade. As he climbed inside, his eyes met mine for a second.
I shrugged and shoved Jessica behind Lydia inside mine. Then
I hurried into my car and we were out
of there in a flash.
Everything happened so fast.
Lydia and Jessica were bowled over in the back. “I can’t
believe that happened!”
“What did happen?”
“Logan Kade is so hot.”
Jessica snorted. “Logan is? Didn’t you see Mason? I’d do him
in a heartbeat.”
Lydia moaned. “Let me go to bed with my dreams right now.
Why can’t they go to our school?”
Jessica grinned again. “I heard it’s because public school
is tougher. They didn’t want a pansy
school.”
Lydia fanned herself. “Whatever. I don’t care. I’m
transferring.”
Then Jessica grew serious. “You think that’ll be on the
news?”
Lydia lifted her shoulders. “All I know is, how are we
supposed to go home now? Sam, please,
please, please can we go to another
party? I bet I know where they’re going.”
I dropped them off at the party and left for home.
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Tijan is a New York Times Bestselling author that writes suspenseful and unpredictable novels. Her characters are strong, intense, and gut-wrenchingly real with a little bit of sass on the side. Tijan began writing later in life and once she started, she was hooked. She’s written multi-bestsellers including the Carter Reed Series, the Fallen Crest Series, and the Broken and Screwed Series among others. She is currently writing Fallen Crest Seven (untitled) along with so many more from north Minnesota where she lives with a man she couldn’t be without and an English Cocker she adores.
