Your Fault (Culpable Book 2)

I was graduating. I don’t know if you’ve ever been through something like that, but it’s amazing. I knew the hard stuff was still ahead of me—I still had to go to college, not to mention any number of other, worse things—but still, you just can’t compare graduating from high school to anything else. It’s a step toward maturity, a step toward independence, a feeling so gratifying that I could barely contain myself as I waited in line next to my classmates and listened to our names being called.

We walked out in alphabetical order, which meant Jenna was several places in line behind me. The ceremony was organized to a T, very fancy, out in the school’s gardens, with huge panels reading CLASS OF 2016. I still remembered the celebrations at my old school, in the gym, with a balloon or two and not much more. Here they had even decorated the trees on the edge of the green. The chairs where friends and family sat were lined with costly green and white fabrics—the school colors—and our gowns were green, too, and were the work of a famous designer. It was an insane waste of money, but by now nothing scandalized me anymore. I was surrounded by multimillionaires, and this was just how they lived.

“Noah Morgan!” was the next name uttered into the microphone. I jolted, climbed the stairs nervously to collect my diploma, and looked with a huge smile on my face at the rows of families. I saw Nick and my mother standing and clapping, and they were as excited as I was. My mother was even jumping up and down. I shook the principal’s hand and joined the rest of the graduates.

The valedictorian—her GPA was .2 points higher than mine—mounted the stage once everyone had received their diplomas to give her graduation speech. It was sweet, funny, entertaining, and tender, and I doubt anyone could have done better. A few tears slid down Jenna’s face, and I laughed to keep from doing the same. I’d only been there a year, but it had been one of the best in my life. Once I’d put my prejudices aside, I’d not only prepared myself for college magnificently, I’d also made a lot of good friends.

“Congratulations, class of 2016. We’re free!” she shouted into the microphone, elated.

We threw our mortarboards into the air. Jenna hugged me so tight, I could barely breathe.

“And now it’s party time!” she shouted, applauding and jumping all around. I giggled, and all at once, we found ourselves surrounded by hundreds of people trying to reach their children to congratulate them. We said a quick goodbye to one another and went off to look for our parents.

A pair of strong arms wrapped around me from behind and picked me up off the ground.

“Good job, brainiac!” Nick said, setting me down and kissing me loudly on the cheek. I turned around and hugged him.

“Thanks! I still can’t believe it!”

I wanted to kiss him, but my mother appeared, pushed him aside, and embraced me.

“Noah, you graduated!” she shouted like another one of the schoolgirls. Her enthusiasm was contagious. I shrieked and laughed and watched Nick shake his head, amused at my mother and me. William walked up beside her and gave me a hug of his own once my mother had let me go.

“We’ve got a surprise for you,” he announced.

I looked at the three of them with suspicion.

“What have you done?” I asked.

Nick grabbed my hand and pulled me along with him, saying, “Come on,” and the four of us walked across the garden. With all the people there, it took us ages to reach the parking deck.

No matter where I looked, there were huge cars everywhere, some of them with giant colorful bows, others with balloons tied to the mirror. Who could be crazy enough to buy one of those cars for an eighteen-year-old kid?

Nick covered my eyes with one of his big hands and started guiding me across the lot.

“What are you going?” I asked, tripping over my own feet. I was starting to feel nervous but also excited.

No way…

“Over here, Nick,” my mother said, more animated than I’d ever heard her in my life. Nick turned me around, then stopped. A second later, his hand moved away, and my mouth fell open, literally.

“Tell me that red convertible isn’t for me,” I whispered incredulously.

“Congratulations,” my mother and William said, both of them beaming.

Nick dangled a ring of keys in front of my nose.

“No more excuses not to come visit me,” he said.

“You all are crazy!” I shouted hysterically when I was able to react.

They’d bought me a goddamned Audi…

“Oh my God! Oh my God!” I started squealing.

“You like it?” William asked.

“Are you kidding?” I replied. I was so overwhelmed, I had no idea what to do or say.

I ran over to Mom and William and hugged them as tight as I could. I’d been dropping comments about saving up to buy another car. Mine had broken down five times in the past few months, and I was spending so much money at the shop that it would have been cheaper to buy me a new one, but…an Audi! I never guessed they’d give me something like that!

“Honestly, I can’t believe it,” I said, getting inside. The car was precious, bright, gleaming red. There wasn’t a single corner of it that didn’t seem to be sparkling.

I heard shouts of joy all around me. I wasn’t the only one who’d gotten a car, obviously. All those giant ribbons made the lot look like a gift shop.

“It’s an A5 Cabrio,” Nick told me, getting into the passenger seat.

Still in shock, I started shaking my head.

“This is incredible,” I said, hitting the button and listening to the motor’s soft roar.

“You’re incredible,” he corrected me, and I felt a warmth spread through my interior. I was in heaven. I looked at him and, for a brief moment, was lost. My mother had to call out to me twice to get me to react, and when I did, flummoxed, Nick chuckled.

“Shall we see each other at the restaurant?” William asked, resting his hands on my mother’s shoulders.

Mom had made a reservation at one of the best restaurants in the city. Afterward, my graduation party would be at the Four Seasons in Beverly Hills. They’d pulled out all the stops on the catering and gotten a hall that accommodated five hundred, apart from renting out two floors of the hotel so no one would have to worry about going home till the next day. I had complained at first—it was excessive, and the students had paid for all of it, even if we did get a discount, since the father of one of our classmates was an investor in the hotel.

“When I graduated, we had the party on a cruise ship and didn’t come back for five days,” Nick had said when I’d told him how shocked I was at what my class was planning. When I’d heard that, I’d decided to keep my opinions to myself.

I nodded, dying to take off in my new car. The seats were beige leather. It had that new car look and that new car smell…a smell I was encountering, just then, for the first time in my life.

I put it in gear and pulled out of the lot, leaving that school behind…forever.

“Noah, slow down, you’re overdoing it,” Nick said from the passenger’s seat. The wind was blowing in our faces, pushing back our hair, while I hooted and laughed like a banshee.

The sun was setting, and the views just then were dazzling. Cars were driving past me, the starless sky was painted a thousand colors ranging from pink to orange, and the stars were just starting to twinkle. It was a perfect summer night, and all I could do was smile as I thought of the month and a half I had to spend with Nick, together, no more exams. And then I’d move to the city. I couldn’t imagine a more perfect future.

“They shouldn’t have bought you this damn car,” he complained between clenched teeth. I rolled my eyes and slowed down.

“You happy now, Grandma?”

“You’re still over the speed limit,” he said earnestly.

I ignored him. No way I was slowing down to seventy. Seventy-five was fine. Anyway, everyone in that city drove like a maniac.

“This isn’t NASCAR… You want to chill?” he said. He was joking, but the remark made my smile freeze, then slowly fade away.

I had tried as hard as I could not to think about my father, and I definitely didn’t want to remember him just then. But something brought him insistently into my thoughts. Maybe it was seeing all my friends with their dads on that special occasion. I kept asking myself what it would have felt like if he’d been there, if he hadn’t been crazy…or dead. In that alternate universe, Nick wouldn’t be the one beside me just then, and he sure as hell wouldn’t be telling me to slow down.

But what kind of stupid thought was that? My father was a drunk, a criminal with a killer’s instincts, he had tried to murder me… What the hell was going on with me? How could I be missing him? How could I be sitting there imagining a life that never had existed and never would?

“Noah?” Nick called to me. Without realizing it, I’d slowed down to forty-five, and cars were honking and passing me. I shook my head. I’d gotten lost in myself again.

“I’m okay,” I said, trying to get back to that state of euphoria I’d been in just a few minutes before. I stomped on the accelerator and ignored the nagging feeling in my heart.

Soon we were at the restaurant. It was gorgeous inside. I’d never been there, and I was excited to try the food. I’d told my mother I didn’t care where we went, as long as they had the best chocolate cake. That was my one request.

Mom and Will must have been right behind us. I got out of the car, and Nick did, too, walking around to see me. He looked fantastic in those dark pants, with a white shirt and gray tie. I fell in love with him all over again every time I saw him in businessman mode, as I called it. He smiled the way he only did with me and smirked as I looked down and realized I still hadn’t stripped off my gown. I pulled it off, giving him a view of the pink dress I was wearing, with the patterned lace back. It fit me like a glove.

“You look incredible,” he said, pulling me close. Even in my heels, I felt minuscule next to him. My eyes were level with his lips, which were tempting, the way every inch of him was.

“You, too,” I said, tickled because I knew how much he hated compliments. I didn’t know why, but he always got really uncomfortable whenever I called him handsome. It wasn’t a secret—we’d only been parked there three minutes, and five women had already turned their heads to give him a slow, shameless once-over.

He kissed me before I could say anything else, and after a moment, I pushed him away.

“Easy, we’ve got the whole night ahead of us,” I said.

“I’m on the verge of taking you to my apartment and forcing you to live there all summer,” he blurted out.

That idea, the two of us living there with no parents to bother us, made my heart swell… but obviously it couldn’t happen.

“I wouldn’t say no,” I told him.

“Really?” he said, pushing me into the car. I wrapped my arms around him and tried to give him a kiss, but he jerked back, clearly expecting an answer. That allured me, and I wanted to keep playing.

“Yeah, I wouldn’t mind spending the night with you, naked, in your bed…” I admitted, digging my fingers into his hair.

In his eyes, there was hunger. I was seducing him. I’d figured out I had a talent for it.

“Don’t start what you can’t finish,” he warned me, now ready to kiss. But this time, I was the one who turned away. I was toying with him, but his expression promised passion and danger. I’d realized by then that the slightest contact with my lips was enough to completely disarm him.

I knew I couldn’t take it too far. We were in the middle of a parking lot, and our parents were about to arrive. But I wanted him so bad…

“Tonight,” I said, kissing his chin, his throat, his neck. “Make me yours, Nick.”

He held my waist with one hand, while the other forced my head back.

“I don’t need to make you mine—you are mine,” he replied before kissing me the way he’d been wanting to do since before we arrived. His tongue pushed into my mouth immodestly, wrapped around mine, tasted me, maybe punished me—I wasn’t yet sure.

Just being with him, just touching him, was enough to make me lose control. It didn’t matter how much time passed; it didn’t matter that we’d spent the whole previous day together. I never got tired of him, never lost that painful attraction that brought us together like two magnets.

But before my body could melt in his arms, or else undergo spontaneous combustion, a horn honked, startling us and making us step back from each other.

“Your mother,” he said with a frown.

“Your father,” I counterattacked.

They glowered at both of us.

“Could you all keep it under control? We’re in a public place,” Mom reprimanded us, with an accusing look at Nick. She’d been doing that kind of thing a lot lately… And I didn’t like it one bit. We’d need to have a talk about that. William appeared a moment later, glaring alarmingly at his son.

When we went inside, I realized we weren’t the only ones who had chosen that place for our graduation dinner. Several classmates waved to me as we passed. I smiled at each and every one of them. The maître d’ led us to the terrace. We were seated next to a swimming pool. Lit candles stood in the center of all the tables. It was a cozy place with relaxing piano music in the background—a live musician, as I would realize some time later.

Nicholas sat down next to me, and our parents sat across from us. For some reason, I felt suddenly uncomfortable. One thing was the four of us eating a pizza in the kitchen, another was having dinner in a place like that, especially since Nick hadn’t eaten with the family for months, and the tension in the air was palpable.

Everything was fine at first. My mother couldn’t keep her mouth closed—nothing new there. We talked about my new car, college, Nick, his job, William’s new firm, which I knew Nick was anxious to lead someday… I started to feel more comfortable. My mom ignored the fact we were a couple. In some sense, that was irritating, but it also smoothed things over.

It wasn’t until the end of dessert, when I’d swallowed the last bit of my chocolate cake, that my mother decided to blurt out something she must have been keeping under wraps for weeks:

“I have another surprise for you,” she announced when we were all sitting there stuffed. I brought my glass to my lips, so happy, I didn’t see coming the bomb she let off a second later: “You and I are going to Europe for a girls’ trip for four weeks!”

Wait…what?