Page 97 of Declan

“Ah! This is higher than I thought,” she said. Her long black hair brushed the top of her ass, even while in a ponytail. I doubted she’d ever had her hair cut. She wore a silver cross around her neck, and her swimming suit was more modest compared to the other girls. “What if there’s sharp rocks at the bottom?”

“It’ll be okay,” I said, nudging her. “As long as you jump out a bit, you won’t hit anything. Want me to go first?”

She shook her head. “Can we go together?”

“Fuck yeah we can.” I grabbed her hand. “On the count of three.”

As we jumped off the edge, Dana screamed. We submerged in the water seconds later before coming back up. She had the biggest smile on her face.

“I want to go again!” she said.

For the next twenty minutes, she and I jumped off the bluff, and other people gradually joined us. I cut out after that and went back to Brysen and Royal.

Brysen’s creamy skin was pink in areas. He didn’t tan well at all.

“You’re way too nice, Kye,” Brysen said, lying in the grass with big sunglasses on that made him look like a mutant bug. “That girl has no idea you like dick. She totally wants some of you.”

“No she doesn’t,” I scoffed.

“The guys over there want some of you, too,” Royal chimed in.

I looked to where he nodded. Sure enough, there were three guys standing near the shore, all smiling at me before they turned back to the water.

“When will you move on?” Brysen asked, sitting up and eyeing me over the top of his bug glasses. “Not to be insensitive or whatever, but you can’t wait around forever on that sonofabitch. Not when there are some fine ass men here who want you to give them the D. It’s been two months, dude.”

I grabbed my phone and looked at Declan’s contact. Again.

And then a text came through.

Spartan:What are you doing?

I stared at his text in shock, wondering if I was imagining it. I had difficulty responding due to my fidgety hands.

Me:At the lake. Why?

After I sent it, it showed that he’d read the message, but he didn’t respond. About five minutes later, I sent another. Because I was kind of pissed.

Me:And wtf? U don’t talk to me for fucking ever and now u randomly ask what I’m doing?

Spartan:Turn around.

I read his response before looking up at Royal.

Royal, however, was staring at something behind me, his mouth agape.

Finally, I turned.

Declan stood about twenty feet away. Staring right at me. There were several things I felt all at once: anger, confusion, and disbelief. But the strongest emotion was happiness. In that moment, I let go of all the anger and stood up from the grass.

I didn’t know why he was there. Hell, I didn’t know if he was even real. Maybe I was hallucinating.

People around us recognized him, and even though there were waves of gasps and stunned stares, no one swarmed him. The intimidating Gideon probably stopped them from doing so.

He was all I saw as I moved toward him. Everyone else just disappeared. Declan was focused on me, too. The closer I got to him, the faster I walked.

“Declan, what are you—”

He gathered me in his arms and cut off my words with a kiss.