Do I Wanna Know?

Chapter 24

My life, simply put, was not supposed to be like this. I had my arms crossed over the edge of the infinity pool, staring out at the rolling blue waves as the breeze brushed through the palm tree leaves high up in the backyard. Meanwhile, Harry was inside the house, making me a margarita.

When he came back with two glasses in hand, I squinted up at his broad, toned, and tanned frame in his short black swim trunks and nothing else. His hair was wet from already being in the water with me, and he looked like a goddamn dream.

"Thank you," I took the glass as he set his down on the edge of the pool and dropped himself down into the water without making a splash.

"That's alright," he mirrored my position, taking a drink from the glass while I tipped my head back to wet my hair again.

We let the silence wash over us after doing nothing but talking since we changed and came out here three hours ago, but now the sun was slowly beginning to set and I just wanted to hear the ocean. That's all there was to hear.

At any given beach back home, there were always surfers, children screaming, their parents screaming back at them, and people laughing, playing shitty music, and yelling at each other. You couldn't have a moment of peace unless you went out in the middle of the night, and even then there was always someone.

I had asked Harry to start from the beginning, so that was what he did. He told me that he was a drug dealer when he was fifteen, and he got addicted to the business side of things, never the actual drugs themselves.

Zayn, Niall, and Louis had been with him since the beginning too when they just started with weed. But then they met people who knew people, and those people knew people, and soon enough they had more resources than they even knew what to do with.

He said he was obsessed with perfection in every way. The product needed to be clean and pure and the delivery needed to go through seamlessly so that he could get away with charging more for everything. It was smart, but Harry was smart. A genius, really.

When I asked if he was the only boss, he explained that he was only the boss of certain regions around the world. His current regions were the entire west coast, as well as the entirety of England.

Of course he can't do it all on his own, so he has men he trusts in each part of the state or country to oversee things for him. Still, he was considered the boss and that was a mutual understanding amongst all of them. He made every single decision, and that explained why he was always on the phone at all hours of the night.

"I have another question," I said, turning my head to him.

"What's that?"

"Do you do the drugs yourself?"

Honestly, he nodded as we sipped from our glasses at the same time. "I've tried every single drug we've ever sold at least once, just to make sure I understood it fully and as quality assurance."

"And you never got addicted to them?"

"Um," he squinted out to the orange setting sun before looking back at me. "Cocaine is the only one I'm having a hard time shaking. I work a lot, and it keeps me going. And I, uh...I don't hate the way it makes me feel, so."

I didn't realize how vulnerable the topic was until he explained that, and then I almost felt bad for asking. Even so, I appreciated his transparency.

"Were you ever on coke with me?"

"Mhm," he sighed, scratching at his jaw before pushing his hair back from his forehead. A few stubborn pieces fell right back into place. "The night I fired you. I did a decent line when you were on stage, and when that guy grabbed your ass, I just...snapped, I guess."