Life Of Bayla

|56|

"What the hell? You didn't tell me this was a freaking party!"

Charmaine and Koa had told me that we would be at Bondi beach together and they said it would be just the three of us and not half of the Applecross population!

Koa lowered her back onto the sand, clasping her hand behind her head. "It is just the three of us".

"Yeah, with pretty much the rest of Australia". I folded my arms across my chest. "I didn't sign up for this".

"Oh stop exaggerating", Koa sighed. "It's just some guys from Thornsden and Hauntley. No big deal".

I scoffed. "No big deal?"

Charmaine adjusted her shades. "Bayla, chill. We did plan this for us three. But like, this is a beach Bay. It's free for all. We can just stay here and enjoy the sun".

I twisted my body around to look at the scene unfolding before me. Hauntley is this other high school in the neighborhood. Aaron goes there with his Italian friend, Faust. Apparently they're buddies with some Thornsden students and they decided to have a little get together here on the beach.

Girls were running about the place with water guns in their hold, clad in bikinis, showing off tanned skin and guys were lounging around, nursing their beers or hollering at the girls. My eyes fell on a very familiar ash blonde- haired boy and when he caught my eyes, he began making his way over to me, a big smirk crossing his lips.

"You came", he said.

My eyes ran down his rippled abdomen and fell on the soft trail of hair that disappeared into his denim shorts which hung loosely on his hips.

Caden coughed and I pried my eyes off.

"Yeah", I looked at anything but him in the hopes of ridding my cheeks of the blush painted on it. "I didn't know it was a party, though. I came here with my friends".

Caden looked over my shoulder at Koa and Charmaine who had busied themselves with applying Blue Lizard sunscreen lotion. I'm sure they would have lost their common sense if they had known Caden Cassius was only a few feet away from them- and most importantly: he was shirtless.

He smiled. "So if you had known that this was indeed a party then you wouldn't have come?"

I nodded, running my hands through my blonde locks. "Pretty much".

"What are you, anti-parties?"

I shrugged. "I guess one could say, they trigger me".

My eyes glazed over for a second and in that moment, antique memories from my past flooded my vision, playing out before my eyes: Ingrid spiking my drink, me nearly dying of a ketamine overdose, some Kahuna boys attempting to rape me...

"Hey, you okay?" Caden's handsome face was etched with worry.

He tried to put a hand on my shoulder but I wrapped my hand around his wrist, stopping him in the process. I faked a chuckle. "I'm fine".

"Yeah, right". He didn't sound convinced.

Just then, Sutton called out Caden's name and when he saw me, he too decided to come over.

Great!

I didn't expect what happened next though.

Sutton pulled me into a hug. Translation: I was pressed agsinst wet, hard muscle.

"How are you?" He raked his fingers through his disheveled, damp tawny hair.

His scent made me feel vertigo. "Fine".