Beauty and the Beat

Beauty and the Beat (20)

When I finally got to my car in the parking lot, I just sat there for about ten minutes, my head on the steering wheel. Why was I letting this upset me so much? I was getting mad over something so stupid, but I just couldn’t stop myself.

I took the long way home and drove as slowly as I could without getting honked at or pulled over by a cop. Driving just made me feel better.

I was so pissed off and upset that I didn’t even notice the two cars parked in front of my house while I parked in the drive way and trudged my way up to the front door.

“I’m home,” I called out once I got inside, stopping short when I saw that my brother was not the only person in the living room. Anna and Ethan were there, too.

Well, this was awkward.

“Hi, Sadie,” Anna greeted me with a smile, though I couldn’t tell if it was forced or not.

“Miss Ryder,” I nodded, biting down on my tongue to stop myself from calling her Anna. I then turned toward my boyfriend. “Mr. Deveraux.”

When Riley had asked them to hang out, I did not expect them to be at my house. I thought they were going to go out to a club, not my house.

“I hope you don’t mind that we’ve kind of taken over the living room,” Riley told me, and I could tell he didn’t really care that he was pretty much kicking me out of my living room for the day.

I let out a sigh. “Whatever, it’s fine. I’ll just invite some friends over and we’ll stay up in my room.”

“Bennett and Freya?” my brother guessed. 

“No,” I corrected with a shake of my head, remembering how Freya had a doctor’s appointment today. “Bennett and Maxxon.”

Ethan moved uncomfortably in his chair, and I couldn’t help but smirk. Was Ethan actually jealous?

“You’re going to be upstairs in your room by yourself with two boys?” Riley asked, seeming very uncomfortable with this decision.

I rolled my eyes at him. “Bennett’s my best friend, Riley.”

Riley still didn’t look happy about this. “But aren’t you dating Maxxon?”

I thought about how I was going to answer for a moment. If he had asked me this the day before, I would have said no right away. Feeling like getting a little revenge on Ethan, I shrugged. “Yeah, we are. So?”

He once again squirmed uncomfortably in his seat, and I bit the inside of my lip to stop myself from smiling. Making him jealous was actually a really fun thing to do.

I stepped into the kitchen to call both Maxxon and Bennett, who just so happened to be together when I first called Bennett. I didn’t exactly ask them to come over; I told them to. They didn’t refuse and arrived in less than fifteen minutes.

The way my house was set up, you could see the front door from where Ethan, my brother, and Anna were. They could see who would come in or out, and they can see how I greeted my guests.

Normally, I would hug Bennett whenever I greeted him. We had been friends since childhood, he was like a third brother to me, so hugging him was no big deal. Maxxon, however, was not someone I greeted with a hug. I greeted him with a glare.

But right then was different. Before I even acknowledged Bennett’s existence, I smiled at Maxxon and practically pounced on him, wrapping my arms around his neck and greeting, “It’s so great to see you!”

Both Bennett and Maxxon were deeply confused, but I said nothing about the hug as I pulled away from him. I could see out of the corner of my eye that Ethan was very stiff in his seat. My brother noticed it as well, because I could hear him say, “Ethan, you alright?”