Page 206 of Filthy Beautiful
Fucking.
And beyond the glass… something moved in the dark outside.
It could’ve been a tree in the wind.
But.
It totally wasn’t.
“Ohmygod.Someoneintheyard.” It gushed out in one word, and Xander’s eyes met mine. He froze, and the look on my face must’ve said everything I didn’t say.
Cary.
Xander leapt off of me.
What happened next was too fucking surreal to fully process.
I wasn’t even aware of getting up. The next thing I knew, I was trying to stuff my boobs back into my dress as I ran across the backyard. My bra was somehow undone, hopelessly askew beneath by dress. My panties were a lost cause, so I’d left them behind. I was pushing down my skirt to cover myself as I tried to catch up with Xander and not fall in the pool.
The last I’d seen him, he was streaking out the door of the poolhouse with his jeans on but still undone, wrestling his shirt over his head.
“Xander!” I hissed into the dark. “Wait!”
But he didn’t wait.
He was already long gone.
There was no sign of my brother or anyone else in the yard, Freddy included. When I hurried into the house through the open French doors, I could hear Xander in the hall off the foyer, banging on the studio door.
“Cary!” he shouted. “Open the door!”
“Did you see him?” I panted as I caught up. Shit, the man could run. “Did he seeus?”
“I saw him. He was in the yard.”
“Oh, fuck…”
He banged on the door again. “Cary, let me in!”
“You’re gonna bruise your hand.” I wrapped my hands around his arm, gently, and stopped him. “It’s soundproofed. He can’t hear you.”
Xander looked at me, and his eyes were like bruises; a tumult of blue and gray and green. He pulled from my grasp and dug his phone out of his pocket. Then he stomped away from me, into the foyer, his phone to his ear.
I followed him. “What are you doing?”
“I’m calling him.”
I waited, sitting down on the staircase and wrapping my arms around myself.
“Fuck.” He tapped his phone, hanging up. Then he started typing like mad.
“Are you texting him?”
“Yes, I’m fucking texting him.”
I tried not to take offense at his tone. He was kind of… freaking out? I’d never seen him like this.
“Why?”
