Good Boy by Megan Lowe

Chapter 16

Idid a lot of thinking overnight and concluded that I’m not going to let James, I mean Cav, slip through my fingers again. We had a connection. We have a connection. You don’t find that every day.

It makes total sense why Cav is the way he is now. I know it must be hell on him trying to juggle the two sides of himself. But I can help with that. I want to help with that. I want to be the one he comes to when things are too much for him to handle. I want to be the one who comforts him, who makes him laugh, who makes him moan. Cavanaugh McLaughlin has wormed his way inside my heart, and I don’t want to let him go. I won’t let him go, not without a fight.

“You okay?” Jase asks after I park and turn the car off.

“Why wouldn’t I be?” I give him my best blinding-smile-to-cover-the-fact-I’m-dying-a-little-inside smile.

He points to my face. “That’s why.”

My shoulders drop. “I think I’m doing the best I can, and I guess that’s going to have to do.”

He nods. “What hurts more?” he asks. “The fact he didn’t tell you who he really is? The fact he’s an absolute ass to you here? Or the fact that through it all, he doesn’t want to be with you?”

Trust Jase to get to the heart of the matter.

I clutch my chest. “Damn, kid, hit me where it hurts, why don’t ya?”

“Sorry, I just thought we’d get all that other stuff out of the way and get to the heart of the matter.”

I nod, thinking about his question. “I think what hurts the most is he trusted me enough to tell me certain things about his life, and even when I expressed the desire to know more, he wouldn’t let me in. I told him everything about us, and he couldn’t even return the favor.”

“Who wouldn’t return the favor?” Chloe asks, resting her arm on the roof of the car and leaning in. “Is your mutual masturbation friend not being so friendly anymore?”

I chuckle. “You could say that,” I reply.

She shakes her head. “I told you,” she sings.

“I know, I know.” I shoo her away from the car so I can get out.

“Con,” Jase calls.

I turn back to face him. “I’ll be okay, bud.”

He gives me a look.

“I promise.”

He blows out a breath and shakes his head. “Just don’t do anything stupid, okay?”

“I’ll try not to.”

“Try not to what?” Chloe asks. “Get in another fight with Cav? Why do you always do that when I’m not around, huh?” She threads her arm through mine and hugs it to her chest. “Tell me, Connor, why do you hate me? You always have all the fun when I’m not there.” She sticks her bottom lip out and gives me puppy dog eyes.

“Given my aversion to vagina, I’d wager a lot of my fun is going to take place without you.”

“Oh, ha ha,” she deadpans.

“And I hate to break it to you, but you don’t like what I’ve got, either.”

We’ve just reached the front row of cars when Cav pulls in. He glares at me as he drives past. But my heart leaps at the sight of him.

Chloe laughs. “What the fuck is going on with you two?” she asks. “I know you have this weird fascination with him, no matter how many times I’ve tried to warn you off him, but I’ve never seen him actually go after someone, not like he has with you.”

“Maybe he’s bored?” I say.

“It doesn’t seem like boredom to me.”

“Maybe I hit a nerve?”

“Oh, you hit a nerve all right.”

“How much do you know about him?” I ask. “I mean, really know about him?”

“Aside from all the usual stuff?”

“Yeah.”

She sighs. “Not much. His mom’s a senator, and from what I hear, she has balls, big ones. She’s not one to shy away from having unpopular opinions.”

“And his dad?”

“Hmm. I think he owns like, half of Chicago. Inherited it from his dad who inherited it, who inherited and blah, blah, blah. I don’t think he really does much though.”

“And what about this so-called ‘murder’ he’s supposed to have committed?”

She rolls her eyes. “Honestly, I’m pretty sure that’s all bravado to make him seem like a badass. A weird choice of actions if you ask me, but Cav has never been normal. But they do say death affects people in different ways.”

I nod. “Were he and this guy close?”

“As close as anyone can get to Cav I guess. He, Max, and Thomas were like the three amigos. They’d known each forever, so yeah, I guess they were close, doing whatever guys do when they’re friendly, you know, shaving each other’s chests and braiding their back hair, I don’t know.”

“Why would they shave their chests and not their backs?”

She laughs. “I just said I don’t know! Didn’t we establish, like, first thing in this relationship that dicks aren’t my thing?”

“We did, but that doesn’t mean common sense goes out the window along with an X chromosome.”

She pokes her tongue out.

“What exactly happened anyway? All I ever hear is that this guy died and Cav is apparently happy to take responsibility for it, never mind how fucking weird that is.”

“So there was a party because there’s always a party and Max just snapped. No one really knows what happened; I’ve heard a whole heap of things, each more unlikely than the one before it. And I guess all Cav’s lackeys value their lives too much to ask him about it.”

“Okay, so Max snaps. How does that lead to Cav killing him? Wouldn’t it be more likely that Max tried to murder Cav? And I still don’t get why he’s taking responsibility for it! None of this makes sense!” I throw my hands up.

“None of us understand it, and even less of us are willing to take our lives into our own hands and actually ask about it. If he’s owning responsibility for it, it’s not such a great leap that he’d be willing to do something like that again.”

I roll my eyes.

“Look, I’ve heard everything from Max was super drunk and just messing around, to Max was in love with Cav and Cav rejected him. I have no idea how anyone knows that, as the party was pretty much shut down when he first pulled the gun, but this is Windswept. People know all manner of things that they either can’t or shouldn’t know. Nothing is secret for long here.”

“So Max was drunk? That seems like a reasonable motive for murder.”

She hits me in the stomach. “Shut it. It’s story time, so sit back and listen, will ya?”

“We’re walking.”

She rolls her eyes. “You know what I mean.”

“Okay, continue.”

“I can’t remember what the party was for. I mean, we’re teenagers; do we need an excuse to party?”

“No, we do not,” I agree.

“Right. So as far as I know, and remember I’m getting all of this like, third or fourth hand, everything was fine. Nothing weird was happening, it was a normal party. The night goes on. At some stage I think Cav left. That’s when Max goes nuts.”

“Wait. He went nuts because Cav left, or it just coincided with him leaving?”

“I don’t know, Con. He went nuts; that’s all I know.”

“Well, I think this might be an important fact, but if you couldn’t bother to do the proper detective work….”

She rolls her eyes.

“Anyway, Cav is gone, and Max goes nuts. Out of nowhere, he starts ranting and raving. Obviously he’d had a lot to drink, but then, everyone had. So he’s ranting and raving and then pulls out a gun.”

“A gun? Where’d he get a gun?”

She shrugs. “No idea. So everyone runs inside and leaves him outside, and he’s like, super agitated and not getting any better.

“Someone calls Cav. He finally shows up and goes out to talk to Max. They were talking and then they moved into the pool house, which is where absolutely no one knows what happened, except that after a while there’s a gunshot, and Cav emerges, covered in blood. Max’s blood.”

“Was there a police investigation?” I ask.

“Of course, but this is Chicago. They said it was a suicide, but come on, it’s Cavanaugh McLaughlin. Even if he did kill Max, they’d never say so.”

“So now it’s not just murder, it’s a coverup?”

She shrugs. “I didn’t make this up. I’m purely telling you what happened.”

A hot breath comes over my neck. “Yeah, Siddell, she’s just telling you what happened,” Cav says. He walks around me, so he’s now facing me. “So watch out, or who knows, you might be next.”