The Heart of Cars

Chapter 17

"J, are you alright?" Colton gently grabs my arm and I shake my head. "I'm fine."

"You sure?" I nod and pull away from him gently. I look around the dark red room with dark wood that makes up the desk and chairs and is around the older fireplace. I gently hold out my keys for Colton to take. "You sure you want me to drive?"

"Yeah, my mind is a thousand miles away." He nods and goes to open the door. "I'll meet you out there, I'm gonna go check on Britt real quick."

"Okay. You know where I'll be." I nod and look at the king. "You wanna come with me to check on her, Brett?"

"Yeah, sure, Kid." He follows me out as I walk down the hallway into the master bedroom, where I knew Ashley would take her. I knock on the door and slowly open it. "Hey B. Long day?" She smiles at me and nods. "At least we got to finish shopping."

"Yeah. I should have guessed you would be happy about that." She laughs a little as I sit next to her on the bed as Brett goes and puts his arm around his wife. I hug Brit and tell her that I know about Colton. She gasps, as does the queen who overhears us. I pull away from the hug. "How?"

"I could just tell today in Brett's office." Brett frowns but nods. "You can't tell him, Jolene. Promise me." I look at the queen. "I promise. I might not understand why you don't want me to tell him, but I won't. It's not my secret to tell." Ashley nods and I turn back to my best friend. "You'll call me if you need me right?"

"Of course! You are the one person who wouldn't be looked at weird if you were hanging around me. I know Dad wants you to enlist so you can take up protecting me and being my bodyguard." I laugh and look over at the king. "Oh really?"

"Brittany! You were suppose to try to get her to enlist, not tell her my plan!" Brett turns red under the stares of the three girls in the room. "It's alright. I plan to choose to enlist, I wouldn't know how to be a mom. I just have to get through the festival in order to find out if whoever I choose will be okay with that. Dad says I have to have their approval."

"You still don't know? Sweetheart, I thought you figured it out the other day."

"I did, I wanted to choose Sam since it would be easier and me and Colton got into an argument but one that isn't fair to Colton and two if I'm comfortable enough to argue with Colton this early into meeting him then maybe I should choose him."

"I think you should choose Colton." Me, Brittany, and Ashley each throw a pillow at the king for his obviously biased opinion. "I think you should choose Sam. You guys work well together in conflict, and that was in River Run." I sigh and look at Ashley. "Your turn for your opinion."

"I think you should choose Tyler." We all look at her like she is crazy. "What? She said when she was little, she would date Tyler if he wasn't next in line since then she would have to have kids as queen. And know she is saying she might have kids. They work well together too. Do you guys remember when they got trapped in that burning building? They both got out and they got two other teens and a baby out." I shake my head. "Brett said I couldn't choose to not choose either of them though."

"Oh whatever! He doesn't mean it."

"I don't?" The king looks amused at this whole conversation. "No, you don't." We all laugh at the statement. "I should get going, Colton's waiting for me."

"Okay J. Bye."

"Bye sweetheart."

"Goodnight Kid." I hear them all answer as I walk towards the door. "Oh, wait. Brett? Did you or anyone else tell someone to follow me?"

"Not that I know of and I know you wouldn't do anything stupid to break our deal, so I wouldn't put someone on you."

"Oh, okay. That's weird. I thought someone has been following me since the other day."

"Well, it's not because of me." I nod and walk out to where I left my car and go sit next to Colton on the hood.

*edited*