Sunlight

Chapter One

Lips Like Sugar // Echo and the Bunnymen

Pete - 4 years ago

Coming to Salt Creek was a bad idea.

I drop my bag in the guest room closest to the deck and plop onto the bed.

What the hell was I thinking coming up here to be trapped in a mountain cabin with these people. We finally graduated high school. Moved on to our various college campuses and started the next phase of life. I ended up at Fallbrook University with most of my graduating class, but there's a reason I didn't ask to dorm up with any of these guys. I needed some fucking space.

If it wasn't for Jeff, I wouldn't even be here. He called and used his smooth-talking camp counselor voice to guilt me into tagging along with everyone for a weekend at Salt Creek mountain resort.

We haven't seen you in forever, man.

We won't have time to hang out once we're all out in the real world.

Matt's really changed since he met Hannah. You guys should reconnect.

Kyra's coming, too, and I need all the help I can get keeping her out of trouble.

It's the last statement that did it. Which is the bitch of the whole situation, because what he needs me to do is to be another big brother to keep his eighteen-year-old sister in line.

That's the last fucking way I want to treat her.

Now I'm hiding in the guest room because the second we arrived, Kyra started peeling off her clothes down to her black bikini underneath. It was like looking at the sun, or a really bright fucking light that burns its image into your retina. The kind you still see when you close your eyes.

I can still picture her supple curves accentuated by the scraps of black fabric in strategic places. She may as well have been walking around in black lace lingerie with the way my body reacted. Jeff shoved her into her room and growled at the rest of us to avert our eyes.

Too late. My eyes are permanently scarred.

In the best and worst fucking ways possible.

"Shit." I grunt as I press clenched fists over my eyes.

The door to my room swings open and Gio sticks his head in. He and Micah are new to the group, fellow rookies on Fallbrook U's football team.

"Dude, you okay?"

"Don't you knock?"

"It wasn't locked."

I open my eyes and push up on my elbows. "So that means you don't need to knock?"

"Dude, what's got you so worked up?" Gio steps further into the room before closing the door. He doesn't bother to lock it. I let my elbows slide out from under me and drop back onto the mattress.

"Nothing."

"That's the most nothing I've ever seen from you. I mean, you're a broody guy but this is next level brood. You're a full on grump." I feel the mattress dip as he sits down. "Jeff know you're off the rails?"

I can't stop my wincing at Jeff's name.

"Oh, damn dude. It's Jeff that's got you twisted up? What'd he do? Spill the tea."

"You're worse than the girls."

"I've heard deeper digs before. Doesn't faze me."

"It's really nothing. Like you said, I'm broody. You didn't stop your yapping the entire ride up here. My ears are practically bleeding. I need some peace."