ROCK BOTTOM ~ Rafe Cameron // OC // JJ Maybank

fifty.

tw: slight violence

It was a restaurant.

She was surprised, honestly. She would've thought that if Rafe had the chance, he'd lure her into some secluded area and lay some kind of feral trap to get ahold of her again.

But no. He just told her to meet him at a restaurant. One near the water on Figure Eight. A nice, seafood restaurant that sold lobster and wine. The place Rafe took Bexley the day they almost ran away together on his boat, the place she let herself get drunk for the first time ever, the place where she had the first truly luxurious meal of her life.

When trying to describe the place to JJ, she told him, "That's where you technically kidnapped me, remember? When you stole Rafe's boat with me in it?"

JJ recalled that day, and he quickly insisted, "I didn't kidnap you. I just kinda...took you."

"What happened?" Kiara asked, eyeing JJ up and down.

"Her mom told me she was missing," JJ defended. "She asked me to bring her home. I go look for her, and she's drunk off her ass with Cameron, and he's planning on doing god knows what with her, so I take the boat while he's out of commission. I took her straight home, nothing weird."

"You...held Rafe at gunpoint, and tied him up, and threw him in the water," Bexley told him.

JJ rolled his eyes. "Okay, but considering all that's happened since then, that doesn't seem that bad now, does it? Besides, you were knocked out. How was I supposed to know nothing would happen?"

"She was dating Rafe at that point," Kiara pointed out, still side-eyeing him. "You went and stole someone's girlfriend while she was passed out? JJ, no wonder she thought you were a creep for so long."

"It's not like I touched her," JJ scoffed. "Well, barely-"

"Would you stop?" John B suddenly blurted out. He looked at Bexley. "So Rafe sent you the address of a restaurant. What do we do next?"

JJ threw up his hands, scoffing, "So everyone's just gonna think I'm the villain in that story-"

Pope and Kiara groaned a low, "Stop, JJ."

Bexley waited until it was quiet before continuing. "It's a nice restaurant," she said. "So I don't think you'd be able to break into any cars without someone noticing. If he has the cross in some truck or something, I really don't know how you could take it without everyone seeing."

"We can deal with that when we get to it," Sarah quickly said. "People know who I am. They know Rafe is my brother. If we get caught messing with his car, I'll just say I lost the keys, or he accidentally took something I needed."

"We're gonna get there in about five minutes," Pope piped up from the driver's seat. "He'll recognize this car for sure. I'm thinking we park it behind something, get out and start going by foot."

"He can't see the parking lot from the restaurant," she said. "Especially not from the outside patio."

"You think he'll be at an outside table?"

"Yeah." She didn't know why, but just based on everything she knew about Rafe, she was pretty sure he would make sure to be given the exact same table they got last time.

"We're gonna pull up any second," Pope said. "Everyone duck down, alright?"

They did so.

They all hid behind the seats, as if the car wouldn't give them away.

They parked at the edge of the parking lot. They all looked around.

"I don't see anything," John B commented.