1. Mason

Mason

3 years ago, May

I fucking hate Malibu.

The money, oozing out of every mansion. The people with their high society standards and self-entitlement. The fucking secrets.

I can’t remember the last time I was here. Probably when Savannah graduated high school two years ago. It’s just not the place for me. While I try to be there for my sisters whenever they need me, I also prefer to stay in my half of LA, far away from Parker Estate and my stepfather with a penchant for illegal activities.

I’ve got enough problems.

But . . . Bailey— the first out of three sisters— is celebrating her graduation from college and not even Marcus Parker could force me to miss it.

So, here I am, cruising down the busy streets toward the shiny mansion Mom and the girls moved into after she married Parker. The one place that makes my fucking skin crawl like I’m covered in a thousand fire ants.

I thought about backing out. I really did. Bailey wouldn’t care. She knows I hate it here, but I also don’t want to be the shit brother who never shows. I didn’t come for Christmas, even though she begged me to. I owe it to her to at least make an appearance tonight.

Pulling up at the gate, there’s a line of cars waiting to enter. Mom is throwing the party for Bailey and her best friend Andi, so I knew there would be people, but damn. Even I didn’t think they were this popular.

“Jesus Christ,” I murmur when I spot a guard waving a metal detector over the gift bags someone a couple cars ahead of me brought. Like they’d bring a bomb to a graduation party.

Then again . . . Parker is into some bad shit, so I guess it’s warranted to be a little paranoid.

Too bad he’s got his security searching out threats to him like bloodhounds.

I wait in line for twenty minutes before finally, the car in front of me begins their federal prison-style search and seizure. It’s a group of kids. I wonder if Bailey and Andi even know them, but knowing Mom, she didn’t invite their actual friends. Just the people she could claim she knows.

The problem with my mother, like a lot of people in LA, is they’re too worked up over who’s doing what, when, and with who. Mom loves anything to do with a high-class party and Bailey’s graduation was the perfect opportunity for her to show off the wealth that oozes out of every brick in the Parker Mansion.

I remember when things were different. When us kids came first and she loved Dad. When she would make pancakes every Saturday morning, even though they were awful, and when she and Dad ran Carpenter’s Auto together.

Now . . . I don’t even recognize her.

The brake lights in front of me flash and I realize it’s about to be my turn, the whole time, my stomach filling with dread at the prospect of having to let Mom try to force another one of Bailey and Savannah’s expensive friends at me.

The women Mom tries to throw at me . . . they’re beautiful, don’t get me wrong, but they aren’t for me. I’m too rough for a soft girl. Too big a dick for someone who expects elegance and grace. Who was raised on money and fine dining, instead of hamburgers and Kool-Aid.

I move to pull up, but before I can, a young girl storms through the gates, so close to the front of my truck, I have to slam on the brakes to keep from adding a new addition to the cobblestone drive.

The guard yells something at her, but she just wipes dark black tears from her face and keeps marching down the sidewalk, wrapping her arms around herself.

Don’t.

It’s a busy road.

It’s Malibu. She’ll be fine.

I think we all know just because there’s money, it doesn’t mean there isn’t also danger.

I war with myself, toying with the idea of going after her. I shouldn’t. I don’t know who she is. I’m here to see my sister. Not play Superman for the crying girl shuffling down the street.

A car horn honks loudly behind me and I stick my middle finger up at them out the window.

Dickhead.

“Fuck me,” I grumble, whipping the truck into the grass beside the gate while two of the guards yell at me. “Tell Daddy dearest I say hello.”

They glare at me, but neither says a word when I pull back out onto the street and make my way off toward the city where the girl went.

She didn’t make it far. Probably because she doesn’t have shoes on and she’s soaking wet, for some reason, but I pull up beside the curb in front of her and roll the window down, anyway.

“You alright? I almost ran you over.”

She pauses on the sidewalk, turning toward me with black-tinted tears streaming down her face.

I think she’s going to start crying again when her lip wobbles. I’ve dealt with my fair share of upset women. Three sisters and all. Instead, she sucks it in and lifts her chin, glaring at me.

Yep. That’s fucking Malibu for you.

“I’m fine.”

I shrug.

“Suit yourself.”

I put the truck in drive, debating on whether I want to sit in the line of cars or just go home and see Bailey tomorrow when the girl jumps toward the truck.

“Wait!”

I can’t help but chuckle.

Fresh tears brim in her eyes and now that she’s closer, I can see she’s young. Pretty, but young. Probably no more than eighteen.

“Get in.”

She doesn’t argue and for a brief moment, I wonder where this girl’s sense of self-preservation is. Then, I’m hit with the aroma of her perfume when she climbs in the passenger seat and despite myself, I fucking like it. Like sugar and honey and everything sweet.

“Where to?”

“Um . . .” she stammers. She’s obviously been drinking. Doesn’t surprise me coming out of Parker’s place. “Do you know where the Kappa Nu house is?”

A sorority girl. Makes sense, I guess, hanging with Bailey and Andi.

“UCLA?”

She nods, buckling her seatbelt and hugging her arms around herself.

“I’ll find it.”

“Why are you helping me?” she asks quietly.

“Why are you soaking wet?”

She blinks at me, finally looking at me head-on with two of the brightest fucking green eyes I’ve ever seen. Like mint leaves or the trees up north. Fucking breathtaking.

And also highly unobtainable.

When she turns away, I start back down the highway toward the city, deciding I’ll take Bailey out for ice cream and whatever else she wants to do in a couple days once things have settled down. She’d like that more than Mom’s party, anyway.

“My boyfriend—sorry, ex -boyfriend, pushed me in the pool.”

I raise a brow, but she doesn’t look at me.

“Why did he do that?”

She shrugs. “I don’t know. Because he’s an idiot. And a child. And a cheating jerk.”

Cue another brow raise for her choice of jerk as an insult. I can think of plenty of things to call the little bastard, none of which are nearly as kind as jerk.

“So you found out he cheated and he shoved you in the pool?”

“I guess. It sounds silly. Childish.”

“You’re not wrong there.”

She regards me for a moment, probably trying to decipher what to say.

“Now you.”

“What about me?”

“Why are you helping me?”

I let out a breath through my teeth as Malibu and that shit party slips away and the few miles of quiet country road takes us back to Los Angeles. Well, as country as it gets around here.

“Because that was my sister’s party and she’d be pissed if I didn’t help you.”

“Bailey? Or the other one?”

“Andi. And yes, Bailey is my sister.”

She shivers in the cool air of the AC, so without taking my eyes off the road, I pull an old flannel from the back seat of the truck and hand it to her.

“It’s not much, but it’s warm.”

“Clean?”

“Probably not.”

She seems to contemplate it for a moment but ends up slipping it on anyway.

“Thank you. I’m Hannah, by the way.”

“Mason.”

“Well, thank you for giving me a ride Mason. I’m sure you didn’t want to leave the party.”

I chuckle and I can feel her watching me.

“How do you know my sister?”

“I don’t.”

“So, why are you at her party?”

“My boyfriend— God, ex -boyfriend— is Drew’s cousin.”

Fucking Drew Marshall. I can’t stand the kid, but Bailey loves him, so I tolerate him, for her sake.

For now.

Lately, he’s been a little too controlling, from what Mila reports. Mila’s the youngest of us and the most awkward, but she listens and she’s good at keeping an eye on things when others think she isn’t paying attention.

I had planned to talk to Bailey about Drew’s controlling nature tonight, but that was before I realized Mom invited all of Los Angeles.

“The Marshall's are all rich kids who couldn’t hold their own in a thumb war.”

She laughs, a real laugh, and even in that moment, I don’t think I quite understood the role that laugh would play in the rest of my life.

“Isn’t he a little old for you, anyway?”

She rolls her eyes like a petulant teen. “I’m twenty. He’s only twenty-six.”

Shit. My age.

I guess a couple years really does make a difference. Where she’s still na?ve to the world’s dark side, I’ve lived it. Though, from the looks of the expensive dress covered up in my old flannel, the sorority at the biggest college in LA, and the personal invite to a Monica Parker party, I’d say she hasn’t had to live through much.

“A lot can change in a couple years.”

“Maybe I just like older guys.”

I glance at her and she’s watching me. For a moment, I forget she’s some random soaking wet twenty-year-old college kid and not a fucking siren here to drag me to the bottom of the ocean.

Then I remember. College. Twenty years old. I’m twenty-eight. I’ve got a business. A house. All of which I got because Dad died, but still. I’ve got responsibilities that don’t interest someone so young. Or of her class.

“What is your major?”

She rolls her eyes, turning away from me.

Yep, a kid.

“Communication and Economics.”

“Fascinating. You’ll have to tell me more next time.”

She pauses for a moment, but when she catches on that there won’t be a next time, she gasps, laughing and punching me in the arm.

“Could you have picked a more boring degree?”

“Fine, what did you major in?”

I side-eye her. “College wasn’t for me.”

“Don’t like school?”

“Don’t like shelling out unnecessary money.”

She shakes her head as we pull onto a busy campus street. For the end of the year, it’s packed with people leaving or partying away their last days before summer break. To our right, Greek Row has houses lined down the street that all look like some poor attempt at replicating the Parthenon, each one with the trademark Greek symbols above the door.

“So, what do you do Mr . . .”

“Carpenter,” I finish for her, spotting Kappa Nu and pulling to a stop between a Beamer and one of those new electric cars that look like a toaster. “I’m a mechanic.”

“You don’t strike me as the glamorous party-type like the rest of your family.”

“And you don’t strike me as the type to allow a Marshall to push her into a swimming pool.” I lean across her, ignoring her gawking face and mouthwatering perfume and push the passenger door open. “Your stop.”

She pauses for a moment and I hang there, balancing on the center console and holding the door open for her, our faces inches apart.

“Thank you for the ride, Mason Carpenter.” Slowly, she exits the truck. I don’t bother to ask for my flannel back. It looks better on her.

I chuckle darkly, for no other reason than dry amusement. If she knew what was going through my head at the sight of those pretty eyes, soft red hair, and a smattering of light freckles across her cheeks and nose, she wouldn’t think I was her knight in shining armor, coming to rescue her from walking the twenty miles back to college.

“You’re pretty, Hannah,” I say quietly and her mouth parts over a soft breath. “But stupid. Don’t get in the car with strangers.”

And with that, I shut the door on her and she stumbles back a few steps. She stares through the tinted glass for a moment, glaring at me before finally, she turns and marches up the stairs to Kappa Nu.

I watch her go inside before I pull away, all the while my skin crawling and my nose filled with the scent of her perfume. Sweet and honey-like. The soft southern accent that’s barely noticeable under that California exterior. Perfect body hidden under a sopping wet dress.

Yeah . . . whoever she is, she’s going to be a problem.

And that, my friends, is what I get for trying to play hero.