Chapter Twenty-Four Wyatt

Chapter Twenty-Four

Wyatt

Three Years Ago

Wyatt could have been home playing video games.

The thought bobbed at the front of his mind as he struck out on the dance floor. Again. Another girl shot him a Do I know you? glare before finding a better dance partner. Meanwhile, Liam, who actually had rhythm and some semblance of coordination, spun and dipped a drop-dead-gorgeous twentysomething Wyatt recognized from TikTok. How did he do that?

Wyatt wished real life were as easy as video games. Select your character, customize your stats, and press A, B, X, or Y to speak. Be witty, flirty, aggressive, or kind. No option for word vomit that makes people hate you. And even if you did fuck it up, you could reset and start over.

He'd already failed tonight's mission: have a great time and get the girl. Any girl, really. But the vibe was off, and no one seemed interested. If he'd stayed home and streamed Hitman 3 on Twitch instead, maybe he could have at least grown his followers. People liked him online.

Thankfully, he had his phone. It wasn't as good as a console, but he had some first-person shooters he was pretty decent at, plus a merge game he would never publicly admit to being obsessed with.

"Omigod is that Call of Duty ? Can I see? Can I play?"

That bespeckled cousin of Liam's practically accosted him, grabbing for Wyatt's phone.

"Whoa, whoa!" Wyatt hastily paused the level and held the phone at arm's length, away from the kid. Noah, was it?

Probably-Noah sighed. "My stupid phone died, and this music sucks, and I'm bored. Could I use yours?"

"No way," scoffed Wyatt. "Why did you even want to come to the party in the first place? You could have gotten some other favor from Liam for not snitching."

"I thought it would be different." Noah sighed again. "Like actually cool people from TikTok. But everyone here is old and a big nobody."

Don't let Declan hear you say that, Wyatt thought.

"The girls are pretty hot, though." And the kid literally waggled his eyebrows at that.

A laugh caught in Wyatt's throat. "How old are you? Ten?"

Noah puffed up his chest in an attempt to draw himself up taller. "I'm twelve."

It was comical, this pipsqueak of a kid thinking he had a shot with any of these girls. If Wyatt couldn't land a date, what chance did this prepubescent have? Then it came to him.

"Listen, little man, my phone's almost out of juice itself, but if you want to play, you should head upstairs to Declan's game room," Wyatt said. "He has a PS4. Just don't mess with any of his profiles or delete anything."

It got Noah out of his hair, and Wyatt back onto the dance floor. He could do this. He had main-character energy. It was just a matter of time before someone IRL noticed.

Although then Eden did notice him. Maybe Wyatt wasn't good for a hookup, but he was good for a hookup. Or his brother was, at least.

Wyatt found Blaine by the pool shooting B-roll.

"Bro, where's your gear stashed? I need to get one of your girls." Wyatt spoke in Blaine's favorite code. Drugs were like different flavors of chick. His favorite strain of weed was Samantha, because she was chill and could hang, just like Blaine's high school girlfriend. But what Wyatt wanted was—

"Carly," Wyatt specified with a knowing look.

"Really?" Blaine raised his eyebrows. "You know I'm cool with…Samantha, but supplying something more serious might land me in hot shit."

"Don't worry. Look around. They're serving us alcohol and no one cares."

Blaine considered it, knowing Wyatt had a point. This party was a legal dead zone. Declan's whole life was. Real life blurred around the edges, and you could do anything you wanted in his orbit.

Blaine acquiesced, his shoulders dropping into a shrug. He jerked his head in the direction of the house. "Stashed my kit in the dining room. Just be careful."

Wyatt found the camera bag right where Blaine said it would be, and the secret compartment at the bottom was filled with neatly labeled baggies of kush, pills, and powders. He snatched the one he wanted and winged his way back out to the patio to find Eden. God, that girl was sexy. Out of his league, but a boy could dream.

He found her in the kitchen. She already had six plastic cocktail cups lined up in a row, half filled with a brown liquid. Wyatt tilted his head in question.

"Whiskey. Declan's favorite," Eden filled him in. "For you, me, Declan, Delaney, Camille, and Willa. You got the special ingredient?"

Wyatt flashed the baggie. Eden's face perked up.

A minute later she was carefully tapping equal amounts of white powder into each of the drinks, which she then stirred aggressively with a metal spoon. Finally Eden dumped some finger foods off a fancy silver tray with embellished handles and replaced the spread with the party-laced refreshments.

"You ready?" Eden took the tray and clopped over to doors leading outside.

"Are we going to tell them?"

"Now where's the fun in that?" Eden replied with a wink.