Chapter 23

No new messages

I sighed because there was still no message from Madison. It’d been over six hours since I’d left her, and I was starting to get concerned. She couldn’t still be sleeping, could she? Gripping my water, I had an urge to go to her dorm and check, but there was no way I was leaving this party anytime soon.

Cade was drunk.

Living up to his party boy reputation, he was standing on the wooden coffee table, shirtless. Drinking a beer via a tube connected to a keg while random partygoers cheered him on, he looked ridiculous, and was far too drunk to think rationally, which was putting me off having to speak to him about anything rational.

I couldn’t leave him alone because I wasn’t sure what he’d do, and I was hoping there’d be a way that I could distract him enough to somehow lock him in his room, but with every chug of his beer, the possibility was becoming less likely.

Taking a drink of my water, I contemplated whether I should call Madison and get her to come over. Maybe if we were both here together, and he saw how much we liked each other, he’d take it easy on me.

“Stop overthinking.” Scotty shunted my shoulder as he stood next to me. “It makes that wrinkle in the middle of your eyebrows more pronounced, and if it gets any bigger, people are going to start thinking you have a unibrow.”

“Why do you think Cade’s drinking so much tonight?”

Cade was sitting on the table now, and weirdly, Henry was by his side amongst the puck bunnies, looking like a kid brother that was finally getting to hang out with his sister’s friends at a pajama party. He was almost acting like he’d never touched a girl before.

“Are you using Cade’s drunkenness as a distraction to get out of talking to your best friend about the shitshow relationship the two of you now have?”

“What do you mean? Our friendship isn’t a shitshow.”

“You sure? Because Cade’s clearly going through something, but your head is too far up your own ass and your new secret relationship to ask. Gotta admit, if you were my best friend, I’d be hurt.”

“Cade doesn’t do feelings. Talking it out isn’t his thing, and as his friend, I respect that. If he wants to talk to me, he knows I’m here.”

“And he’s handling it so well.” Cade’s tongue was out, and he was showing the rest of the team that he’d finished his drink. “Did you ever find out why he and Henry showed up with matching bruises earlier this week?”

“Was I supposed to be finding out?”

“You’re the only one Cade would tell.”

“Well, he didn’t tell me anything.”

With Cade’s arm around Henry’s shoulder, I realized Scotty had a point. Something happened between them, and I didn’t know. I also didn’t know who was calling him or why he was hanging out at Behind Closed Doors so often . I was the one who usually kept Cade in check and stopped him from doing outlandish things, but I’d been so busy thinking about his sister that I’d put our friendship on the back burner. I knew nothing about what was going on in Cade’s life, and it sucked.

“Daniel,” Sienna said sharply, and I could have sworn her voice had the ability to make a boner flaccid.

“I’m out,” Scotty said, sneaking away before Sienna could talk to him.

When I turned to face her, she was glaring at me “Sienna? What are you doing here?”

“I’m just trying to enjoy the party like everyone else.” She held her hand out, trying to look like any other college kid, but, as per usual, failed miserably. With her thick glasses and a pencil skirt, she was making it too obvious that she wasn’t here to party.

She had her eyes on Cade, watching as he sauntered around the room, making a show of himself. I wondered if he was her new target, but she was barking up the wrong tree there. Drinking a keg at a party wasn’t enough for a story, and that was all she’d get. Cade was a private guy. He did shady shit all the time, but no one knew what that shady shit was because he kept himself to himself. Like I said before, he tells me nothing, and if I, as his best friend, couldn’t get the information out of him, then there was no way Sienna would.

“Sienna.”

She couldn’t help herself. She whipped her head in my direction, her smile so wide that she looked like the Joker. “Have you got a story for me? Give me all the deets. Please, please be about substance abuse.”

I shook my head. This girl was insufferable, and there was a moment that I thought I could just let this all go. That was until Sienna grabbed my arm and held me in place. Surprisingly, for a small girl, she was pretty strong. “Dash. If you don’t tell me what you know, I’ll find someone who will, and getting the story from them won’t do you any favors.”

I glared at her with a furrowed brow. “Is that your way of asking if I’m taking performance-enhancing drugs?”

She puffed out a breath obnoxiously. “I know you’re not, but I’m pretty sure you’ll have an idea who is.”

“Wait, how do you know I’m not?”

She looked at me with the tiniest hint of amusement marring her lips. “Come on, Dash. You’re a goalie. ”

“And?”

“What are performance-enhancing drugs going to do for you? You just stand there and squat for the entire game.”

Wow. If Sienna were a guy, I’d have decked her for that comment. “They could do a hell of a lot, thank you very much. How about helping the accuracy of my hand-eye coordination or heightening my attention span?”

She smiled, watching me with amusement as I listed out all the ways drugs could help. It wasn’t until a few seconds later that I realized that was her plan all along. She was trying to get me to admit to something I hadn’t done, and I was the stupid sap falling for it.

“Look. I’m not doing drugs. None of my friends are doing drugs either. I don’t have a story for you. I’ve got nothing to talk about.”

“I think Madison Bright might be a little offended by that,” she teased, and when I turned to glare at her, she just smiled and winked. “You know, if you want to keep that relationship hidden, you should probably try to stop your eyebrow from quirking every time her name is mentioned. It’s such an obvious tell.”

I shook my head, shaking my hair forward so it was harder to make out my eyebrows. For the first time, I was happy I had curtains.

“How do you know that?”

“Did you forget she nearly cried when she saw me walking out of your room? I may have followed you guys around for a little bit the next few days. It’s a boring, unimaginative story, but since there seems to be nothing else interesting to write about with the hockey team, I’m considering writing an article about it.”

“You’re not going to write a story about Madison and me.”

She clicked her tongue across her teeth. “So touchy, but don’t worry, Daniel. Don’t worry, I’m not here for your lame story. Sleeping with your best friend’s sister is idle gossip compared to what I found out about Cade.”

My spine straightened, and I moved closer toward her in an act of intimidation. Sienna moved back, but she didn’t stop looking at me with a challenging glare. If she thought she could ruin Cade’s college career, she was mistaken.

“What do you know about Cade? ”

Her smile grew, and she stood a little bit taller because for the first time in this conversation, she seemed to have the upper hand. “Does the name Savannah Barnett mean anything to you?”

Savannah Barnett? I racked my brain, trying to think of anywhere I’d heard it, but I was drawing a blank. I didn’t want her to know that, though, so I played along. “What about Savannah Barnett?”

She grinned at my answer. “You don’t know, do you?”

“Hard to know what I don’t know when you’re talking to me in riddles.”

“Adley Barnett?”

I pursed my lips together because this was getting harder to lie about.

She shook her head, laughing. “Nope. You don’t know.” Her chin tipped up. “That means this story will break the internet when I publish it.”

Standing dumbfounded, I was trying to figure out if Cade had mentioned this Savannah girl before, but I couldn’t remember. I also couldn’t remember the last time I spoke to him without it involving Madison.

Sienna tapped me on the shoulder and smiled. “That’s all I needed to know,” she hummed out.

Turning on her heel, she was about to skip away from me, but I gripped her arm, stopping her. “You’re going to tell me everything you know right now.”

Glaring at my hand, Sienna’s smile dropped as she looked up at me in anger. “Or what?”

“Dash. Reporter Girl.” Cade drawled out her nickname seductively, but he was staring at me with a smirk on his face as he wiggled his eyebrows. His eyes were bloodshot now, and that keg had clearly gone to his head because he couldn’t walk straight. Well, that wasn’t exactly helping Cade’s reputation.

I took a subtle glance at her. With her brows furrowed, she looked genuinely concerned, which was odd for her. She was usually a pit bull but maybe she was softening toward us. No. That wasn’t it. She hated me, so maybe the softness was only toward Cade because of the things she found out.

She reached out her hand, holding on to Cade’s bicep. “I think you might need to sit down.”

Cade blew out his breath and laughed. “Will you sit on my lap if I do? Oh, wait, sorry. I know you’re Dash’s girl. I would never steal a girl from my main man,” he said with pride, and that guilt I was feeling earlier came straight back to the pit of my stomach. I was a dick. I already knew that, but this was making me feel worse.

Taking a step in front of Sienna because I didn’t want him doing anything he might regret, I forced him to focus on me. “C, is everything okay?”

With hazy eyes and a drunken smile, he said, “I’m fine, D. Why wouldn’t I be?”

“I know you like to drink, but I think you’ve gone a little too far tonight.” I could tell he didn’t like the challenge in my voice. His blue eyes said as much as they stared into mine. Even drunk, the guy was a force that you didn’t want to mess with.

“Hey, Reporter Girl,” he said, staring at me. “Did you know the last time you were in Dash’s room, you were so loud that you woke up the team cat?”

“Team cat? We don’t have a team cat.”

Cade cackled and pointed at me. “Ha, but you didn’t deny it was Reporter Girl in there with you, did you? You’re too easy to fool.” He pushed past me so he was directly in front of Sienna. “Will you just admit you’re dating Dash because you’re looking for a story?”

“I’m not.”

Cade didn’t let her finish talking. “Because he already told me you were a mistake the first time you left his dorm, and you’ve been fucking up his game ever since you walked in here in those platform heels.” Sienna’s eyes grew wide in surprise. “You might think he’s the easiest one of us to crack because he doesn’t let many people in, but he’s not. You’ve been dating him for a few weeks now, which makes me think he cares about you, and I don’t want to have to deal with a broken-hearted Dash. Last time, he broke a guy’s nose and got suspended, and I don’t want that for my big, burly best friend.”

He was talking garbage, and as I looked at Sienna with unease from over Cade’s shoulder, he wrapped his arm around my neck, pulling me close enough to kiss me on the cheek. “I love this guy. He deserves the best, and if that’s not you, then you can get the hell out.”

It was official. I was going to hell for everything I put my best friend through.

“Don’t worry, I have no intention of hurting Dash. You’re right, he’s a pretty good, upstanding guy. I wouldn’t want to break his heart,” she said with a smile as we both tried to calm my overly affectionate drunk friend, who swooped his other arm over Sienna’s shoulder. “He’s a good guy.”

“A good guy who deserves to get his dick sucked!” Cade yelled, and I pushed him off me.

“Cade!”

He opened his arms wide and cackled. “What? I’m just saying what we’re all thinking. Maybe it would help you loosen up.”

Okay, this wasn’t working, there were two things I needed to do. Get Cade in his bed, and make sure that whatever story Sienna had on him stayed out of print. Looking over at Scotty, I motioned for him to come over.

“Can you take care of Cade until I’m back?” He looked between Sienna and me. “It won’t take long.”

“Okay,” he said and made his way over to our teammate. I didn’t waste time watching them, I was too intent on making sure Cade’s private life remained private.

Sienna yelped when I grabbed her arm and started dragging her to my room. “Hey! Get off me. What are you doing?” When I didn’t answer, she kept talking. “Where are you taking me?”

“Somewhere we can talk,” I gritted out.