The Moment We Began (A Fairhope New Adult Romance) Read online

  “I’m okay,” I say. “I’m sorry I didn’t call you sooner, but life has been a little crazy over here.”

  “I’ve been so worried about you,” she says. “Preston texted me to say you weren’t seriously hurt, but I can’t even imagine what you’ve been going through.”

  “Is Knox okay?” I ask. “I never wanted to get him into any kind of trouble.”

  Leigh Anne chuckles. “Trust me, Knox has been in worse situations than this. He can handle himself. Don’t worry about us, I just want to make sure you’re okay. Preston said something about some cuts and scrapes?”

  “Just a few minor things,” I say. “Listen, I really need to see you. I hate to ask for a favor at a time like this, but I need your help with something important. Can you come over? I’m currently without car privileges.”

  “I figured your parents were planning to lock you away for awhile,” she says. “What is it with our parents still treating us like we’re kids?”

  “This is what happens when you still rely on them for everything instead of moving out and getting a job,” I say. “You seemed to figure that out before I did.”

  “Barely,” she says. “When do you want me?”

  “As soon as you can get here.” I look around my bedroom, a plan formulating in my brain.

  “You sure everything’s okay?”

  “It’s going to be,” I say. “I’ll see you soon?”

  “I’m practically on my way.”

  I hang up, then go into the bedroom and search my closet for a small bag. The only thing I can find that isn’t crazy huge or way too small is my Fairhope High cheerleading bag. I dump my old pompoms and sneakers on the floor and start filling it with anything I think I can sell fast. I search my room for cash, jewelry, expensive clothes, whatever will fit. It’s a lot, but I’m scared it isn’t going to be enough. Five grand is a lot of money to come up with overnight.

  This is my only hope, though. It’s either this or go back on my word to the family. And right now, their little baby feels like the most important thing in the world. Like maybe if I can help him, I can erase the guilt of the danger I put my own baby in. I know that’s not how the world works, but my heart is clinging to it.

  I’m on my way out the door to wait for Leigh Anne when a plastic bag on my counter catches my eye.

  It’s my bag of personal effects from the hospital. I pick it up and the diamond bracelet inside sparkles like it’s lit up from within. I rub the back of my neck. It’s so wrong, I don’t even want to think about it. Haven’t I made enough bad decisions lately?

  The phone rings. It’s probably Leigh Anne telling me she’s outside, but I can’t take my eye off that bracelet.

  I bite my lip, then shake my head. I turn toward the door, but as soon as I get my hand on the doorknob, I turn back.

  I quickly grab the bracelet and shove it deep inside my bag, then run out to meet Leigh Anne.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  I’m dying to talk to Leigh Anne about Mason. I want to know if she’s heard from him or seen him around town since the accident.

  I’m tempted to ask her if she’ll drive me by his house so I can hold his front porch hostage until he agrees to talk to me.

  But I’m still not a hundred percent certain what I’m going to say to him. I know eventually I’m going to have to tell him I’m pregnant, but I’m too scared right now to even think about that.

  A car buzzes at the gate, but when I look out, it’s not Leigh Anne. I don’t even recognize the car that’s out there. I squint at the security cam, but I’m not sure who is inside. The car’s an old Toyota that looks like it has seen better days. Definitely not something any of my friends drive.

  My cell rings again and I fish it out of my bag, expecting it to be Leigh Anne.

  But it’s Jenna.

  I’m confused. “Hey, what’s up?”

  “I’m apparently sitting outside Fort Knox here and your security dude won’t let me inside,” she says. “Can you see me?”

  I look back to the security cam. Jenna leans half her body out the window and sticks her tongue out at the camera.

  I laugh. “Hold on a sec.”

  I hit the intercom button on the security panel. “Jason, can you let Jenna in, please? She’s a friend.”

  “Yes, Ma’am.”

  “Thank you.”

  The gate starts to open and I walk toward the front door. My mom’s voice stops me.

  “Penny? Where are you going, sweetheart?” she asks, her voice tense. She’s staring at the bag in my hand like it’s a bomb.

  “I’m going to go hang out with some friends for a little bit,” I say. “Don’t worry. No parties or anything.”

  She walks over and taps on the monitor. “I don’t recognize that girl,” she says. She crosses her arms in front of her body.

  I’m annoyed at the accusatory tone, but at the same time, I brought this on myself. And I have a stolen bracelet in my bag and am about to break some major rules. So, yeah, I’m not exactly blameless here or beyond suspicion.

  “She’s a good friend of Leigh Anne’s,” I explain. “Her name is Jenna and she goes to FCU. She waits tables at Brantley’s.”

  “How come you girls don’t just spend some time here? You could use the pool or the game room,” she says. “I could have Maggie cook something nice for dinner if you want.”

  “No thanks,” I say. “I’m going to go hang out at Leigh Anne’s apartment for a while. It’s in the same complex as Preston’s. We’re just going straight there.”

  She sighs. “Okay, but please call if you need anything. And no drinking, please.”

  “I promise.” That’s an easy one. “No more drinking.”

  The muscles in her cheeks relax, but she doesn’t walk away. She just stands there, staring at me.

  “I’ll be home later.” I give her a weak smile, then bolt out the door.

  Jenna’s car is idling just beyond the front steps. She gets out and lifts up on her tip-toes, giant purple sunglasses shielding her eyes from the sun. “I hope you don’t mind that it’s me,” she says. “Leigh Anne got a call from her attorney’s office that they needed her for a conference call in half an hour. She called me and asked if I’d take over.”

  I frown and pull the shoulder strap over my body. I clutch the bag. Can I trust Jenna to help me and not blab about it? I barely know her. And I’m not entirely sure she even likes me very much.

  She pounds the top of the car. “I know it’s not your usually fancy ride, but she’s my baby,” she says. “She got me here all the way from California.”

  “I thought Leigh Anne said you were from Macon,” I say, walking the rest of the way down the front steps of the house.

  She shrugs. “Nah. I went to school in Macon for a year, then transferred here to FCU,” she says. “But I grew up in California.”

  “I don’t mind the car,” I say, realizing she thought I was frowning about her car not being nice enough. “It’s just that I…”

  I glance back toward the front door to make sure Mom isn’t sneakily standing right behind me listening to every word I’m saying.

  “I have something I need to do that’s very…secret. No one can find out about this, okay? Can I trust you?”

  As I say it, I know it’s a dumb question to ask someone directly. People who aren’t trustworthy are still probably going to say yes. Who’s really going to admit that no, they can’t be trusted? Not many people, that’s for sure.

  And most people really can’t be trusted.

  “There’s only one way to find out,” she says. She pounds the top of the car again, then laughs and disappears inside.

  I blink and stand there for a second, a little stunned. Was that a yes? Or a maybe?

  I get in and she turns the radio up.

  “Where to, little lady?”

  I bite my lip. “I’m honestly not sure,” I say. “Can you just start driving? We’ll figure it out on the way.”

  �
�Sure,” she says.

  She rolls the car around the looped driveway, then out the front gate and into the street.

  She throws a quick glance toward my bag. “What you got?”

  I pull the bag tighter against my body. “This is part of the whole trust thing,” I say. “I don’t want anyone to find out what I’m doing or why I’m doing it.”

  “In this town, you realize that’s like saying you don’t want anyone to know your family has money, right?” She laughs.

  “This is important,” I say. “I know people talk, but I was hoping we could find a place where people could be persuaded to keep their mouths shut.”

  Jenna puts on her turn signal and swings her car into the parking lot of McDonalds.

  “Listen,” she says, turning all the way toward me in her bucket seat, “I know we haven’t spent a ton of time hanging out, but I know what you’re going through. Whatever you need to do, I’m here for you. Pinky swear. You can tell me and I promise I’ll take it to my grave if you ask me to.”

  I look down at the bag in my lap. I have no idea if I can really trust her, but right now, she’s my best hope of getting this money on time.

  I take a deep breath, then tell her about the baby in the hospital and how my parents cut me off.

  When I finish my explanation, her eyes are a little shiny and she’s staring at me like I’m some kind of alien.

  “What?”

  She raises her eyebrows and holds her hands up. “I had all these scenarios running around in my head. Like maybe you were wanting to run away because your parents beat you when they found out about the wreck or that you had to take this bag full of unmarked bills to some cop as payment for letting you off the hook. I thought this was going to be some shady shit,” she says. “I’m not gonna lie. The fact that you’re selling stuff to pay for a baby’s surgery is probably one of the biggest damn surprises of my life.”

  I lean my head back against the headrest. “You don’t think much of me, do you?” I ask. “How come you never came to any of my parties?”

  “I try to stay away from people who have a lot of money,” she says. “In my experience, they end up being egotistical assholes who only care about themselves and will step on whoever they have to to get what they want. But since I met Leigh Anne, I’ve been in constant amazement about how strong and selfless some of the women in this town can be. Even the richest ones. It’s truly eye-opening, because I never met anyone like the two of you in my life.”

  I study her. She’s not afraid to say whatever she’s thinking, and I’m not used to that. Most people would have lied and said they like me and that I was being silly for thinking otherwise. Jenna didn’t even hesitate to tell me the truth.

  “So what would you have done if this really was full of unmarked bills or whatever?”

  “I would have driven you where you needed to go, and I would have kept my thoughts to myself,” she says. She pulls her sunglasses down over her eyes and turns forward. “Or I would have grabbed the bag, kicked your ass out of the car, and run like hell.”

  I laugh as she pulls out of the parking lot and heads south on Main Street.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Jenna turns onto the highway and starts heading out of Fairhope.

  I turn and look back at the road. “Where are you taking us?”

  “I thought you said you wanted to be discreet. That’s not happening if Fairhope. Look, if you want to sell your stuff for cash as fast as you can, the best way to do that is at a pawn shop,” she says. “You can either pawn it or sell it.”

  “What does pawning it do?”

  She looks over at me, tilting her chin down so I can see her eyes over the top of her sunglasses. “You don’t know how pawn shops work?”

  I shrug, feeling stupid. “I’ve watched Pawn Stars before, but usually people just want to sell their stuff. What happens when they pawn it?”

  “Pawning is more of a cash advance kind of thing,” she says. “Or a very high-interest loan with your stuff as collateral. Instead of actually selling the item, you’ll make a contract with them where they give you cash to borrow for the month and at the end of the month, you either pay them back with interest and get your stuff back or you pay just the interest and have to come back again next month. If you don’t pay, you lose the item you pawned and they can now sell it in the store.”

  “What kind of interest are we talking here?”

  “It depends,” she says. “Most places, it ends up being something like fifteen to twenty percent after all the interest and fees.”

  My jaw practically hits the floor. “That can’t be right. That’s highway robbery,” I say, shaking my head. “There’s no way they’re charging twenty percent interest on a loan for one month.”

  She raises and eyebrow. “Yeah, it’s crazy, but it’s true,” she says. She eyes my bag. “Are you wanting to permanently part with the stuff in that bag? Or pawn it?”

  “It depends on how much I can get for everything,” I say. “I’m willing to sell some of the jewelry and the clothes and stuff, but there are a few items I really can’t afford to sell.”

  “I’m going to take you to a really good place in Savannah,” she says. “The guy that owns it is a real character, but he’s fair and he’ll help you keep this under the table.”

  I pull the bag closer to my chest. I’m stepping way out of my comfort zone, here. “How do you know all this stuff?”

  She smiles. “We don’t all have parents who can help us out or pay tuition,” she says. “And working at a restaurant means you never really know how much you’re going to make every night. Sometimes I come up short on the rent.”

  I feel like an idiot. It never occurred to me Jenna might be struggling with money. “I guess I just assumed your parents paid for your apartment or something,” I say. “Most people I know—”

  “Most people you know live on a completely different plane of existence than us mere mortals,” she says. “It’s no big deal, really. I get by just fine on my own, and I don’t have to worry about anyone telling me what to do or yelling at me when I fuck up.”

  “Must be nice,” I mumble.

  “It is,” she says. “But if I had access to things like tennis courts and private pools and a yacht, I doubt I ever would have moved out either.”

  “It’s a blessing and a curse,” I say. “My parents protect me from a lot of things and make sure I have whatever I need or want. But they also shelter me and do their best to control me. I hate to complain about it, because I know how lucky I am to have them. At the same time, though, they’ve always put so much pressure on Preston and me.”

  “Your life is your own, though, you know? You can make excuses all you want, but in the end, you’re the one who decides the path your life takes,” she says. “If you want to be more independent, then do it. What’s stopping you? Look at Leigh Anne. Her mom’s probably one of the meanest people I’ve ever known in my life. She did everything she could to control Leigh Anne, and it worked for years. But as soon as she decided to get a job, get her own apartment, start thinking about what she really wanted out of life, she kind of broke free from all that. Her mom still says mean things sometimes, but now Leigh Anne just doesn’t put up with it.”

  “I wish I could be more like that,” I say. “My mother isn’t mean. My parents are great, really. They just want the best for us and have these set ideas about what that means.”

  I think about the baby growing inside me. This is seriously going to rock my parents’ plans for my future.

  “Just because they want it, though, doesn’t mean you have to do it,” she says. “It’s your life, not theirs.”

  I stare forward as we cross into downtown Savannah. Jenna makes it sound so easy. Like all I have to do is move out, get a job and start living the life I want and I’ll be happy. But I know it’s a lot more complicated than that. I’m afraid I would need a level of strength I just don’t have inside me.

  We sit in silence
as she navigates the streets. She hasn’t taken us to the pretty River Street area of Savannah. The streets here are full of brightly-colored houses with damaged roofs. Gas stations. Liquor stores. Fast food restaurants. I’ve never been to this part of the city.

  She pulls into the parking lot of a dirty strip mall and parks in front of a tiny little shop called Gold-Silver Pawn. It’s the kind of place you might overlook a thousand times. I’m starting to doubt trusting her with this. I don’t have much time and I can’t see how a small, seedy little place like this is going to get me five grand.

  Jenna laughs and I turn to look at her.

  “What’s so funny?” I ask.

  “The look on your face,” she says. “It’s going to be okay. I promise.”

  She snatches the bag from my lap and gets out of the car. I follow her inside where it’s dark and cluttered. Tall silver racks hold junk from floor to ceiling. DVD players, Xbox’s, CD’s, clothes, lamps. Nothing’s really put in any kind of logical order. It’s more just scattered and thrown across the shelves in basic groupings. The path through the racks is narrow and we have to carefully scoot through so we don’t knock anything off.

  There are only two other people in the store that I can see. There’s a black guy with a shaved head sitting on a stool near the front counter. He’s got one foot up and one foot flat against the floor and he’s wearing a black jacket that’s hanging open just enough for me to see he’s got a small gun tucked into the waistband of his jeans.

  He catches me staring and he adjusts his jacket to hide the gun.

  I look away as fast as I can. I have no idea what I’m doing in a place like this.

  Behind the counter is a really short, fat guy who looks like he could be a mobster or something. He’s wearing four or five ridiculously big gold chains and he’s got a Yankee’s baseball cap on that’s turned to the side.

  He smiles at us. “Jenna, baby, how you doin’?”

  “Heya, Rocco,” she says. She jumps up on the counter and reaches across to give him a huge hug. “This is my friend Penny.”

  Rocco lifts his head up once in greeting. “What brings you two in here?”