Chapter 15

Sarah

A little over six hours later, they arrived at their hotel in Lake Havasu just off the London Bridge strip. It was already six p.m. there, and Sarah couldn’t help doing the math. That would make it just after three in Hawaii. It was still too early for Angel to be calling or texting. The game likely wasn’t even over. If it was, he still had a least an hour of after-game strategy talk in the locker room.

Before Valerie could notice Sarah checking out her phone, Sarah slipped it back into her purse. Valerie walked out of the bathroom, wearing a snug little white skirt, a denim-colored bikini top, and ridiculously high denim wedges.

“Oh, that’s the cutest outfit,” Monica said.

Valerie looked back at Monica with a smirk. “Thanks, but I was going for hot.”

“Well, hot too.” Monica laughed, grabbing a wine cooler out of the small ice chest they’d brought into the hotel room. “I don’t think any guy out there will argue with that.”

Monica, who was the tallest of the three, pulled out a bright orange bikini from her bag. “I’m wearing this with my black mesh sarong.”

“That’s cute,” Valerie said.

Sarah gulped, thinking about what she’d packed. “Are we going in the water tonight?”

Monica shrugged, looking back at Sarah. “Doesn’t matter. You saw how all the girls are dressed out there. It’s hot.”

Sarah had seen as they’d driven through the strip full of partying college kids. She was already regretting it, but she’d agreed to not be a fuddy-duddy, so she dug through her bag. She was already wearing a short skirt. It was an army green camouflage summer thing. She pulled out the black cropped top she’d shoved into her bag at the last minute and went into the bathroom where she replaced the tank she was wearing. She wouldn’t be showing nearly as much skin as Valerie and most of the other girls out on the strip, but her midriff was exposed now as was the navel ring Angel said drove him nuts, so it was good enough.

After having several more beers and wine coolers in the room, they freshened up their makeup and hair and headed out. It was the oddest feeling to be out there in the crowd of single people all looking to hook up. Sarah had to keep reminding herself she’d agreed to have fun anytime any of the guys smiled at her or made a comment about her eyes. Talking to or maybe even smiling at some of the guys flirtatious remarks didn’t mean she was doing anything wrong. She couldn’t possibly point out to all of them that she was in fact in a relationship—very taken. It’d be silly, so she did her best to partake in the giggling and hair twirling Valerie and Monica did. There were moments that worried her such as when four guys decided to kick it with them for a while and offered to take the photos when they saw Valerie trying to do group selfies of all three girls. Later, one of the guys took photos of the whole group. The three other guys had immediately posed with them, and they looked like three couples. Sarah leaned into Valerie as she looked at the photos over her shoulder. “Please do not post that one anywhere.”

Valerie winked at her, but it still made Sarah nervous. By that time, it was late enough that Angel should’ve called or at least texted her, and he hadn’t done either. It was so unlike him Sarah was beginning to worry. Either something was wrong, or he was afraid to talk to her. Both scenarios made her stomach churn. The former worried her most because deep in her heart she knew the latter just couldn’t be true. She stuck to her secret mental rule of keeping the checking for possible missed calls or texts to half-hour increments, no more than that.

The giant clock on the bridge served a good purpose. She couldn’t use the excuse of needing to check the time to pull her phone out, but it was that time now, so she checked.

Nothing from Angel.

The disappointment was overwhelming, but at the same time, she felt a little spoiled. Valerie went through this all the time with Alex. He’d disappear on her for days, sometimes weeks at a time. Here it hadn’t been even a full day since Sarah had last heard from Angel, and she felt ready to cry. She took a deep breath and shook it off.

There was a text from Leonardo. She almost felt bad that she’d been so concerned about hearing from Angel she hadn’t even given any thought to the fact that Leonardo hadn’t responded to her text earlier. It was sent almost twenty minutes ago.

Where are you?

She responded simply with the word “Havasu” then slipped the phone back in her pocket, making note of the time. That first evening in Havasu went by fairly quickly and trouble-free. The only real unease Sarah felt all night was each time she checked her phone and found no messages from Angel.

They grabbed a pizza and headed back to their room. Valerie thought it’d be better if they took it easy tonight since she was kind of pooped from the long drive and because tomorrow they were going to hit the lake early and be out there all day and night.

Sarah’s heart sputtered when she checked her phone as they walked into their hotel room and saw she had a missed call from Angel and a text. The flurry in her stomach was unreal. It felt almost like when she’d first started going out with him and she saw him or got a call from him. She clicked on the text, and her heart nearly stopped.

I’m SO SORRY. Call me please.

Her expression must’ve shown the horror she felt at seeing those two words in all caps, because Valerie asked her what was wrong. “Is that something from Angel?” she asked then gave her a scolding look. “Or are you checking Facebook?”