Beautiful Oblivion Read Free

happen?”
    “Who does that?” I said, turning to see where he went. He’d already disappeared into the crowd.
    “A Maddox boy.”
    I shot the double whiskey and took another drag of my cigarette. Everyone knew Trenton Maddox was bad news, but that never seemed to stop women from trying to tame him. Watching him since grade school, I promised myself that I would never be a notch on his headboard—if the rumors were true and he had notches, but I didn’t plan to find out.
    “You’re going to let him get away with that?” Raegan asked.
    I blew out the smoke from the side of my mouth, annoyed. I wasn’t in the frame of mind to have fun, or deal with obnoxious flirting, or complain that Trenton Maddox had just drunk the shot glass of sugar that I didn’t want. But before I could answer my friend, I had to choke back the whiskey I’d just drunk.
    “Oh, no.”
    “What?” Raegan said, flipping around in her chair. She immediately righted herself in the chair, cringing.
    All three of my brothers and our cousin Colin were walking toward our table.
    Colin, the oldest and the only one with a legit ID, spoke first. “What the hell, Camille? I thought you were out of town tonight.”
    “My plans changed,” I snapped.
    Chase spoke second, as I expected he would. He was the oldest of my brothers, and liked to pretend he was older than me, too. “Dad’s not going to be happy that you missed family lunch if you were in town.”
    “He can’t be unhappy if he doesn’t know,” I said, narrowing my eyes.
    He recoiled. “Why are you being so pissy? Are you on the rag or something?”
    “Really?” Raegan said, lowering her chin and raising her eyebrows. “We’re in public. Grow up.”
    “So he canceled on you?” Clark asked. Unlike the others, Clark looked genuinely concerned.
    Before I could answer, the youngest of the three spoke up. “Wait, that worthless piece of shit canceled on you?” Coby said. The boys were all only eleven months apart, making Coby just eighteen. My coworkers knew my brothers had all scored fake IDs and thought they were doing me a favor by looking the other way, but most of the time I wished they wouldn’t. Coby in particular still acted like a twelve-year-old boy not quite sure what to do with his testosterone. He was bowing up behind the others, letting them hold him back from a fight that didn’t exist.
    “What are you doing, Coby?” I asked. “He’s not even here!”
    “You’re damn right he’s not,” Coby said. He relaxed, cracking his neck. “Canceling on my big sister. I’ll bust his fuckin’ face.” I thought about Coby and T.J. getting into a brawl, and it made my heart race. T.J. was intimidating when he was younger, and lethal as an adult. No one fucked with him, and Coby knew it.
    A disgusted noise came from my throat, and I rolled my eyes. “Just . . . find another table.”
    All four boys pulled chairs around Raegan and me. Colin had light-brown hair, but my brothers were all redheads. Colin and Chase had blue eyes. Clark and Coby had green. Some redheaded men aren’t all that great-looking, but my brothers were tall, chiseled, and outgoing. Clark was the only one with freckles, and they still somehow looked good on him. I was the outcast, the only child with mousy brown hair and big, round, light-blue eyes. More than once the boys tried to convince me that I’d been adopted. If I wasn’t the female version of my father, I might have believed them.
    I touched my forehead to the table and groaned. “I can’t believe it, but this day just got worse.”
    “Aw, c’mon, Camille. You know you love us,” Clark said, nudging me with his shoulder. When I didn’t answer, he leaned in to whisper in my ear. “You sure you’re all right?”
    I kept my head down, but nodded. Clark patted my back a couple of times, and then the table grew quiet.
    I lifted my head. Everyone was staring behind me, so I turned around. Trenton Maddox was standing there, holding two shot