Chapter 18

Liam's alarm went off what felt like mere seconds after his head hit the pillow. The horizon glowed with the first faint traces of sunrise, but the cabin was still dark and quiet. Muttering unintelligible curses, he groped for his cell phone on the night stand and silenced the shrill beeping. For a few seconds he struggled in the silence to gather his bearings.

There had been a race the night before in an absurdly upscale neighborhood. When Liam arrived at the designated starting line, he'd almost backed out right there. The classier the surroundings, the higher the stakes and the more likely they all were to get busted by the cops. Of course, the rich kids that frequented those races also brought more money and less talent to the table. Trevor promised he wouldn't find an easier win if he kept racing for the next twelve months. It was the Indy 500 minus the skill. So, Liam had raced and without even squealing a tire, he'd won. The pot was a ridiculous five grand and it pushed his total winnings to nearly four times that.

The winnings.

Suddenly wide awake, Liam's eyes flew open and he stared for a moment at the ceiling. Throwing back the sheets, he padded barefoot and in the dark out of the cabin to the full bar in the lounge. Aside from the bedroom, he'd barely touched anything on the yacht, still feeling like a glorified guest who overstayed his welcome. The bar was pristine – if a bit dusty from lack of use – and fully stocked. Ignoring the cabinets full of top shelf liquor, he opened the bottom door on the lower left. Rummaging through various odds and ends – high tech bottle openers, a leaded crystal punch bowl, and several martini shakers – Liam pulled out a novelty champagne bucket that must have been left over from one of Spence Montgomery's last parties. Designed like an open film canister, it couldn't have held more than a handful of ice and a single bottle, but it was the perfect size to hold nearly twenty thousand dollars in tightly rolled bills.

Liam flipped the switch hidden beneath the bar and the recessed lighting flared to life. Prying off the authentic looking tin lid, he tipped the bucket over and stared in awe at the cash resting benignly within. Mostly hundreds with a few fifties and twenties thrown in for variety, he pulled out a roll and stripped off the rubber band holding it together. Peeling off a hundred dollar bill, he traced Benjamin Franklin's outline almost reverently with the tip of his finger.

The yacht bobbed on the surface of the harbor, but Liam didn't notice, more accustomed than ever to life on the water. Twenty grand was a lot of money, more than he'd ever seen at one time, let alone possessed. More than enough for all sorts of things an almost eighteen-year-old was just starting to consider with graduation looming in a matter of months. Twenty grand could cover rent for a year in an apartment, or even a down payment on a house. Annie would have seen college tuition staring back at her from that champagne bucket. So would his mother.

Liam blew out a deep breath and returned the cash to its hiding place. Colleen had never been shy about her hopes and dreams for him, but Liam had barely humored her. College had never and would never appeal to him. There was a time, not so long ago, when he would have presented his mother with the money and urged her leave Jeffery with him. It could be like it had been in New York, before his mom decided her dignity had a price.

But those days were gone. Liam stripped and jumped in the shower, trying not to take the luxury accommodations for granted. If everything went according to plan, his days on the yacht were numbered. He'd finally decided what to do with the money he was winning; a selfish decision that took him a long time to accept.

Liam was going to buy his freedom and in less than a month when he turned eighteen, nobody would ever be able to take it away from him again.

An hour or so later, Liam paced the worn, wooden planks of the less prestigious end of the marina and waited for the old man to show up. For weeks, every time Liam had looked, he'd been there, working tirelessly on a boat that seemed in no better shape for all the tender loving care. The paint was still chipped, the sails still ragged and torn and the door to the cabin below decks had nearly warped off the hinges. Despite all the cosmetic shortcomings, Liam noticed two very important things. First, the hull appeared as sound as ever and the boat bobbed proudly on the gentle tide. Second, the For Sale sign was still tacked to the helm.

"You know, if I could get my grandson out of bed as early as you like to greet the day, I'd have her fixed up by now," the gravelly voice Liam had only heard once before made him jump. The old man dropped an rickety lobster crate full of cleaning supplies to the dock and removed his cap to wipe the sweat from his brow. The sun had begun its climb over the horizon and already the temperature had jumped several degrees. "A sunrise is a beautiful thing. That kid likes to sleep until nearly sunset most days."

Liam fought a sheepish grin and looked down at his shoes. "Yeah, well if I had my choice, I'd still be asleep."

"Yeah?" The old man stooped to hoist the heavy crate off the ground, but Liam beat him to it and stood unflinching beneath the old man's appraising gaze. "What's on your mind, kid?"

"I want to make you an offer," Liam made his declaration in a rush, uttering aloud for the first time the idea he'd been contemplating since his boat went up in flames. The old man's white eyebrows disappeared beneath the rim of his hat. Liam shifted the crate in his arms and didn't look away.

"I told you, she's not pretty, but I won't give her away," the old man crossed his arms.

"I'm not asking you to," Liam promised. "And I probably can't pay you what you want for her, but I'm guessing you haven't had any other offers."

"I'm listening," The sun crept high enough to dispel the shadows around the pier and Liam caught a glimmer of amusement in the old man's pale green eyes.

"I'll give you twenty grand cash," Liam's heart started to race, just a little, at the possibility of this dream becoming a reality. "And my help fixing her up."

The old man said nothing and rubbed a gnarled hand over his scruffy jaw. He glanced at the boat floating on the calm water and then back at Liam. "You know, I've seen you come and go from that fancy yacht, but that doesn't make you qualified to take care of my baby."

"No, it doesn't," Liam agreed.

"Then why should I say agree to your terms and turn this boat over to you?"

Liam shrugged and tried to keep pride from coloring his words. "Because I built one."

Annie had been staring blankly at the same page of her Calculus textbook for twenty minutes and counting, but she barely noticed. Her mind was elsewhere. Suddenly, Silver snatched the pen out of her hand without a word.

"What the-?" Annie's eyes went wide and she gaped at her friend in surprise. Silver didn't even lift her gaze from the paperback on film history gripped in one hand. They were sharing a working lunch outside in the gorgeous sunshine. Between her internship and Liam, Annie's time for homework had taken a hit and if she didn't pass the midterm in Calc with flying colors, Debbie would be on her case. Somehow, she didn't think her mother would be asking her to cut back on how much time she spent at the Playhouse. Annie gestured to her pen. "If you needed that, you could have asked."

"Oh, I don't," Silver shook her head and tossed the pen back at Annie. It landed on the textbook and rolled toward the spine. "But you've been tapping that thing against the wall for the past ten minutes and I was starting to go insane."

"I was?" Annie glanced down at the pen as if it were some foreign object she'd never seen before.

"Yeah, and have you even done a single equation?" Silver pushed her hair off her forehead and leaned against the pillar. "I thought you said you had to start acing your tests or your mom was going to freak."

With a heavy sigh, Annie closed her text book and propped her elbows on her knees to bury her face in her hands. When she spoke her words were muffled. "I did."

"So, what's got you all distracted?"

Annie peered through her fingers, hesitating. Silver had been her sounding board for all her problems since they'd rekindled their friendship. In those few months Annie had had a lot of problems and she was starting to feel guilty for taking advantage of Silver's always ready shoulder to cry on.

Then again, if she didn't share her concerns with someone, it would just eat away at her until she either did something colossally stupid or…well, really there was only that one outcome. Annie groaned. "It's-."

"Don't say Liam," Silver held up her hands dramatically as if to ward off whatever Annie was about to say and closed her eyes. "I swear, if you say Liam, I will scream."

Annie bit her lip and offered a smile that fell just shy of innocent.

"Oh god, it is about Liam," Silver exclaimed. "What did he do now?"

"Geez, why don't you shriek a little louder," Annie glanced around furtively for curious stares from the gossiping masses. She'd done an admirable job ignoring the West Bev rumor mill, but she still didn't want to add fuel to the dwindling fire that was her relationship with Liam. "I think there are a few people on the other side of campus who didn't hear you."

"What did he do?" Silver asked, carefully annunciating each word, although at a mercifully lower volume. "Or should I ask who? Because if you think he's hooked up with Naomi again, I don't know, there might be some truth to it. Getting tricked into falling on her lips once is believable. This is Naomi we're talking about. But twice? No one is that-."

"Silver, shut up," Annie ordered. "I don't think he's cheating on me."

"Oh," her friend blinked, her interest piqued. "So, what is it then?"

"I'm not sure how to explain it," Annie began. "It's little things. He's tired all the time. And not just 'stayed up too late playing video games tired', I'm talking 'fall asleep at the wheel' exhausted. He's missing phone calls and not returning texts, especially late at night. It's just…not like Liam."

"How long has this been going on?"

"Since we got back together," she admitted.

Silver pondered the information and toyed with the bright green glass pendant hanging from a black chord around her neck. It was the exact same shade as her silky halter top. "He had a lot of extra credit and homework to make up after skipping all that school, didn't he? Maybe it's just that. School kicks all of our asses once in awhile. Even Liam."

"Yeah, that's what he says, and that's what I figured…until the other night," Annie sighed. Her curiosity about the money she'd discovered, tucked away in the pocket of his jeans, had evolved into queasy anxiety. Wherever it had come from, whatever it was for, she couldn't see how it could be good. Swallowing the lump in her throat, she filled Silver in on the discovery. "Fifteen hundred dollars, Silver. He doesn't have a job. I asked him. Where would he get that kind of money?"

"From his mom?"

"I'm pretty sure right now Liam wouldn't ask Colleen to spit on him if he were on fire," Sharing the burden of her worries with Silver had made Annie feel slightly better…and slightly worse. Just like anything else, saying it aloud made it real. Uncrossing her legs, she stretched them out along the sun warmed ledge and closed her eyes. "I hate this. I wish I'd never found the stupid money. I don't know what to do."

"I suppose just asking Liam about it is out of the question," Silver raised a brow. Annie opened one eye and gave her friend a look that quickly put that notion to rest. "Guess not. I suppose it would be kind of awkward to explain. Hey, Honey. While you were in the shower I was snooping through your clothes and found your secret stash of ill gotten cash. Mind telling me where you got it? Cause it's so totally my business."

"I wasn't snooping. It was an accident," Annie protested, albeit weakly. She found the money by chance, sure, but she could have just put it back where it came from. Instead, she studied it, counted it and guiltily hid it before Liam could see. "I just…I don't want to rock the boat, you know? It feels like we just got back together and I don't want to jeopardize that. Plus, I'm his girlfriend, not his mother. He doesn't need to tell me everything."

"It sounds like you've already made up your mind."

Annie retrieved her pen from the spine of her textbook and twirled it between her fingers. The urge to start tapping restlessly again was overwhelming and she had to make a conscious effort to resist. "Liam and money is a touchy subject. Anything that threatens his independence…I'm just worried about him."

Silver had nothing to say to that and as the silence grew, Annie tried to focus on her textbook. Calculus didn't care about her troubles or what happened to Liam. The figures and formulas blurred as her eyes started to water. Liam was brave, fearless to the point of recklessness and as he'd so clearly demonstrated over and over while she'd known him, prone to getting himself in trouble. She just wanted, no she needed him to be okay.

"Enough of this," Silver announced, closing her book on film history with a definitive snap and doing the same to Annie's thicker, heavier textbook. "This is obviously killing you, so…we need to do something."

"Like what? I thought we pretty much decided there was nothing to do."

"Figure out what Liam's doing without him knowing," Silver replied, making it sound simple. "Look, if it's important enough, he'll come clean eventually. If it's just lame or embarrassing or something, you can at least stop agonizing over it, right?"

"That sounds great, but…how do we do that?"

Silver grinned. "Oh, don't worry. I have a plan."

Curled up against Liam's side in the front seat of the Judge, Annie was blissfully unaware of the rest of the world. They were parked in front of the Playhouse and what had been meant as a goodbye kiss as Liam dropped her off, had turned into a full on make out session that Annie couldn't quite seem to break away from.

Liam's right arm was draped over the back seat, the other wrapped tightly around Annie's waist, pulling her so close she was nearly on his lap. If not for the steering wheel getting in the way, she happily would have crawled closer. He was kissing her slowly and thoroughly, so deep she could feel it in her toes and even if she'd had ideas to the contrary there was nothing to do but kiss him back.

"This happens every time you give me a ride," she murmured during a much needed break for air.

"What happens?" he asked, but brought his lips crashing down on hers again before she had a chance to speak. Her fingers fisted the fabric of his white t-shirt.

"This," she said, her lips still brushing his. "You distract me and make me late."

"No one's stopping you," he pointed out, but she could feel his smile as she got lost in him again. The way Liam drove, they always arrived at the theater in plenty of time for Annie to check in, but somehow she usually found herself making excuses for tardiness. As a result there had been more 'traffic accidents' between West Beverly and the Playhouse in the past two months than any other time in history.

"Mmm, okay, enough. I've got to go," Annie laughed and managed to fend off his good natured protests. She scooted back to the passenger side of the car, as much to put some distance between them as to have room to straighten out her clothes. A flash of silver in the side mirror caught her eye and her stomach flipped. Clearing her throat to hide her sudden nerves, she asked innocently. "So what are doing tonight to keep from missing me?"

Liam smirked. "The usual. Surf practice and then finish some of my missing assignments so Mr. Matthews will get off my back."

Annie grabbed her backpack and froze. Liam was lying to her, and while she was doing the same to him, in a way, it still threw her. The surf team didn't have practice that night, Dixon had said as much before school when they'd been going through the usual routine of figuring out the car situation. Vaguely sick to her stomach, Annie hefted the bag to her lap and forced a smile. "Mr. Matthews is such a jerk, being concerned about your education. Who does he think he is? A teacher?"

Liam rolled his eyes and said goodbye as she climbed out of the car. At the other end of the parking lot, Annie could see the glint of a silver bumper. The Plan, Silver's plan, was in motion. After a few days discussing the best way to discover what Liam was up to when he wasn't with Annie or in school, they'd decided that today was the day. As an afterthought, a last ditch effort to avoid the many ways it could go wrong and to give Liam a chance to come clean, she turned back and leaned down to peer through the open window. "Have you, um, gotten any further finding a job?"

A shadow passed across Liam's face, but it could have just been a shift in the clouds over the sun. He regarded her for a moment, before putting one hand on the wheel and staring through the front window. "Nah. Not yet."

"That's cool," Annie shrugged, overly nonchalant. "I was just curious. I'll see you later."

The way he looked back at her and offered another quick grin before backing out of the parking spot and driving away melted some of the tension locked within her chest. She watched him approach the exit, the huge, orange beast of a car easy to spot, even in rush hour traffic, and shifted nervously from one foot to the other.

Just as Liam pulled out of the lot, taking a right into the flow of cars, Silver pulled up beside her, behind the wheel of Annie's silver Saturn. Annie didn't waste words, quickly opening the passenger door and slipping inside. "Hurry, don't lose him."

"Don't worry," Silver assured her, expertly maneuvering the vehicle out of the Playhouse's parking lot and onto the street. "Liam may be the badass driver, but I've lived here all my life. I know these roads."

"You've got to be kidding me," Dixon piped up from the backseat and Annie turned to find her brother looking at her completely aghast. "You're actually tailing Liam? What are you now, Thelma and Louise?"

"What are you even doing here?" Annie demanded. "I thought Ivy was giving you a ride."

"She is busy, and she is not a taxi," her brother replied and Annie suspected the taxi bit wasn't his own.

"Well, neither am I," Silver declared, weaving around and ahead of several cars in order to follow Liam onto the freeway. "So, sit back and shut up because this car doesn't make pit stops. Louise is behind the wheel."

"How come you're Louise?" Annie laughed despite the tight knot of dread and anticipation sitting like a rock in her stomach.

"Because I'm totally Susan Sarandon," Silver winked. "Thelma was the sweet, pretty one anyway. Hey, Dixon can I borrow your phone?"

"What's wrong with yours?" Dixon grumbled, but handed the phone over anyway. Silver took the small device and tucked it into the side pocket in the door.

"Nothing," She addressed his reflection in the rearview mirror. "I just don't want you to text Liam and warn him."

Dixon groaned and slouched in the back seat. Annie looked at her best friend in awe. "Have you done this before or something?"

Silver grinned in response and focused on the road. Even before the marina came into view, Annie recognized the route. A twinge of indignation flared in her heart, although the surf practice Liam had claimed he was going never existed. Any guilt or hesitation dissolved. Whatever Liam was up to, she'd find out tonight.