Beautiful Sky
Authors: Ashley Blake
The new generation of Hunter is here! Meet Jonathan Hunter, only son of billionaire CEO Joshua Hunter from the best-selling The Billionaire's Desire series!
There’s this thing called chemistry, which can’t be explained, it’s either there or it’s not and it can’t be denied. For Skylar Miller chemistry was the one thing she didn’t consider when she hatched her perfect plan for her freshman year of college: study hard, make new friends and stay away from boys. Still healing from an unforgivable betrayal, the last thing she needed was to see the gorgeous lead singer of Sonic Blaze belting out lyrics to her from that stage. He was tall, dark and sexy; everything she should run from, but didn’t want to.
Her world is turned upside down the night of her dorm meeting when she looks up to see the lead singer of the band introducing himself to the room as their Resident Advisor. College senior, Jonathan Hunter, is even more gorgeous than she remembered and he seems to have eyes only for her. When she finds out he is the son of Joshua Hunter, Billionaire CEO of Hunter International, all of her insecurities rise to the surface. Can a girl from meager means really fit in with such a wealthy family like his? And has Skylar misjudged Jonathan? Torn between his love of music and family business obligations, Jonathan turns to Skylar for comfort. But is she the only one he is turning to?
Beautiful Sky
Amazing Love Series #1
by
Ashley Blake
A Billionaire Rock Star New Adult Romance
Copyright, 2013 by Ashley Blake.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. This is a work of fiction. All names, characters, locations, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination, or have been used fictionally. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, locales, or events is entirely coincidental. No portion of this work may be transmitted or reproduced in any form, or by any means, without permission in writing from the author.
Table of Contents
Introduction
You know how some days are so bad that you wish you could just home go and start over? Yeah, that was the kind of day I was having. I overslept because my alarm didn’t go off, and when I got out of bed that morning, my foot landed right on my brand new cell phone and I cracked the glass and I was pissed! I had been talking to my boyfriend Seth late the night before, and I was too exhausted to charge my phone so I just dropped it on the rug next to my bed. Not the smartest thing to do. I was addicted to my phone so I planned to call and have it fixed later that day.
As I got ready for the school day, I tried not to think about my phone and focused instead on buying my graduation dress after school. Graduation was two weeks away and I couldn’t wait to be done with high school. I had been saving up for months and I’d found the perfect dress at the store where my friend Carrie worked. I had basically been stalking the store, waiting for it to go on sale, and Carrie called me the day before to let me know that it had been marked down to final sale and she put it on hold for me. I shifted my focus to my new dress instead of my broken phone, and I couldn’t wait until school was over that day so I could go buy it.
As I rushed down to our kitchen, I had just enough time to shove down a bagel and slam my orange juice. As I poured the juice, it splashed all over me and I had to go change my clothes, which made me miss the bus which also made me late for school. As I rushed into my first period calculus class, my teacher, who I think never really liked me, handed me the pop quiz that everyone was taking.
Really? There’s only two weeks of school left and you’re springing a quiz on us?
Great.
I sat down and somehow was able to focus enough to complete the test, hoping that would pass.
The rest of my day kind of fell in line with how it started: Seth was busy helping the graduation committee so I barely got to see him, my best friend Bethany ditched school that day (again), and as I was leaving school I felt waves of cramps and knew that my period was about to start…one week early. It had always been irregular so my mom and doctor wanted to put me on the pill to help regulate it but I had resisted that idea, until that very moment. I decided I was going to call my doctor the next day to get a prescription. I rushed into the bathroom just in time, took care of it, and breathed a huge sigh of relief as I walked out of the doors of my school so happy that my school day was over. I rode the bus to Michigan Avenue finally feeling relaxed for the first time that day, so excited about my dress. It was there waiting for me, just as gorgeous as ever, and I finally felt like my day was turning around.
It was unseasonably hot for the beginning of June in Chicago, and I could feel beads of sweat gathering on my upper lip, the hot wind whipping through my long brown waves, as I made my way over to Bethany’s house. We went to each other’s houses almost every day after school. She lived two blocks from me and I wanted to give her a hard time for ditching again and show her my new dress. Bethany was not the most responsible person, but always made me laugh and feel better, so when I bounded into her parent’s house after the cleaning lady let me in, I was looking forward to whining about my day to her. I walked up the stairs to her room and knocked on her door calling her name and opened it, as I usually did.
“Bethany, I bought my dress! Seth is going to
love
it! I can’t wait for you to see…”
It took a minute for my brain to register what was going on. Sheets were being quickly shuffled and I saw panicked looks on two faces, the two most important faces in my life, aside from my family.
This is not happening right now.
I dropped the bag that was holding my dress as I watched my best friend of 12 years and my boyfriend of four years scrambling to put their clothes on.
“What the hell is this?!” My voice boomed louder than I ever knew was possible as I looked at two very guilty people.
Seth spoke first. “Skylar, this is not what it looks like, I swear! We were just hanging out, that’s it! Nothing happened!”
I turned steely eyes toward Bethany who would not look at me. I felt like I had been punched in the stomach as I watched the two of them standing there half naked.
“Are you both
kidding
me right now? I just saw you! I can’t believe you two! Screwing? Behind my back?
What?!
You can’t find your own guy so you have to go and steal mine Bethany? You’re such a slut! You know what? I finally figured out why you’ve never had a boyfriend. Guys don’t want to be seen with you in public, they only want to use you for sex! You have to
slither
around and open your legs for any and
every
guy out there to get any kind of attention from them, huh? You’re nothing but a skanky, tramp piece of trash! And you Seth, you make me sick! How stupid do you think I am? You were just hanging out? I’m sure that included her sucking you off, and I hear from all the guys at school that she’s pretty good at it! How long has this been going on between you two? How long!”
It felt like fire was flying out of my eyes and I was shaking as I tried to control my rage. “Bethany, you better answer me
right
now!”
She raised blood shot, tear stained eyes to me and her tears only pissed me off more. “Six months. I’m so sorry Sky, I didn’t mean to do this to you!” She started balling uncontrollably and I felt totally numb, I couldn’t believe that this was happening. I cut my eyes toward Seth.
“How could
you
do this to me? You told me you loved me and I believed you! How could I be so
stupid
? Everything changed after I finally had sex with you this year. You were just waiting to get into my pants, weren’t you, and then as soon as you did, you throw everything we had away, like I meant nothing to you?”
“Sky, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to hurt you. I do love you! I meant it when I told you that I loved you, this didn’t mean anything. I don’t know why I do some of the stupid things I do.”
Bethany shot him a cold glare and I actually got a little bit of pleasure from that.
“Did you hear that Bethany? You don’t mean anything to him and I guess you must be one of the stupid things he’s talking about.”
They both looked pathetic, guilty and
caught
,
and I didn’t want to be around either of them anymore. I went over to Bethany and pointed my finger right in her face, my eyes narrowed and cold. “
You
are a fucking bitch.”
I stood back and glared at them, my eyes shooting daggers at both of them. My voice was even and deadpan as I spoke.
“When I leave this room I do not ever want to hear from either of you again and I mean it. You are both dead to me.”
I grabbed my bag, turned and walked out and slammed her door behind me. Seth came after me but I kept walking right out of Bethany’s parent’s house and he followed me into the street, grabbed my arm and spun me around. I snatched my arm out of his grasp and my face was mottled in rage.
“Do
not
touch me!”
“Please don’t leave like this Sky! Can’t we talk about this?”
I stood looking at him, my eyes cold and blank. His eyes were begging and I could tell that he knew he had lost me. “No!
Goodbye
, Seth.”
I turned to walk home and he didn’t follow me this time. I made it inside my house before the tears streamed uncontrollably down my face. I collapsed to the floor in a heap of sobs and my mom ran from the kitchen to see what was wrong. She helped me up to the couch and held me in her arms as I told her what Bethany and Seth had done to me. We talked for a while and she told me that I would feel better the next day after a good night of sleep. She also told me that if I didn’t want to talk to them anymore I didn’t have to.
“That chapter of your life is over Skylar and it might not feel like it now, but you have big, big things ahead in your life. One day this will be nothing but a distant memory. You’ll meet better friends, friends who won’t betray you, and you’ll meet a wonderful guy one day. I know it hurts now honey, but trust me it
will
get better. I’m so sorry that this happened to you, I know how much you love both of them.”
“It’s not fair mom! Seth betrayed me with my best friend! How pathetic and cliché is that? Why did he do this to me? How could Bethany do this to me?” I was wailing as my mom gently rocked me back and forth.
“It will be okay honey, I promise.”
Later, as I lay in my bed, I was so happy that my horrible day was coming to an end. I thought about all the stuff I had done with Bethany over the years; all of the sleepovers, sharing secrets, talking about first kisses, and I wondered if she ever really liked me, because if she did, she wouldn’t have done this to me. Maybe she was jealous of me and maybe she had secretly always liked Seth.
I don’t know.
Oh, and Seth, what a liar. He was the only boy I had been with and we slept together for the first time on my 18
th
birthday a couple of months before. I felt sick to my stomach as I realized that he had slept with Bethany before he slept with me. I thought that night was perfect and so special at the time. He told me that he loved me, that he would never hurt me and that he wanted us to get married after college. It made me feel like he really did love me and I believed him and trusted him. We had all just recently had an incredible night together at prom the weekend before, Bethany went with a guy she told me she had a major crush on. I never in a million years would have guessed that my boyfriend and my best friend were hooking up behind my back. Maybe there were signs all along and I missed them because I thought I was so happy and in love.
My eyelids became very heavy as I tried to push thoughts of what had happened out of my mind. I drifted off to sleep wishing that graduation was the next day instead of a couple of weeks away. I would have to avoid Bethany and Seth at school because I didn’t want to see them and I didn’t want the whole school whispering about us. There was absolutely nothing either one of them could say to me to make things better.
***
We graduated a couple of weeks later and in those weeks, both Seth and Bethany called me and texted me non-stop. I defriended both of them on Facebook and didn’t return any of their messages. I meant it when I told them they were dead to me. I spent the summer with my other good friends, stayed as busy as possible and I was really looking forward to the next chapter of my life. It took a couple of months for the pain to subside, but it wasn’t totally gone.
Every now and then I felt sad about what Bethany and Seth did to me, and sad about the relationships that were ruined, but I kept reminding myself that I was better off without them. No one needed friends like that. My friends told me that Bethany and Seth had not seen or talked to each other since the day I caught them, and in a weird way I found that sad. They ruined our relationships for nothing. I didn’t see Bethany or Seth the entire summer and I was okay with that. I ended the summer on a good note, spending the last weekend with a bunch of my friends and it felt really good to have people I trusted around me. I had no desire to date any guys even though a few asked me out over the summer. I had a concrete wall protecting my heart and I vowed to myself to never allow anything like that betrayal to happen to me again.
