The Rules Read Online Free Page B

about Alexa.
    I should have never slept with Alexa,
Jacob thought.
She thought it meant something it didn’t. And I shouldn’t have left her at the pool that night. I just couldn’t take any more of her insanity.
    But I didn’t lock that gate. I don’t care what anyone says. I didn’t do it.
    It had been a Friday, his turn to throw a party. It was just going to be a small get-together at his house. Just the “in crowd.” The coast was clear: his parents were out of town.
    He was texting everyone about when to come over when he spotted Alexa DeYoung coming out of her parents’ restaurant. She’d left town months ago. To go to rehab, people said. The girl was an out-of-control freak. Seriously scary. People steered clear. There’s living on the edge, and then there’s jumping off the cliff without a parachute.
    He grinned as a plan hatched: Morgan totally hated her, and he was pissed off at Morgan because she had scraped the new paint job on his motorcycle with her car door and refused to pay for it. Time for a little revenge.
    So he sauntered up to Alexa, flashed his Jacob Stein smile, and invited her to his party. He told her that Morgan had specifically asked him to invite her. She was so grateful that he actually felt guilty. He had watched her working hard to be liked ever since the DeYoungs had moved to Callabrese. They all had. She was completely clueless about how to fit in.
    Hours later, he had left her crying in the country club swimming pool because she thought he had actually
liked
her, when all their hookup had meant to him was a good time. Tears running down her cheeks because he did not want to plan their future right then and there, like she did. Then the crying and screeching had begun. Calling him a bastard. Saying that he’d used her. Then after that it was as if she had forgotten how to speak English. Sounds and words just exploded out of her, and she was scaring him.
    So he’d bailed.
    I had nothing to do with her death,
he reminded himself.
I didn’t lock her in. I know I didn’t. I checked. But I shouldn’t have left her there.
    He wouldn’t think about that. Tonight was not about regrets. It was about fun. And Thea. He would make sure she understood from the get-go that it was just a hookup.
    It was also about stuff. Their jaded little in-group actually competed for the swag that August provided because it was that awesome. Last time, Larson Jones had won an all-expense-paid trip for two to watch a Mogwai recording session in Scotland. This being the last party, August was going to deliver something even better. So rather than let Albino Man know he’d arrived early, Jacob decided to have a look around. He’d see if he could find some of the objects August would have put on the list and memorize where they were. So yeah, okay, that was cheating.
    Whatever.
    Stabs of moonlight pierced the fog as he walked his bike out of sight before starting a methodical search of the grounds. There was a lot to cover. The warehouse itself was huge, along with an extended building with a rusted corrugated roof and two or three smaller sheds. There looked to be a cave set into the cliff opposite the warehouse, but in the watery light, he couldn’t be sure. He’d check that out, too. A cave would be a perfect scary place to hide something in a scavenger hunt. August was sly like that.
    Jacob’s boots crunched down on the pulverized shells scattered like gravel. He could hear the tide rushing in and out, like an asthmatic giant. As he walked, generators rumbled like jackhammers and gas exhaust clung to his nostrils. The motors must be powering the lights and the band equipment.
    After a few minutes, he heard someone’s noisy footfalls, and he ducked behind the large brick warehouse to wait out the intruder. He prudently turned sideways so that no one would see him if they were looking through any of the windows in the back rooms.
    The footsteps died away. There was nothing but the
putt-putt-putt
of