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“I don’t want to talk about that.”
I’m still filled with a sick sense of dread every time I remember waiting on the wall for Rocco Prince to arrive. Knowing that he was stronger than me, faster than me, and maybe smarter, too . . . Knowing that if one of us was about to die, it could just as easily be me . . .
“It worked, and that’s all that matters. No one else knows.”
“Thank god for that,” Zoe breathes.
“Dean promised not to tell. In return for, ah, a few favors.”
“What!” Zoe shrieks, outraged. “Did he?—”
“No! I mean, not exactly. It’s complicated.”
Now she’s fuming on the other end of the line, imagining the worst.
“We weren’t friends at first, but then we were, and then it turned into something romantic . . .”
I’m trying to explain to Zoe what I barely understand myself: the long progress of Dean’s and my relationship from hatred to lust to love.
If it ever was love at all.
“He changed, and so did I. We connected in a way I’ve never felt before. And I thought we were . . . I thought it was something special. But now I fucked it up. Or he did. I don’t know, I’m so confused . . .”
Zoe sighs, trying to parse my rambling to find the truth.
“He really hurt me,” I sob, remembering Dean’s words cutting me deeper than any knife.
You thought I would like that? Are you fucking stupid?
You’re nothing to me.
“If he hurt you, then he doesn’t love you,” Zoe says.
It’s not what I want to hear. But the wrenching pain in my chest tells me that she might be right.
“When someone loves you, they’ll do anything to keep you safe.”
I want Zoe to be wrong. She’s never wrong, though.
“What should I do?” I ask her.
“Stay away from him,” Zoe says. “And make sure no one else finds out about . . . you know.”
“He won’t tell,” I assure her.
As furious as Dean might have been, he’ll keep my secret anyway. I still feel certain of that.
A dry branch creaks behind me.
I whirl around, thinking Dean came looking for me.
There’s nothing there.
It was probably just a squirrel, or one of the several cats that prowl the school grounds.
“And by the way, Cat . . .” Zoe says.
“What?”
