Page 51

Figures. Stubborn, infuriating Mia.

I leaned in, voice lowering to a conspiratorial register.

“Can you find out who it is?”

“Why?” Her eyes narrowed at me, suspicion growing teeth.

I drew in a long breath and prayed for patience.

“Why the fuck do you think? I’m gonna fix it,” I growled.

I straightened up and forced my shoulders loose, as if trying to convince her—or myself—this was casual.

Pri’s head tilted to the side as her eyes scanned me, calling bullshit without words. Then, she nodded, though suspicion lingered in every line of her face.

The air had grown thin, or maybe my lungs struggled to draw breath. I tapped the wood twice, signalling the subject was closed, before my fingers clawed through my hair as I glanced outside again.

“I need a cigarette.”

And air.

And to stop thinking about her.

Preferably starting with the latter.

Chapter sixteen

Josh

Halloween came and went, with pumpkin lantern decorations and a misty night straight out of a horror movie. But even more daunting had been Pri and Liam’s social media, full of pictures of the three of them: Pri—dressed as a smug Fiona—laughing as Morticia Addams and Frankenstein tried on silly hats and made faces, looking too damn jolly for my comfort.

Pulling on a Ghostface mask I’d bought on a whim, I headed to the nearest bar sans costume, drunk more than was wise, and buried whatever dark thing simmered inside me by sleeping with someone whose name I couldn’t even remember the next day.

What was worse, every grim, grey November morning brought the spine-stiffening fear that I’d step foot on campus to find everyone knew, that Tiffany had squeaked out of sheer pettiness. But she kept her end of the bargain. And in return, she and her cronies would get to continue their remaining two years, much as I wanted to have them kicked out for that little stunt.

And then, the cherry on the proverbial shit cake. Glimpses of Liam and Mia taunted me all over campus—having lunch together, laughing, prepping for exams, colourful flash cards in hand—all the fucking time.

One such day, during the brutal exam period in December, I stalked closer to the table they’d been sitting at—the one tucked in the corner by the window—a careful smile playing on my lips as I folded myself in the chair she’d vacated, trying to ignore the curious glances pinning me from all over the library.

“What’s going on, you two best friends now?”

My words landed a little harder than I’d meant them, like a smoke bomb fuming at the mouth.

Which was I praying for: that he was somehow playing us both—or that I was a jealous, misguided idiot?

I had no fucking clue.

He’d been tucking his things away, but his head snapped up at the sound of my voice. The pleasant smile cracked, and a sliver of something ugly peeked out—the ghost of a sneer.

I wasn’t sure it had even been there.

I blinked, and the easygoing man I knew had returned.

“Yep.” He shrugged.

“Maybe not best friends, though. Couldn’t quite dethrone Pri,” he joked. Then, he peered at me in a way that usually cut right through my bullshit. “Why do you care?”

Shit.