As of late, there’s a brown girl with large hair who makes a fairly frequent appearance at his side.
Anyway. It’s nights like these—the empty ones—when we want him to come home so we can wrap him up tight and never let him go. If nothing else, it would keep us from feeling this alone.
He certainly doesn’t like it. Why on earth would we?
I wake with the scent of Macklin Magic still in my nostrils. It makes me smile, so I keep my eyes closed.
No clue how I got home, but I think this might’ve been the best I’ve slept in a really long time. Bed feels softer than it’s ever felt, and I swear this pillow has arms…
And legs?
Oh God!
I squeeze my eyes tighter because…Yep. That is definitely an arm between my shoulder blades, a leg between my legs, and a chest beneath my cheek. Force one eye open and there’s a chin.
Can’t breathe now.
I shift to sit up.
His eyes open, and he smiles. “Mornin’, sunshine.”
Morning?
I look around. There’s a pink halo around the edge of a window on the far side of the room.
“Shit!” I jump up from Finesse’s couch. Still in my clothes from yesterday. “What time is it?” I say, rushing over to get my shoes on. “Where’s Jessica?”
I look back at Zan who—whoa—looks downright delectable rubbing his sleepy eyes with his hair sticking up every which wa—
Focus, Rico!
He stretches, and the hem of his shirt lifts. “Jess left last night,” he says in the midst of a yawn.
I stop dead. “She what?”
“She’s got a midnight curfew, so she left at like quarter till.” He yawns again.
I’m just like…standing here. Stunned. “She left me?”
Zan looks at me like I’ve lost it. “You said you wanted to stay.”
“Huh?”
“We were watching a movie, and when she got up to leave, you said you wanted to stay. Bragged about not having a curfew and everything.”
Okay, now he’s just talking nonsense.
“You don’t remember?” he says.
“No!”
Thinking back, thinking back…there was Ness and Jess’s disappearance when we first got here, then Zan-the-Man all flirty with me on the couch. They came out, we played Scattergories (I won), then pizza and music and laughter and something fizzy that had kind of a bitter aftertaste—
“You spiked my drink?!”
Welp, he’s wide-awake now! “What? No!”
“Well, how did—?”
“You asked for it.” He shakes his head and puts his face in his hands. “Ness told you what he was drinking, and you asked for a cup of your own.”
“Oh.”
“You don’t remember anything?”
I don’t respond. Can’t.
“Nothing at all?” he says, and as he does, his face morphs into that of a very sad baby elephant. Like if he had a trunk, it would be dragging on the floor right now.
My eyes narrow…and then go as wide as the tires on his Jeep.
Oh no.
“Did we…?” My hand flies to my mouth. “Oh my God.”
Confusion in the caterpillar brows now. “Huh?”
I scramble to get my Docs on. “I have to get out of here. What time is it? Crap, I’m so screwed!” Ugh! No pun intended!
“Rico, relax—”
“I was supposed to be at work at six a.m., Zan!” Where the heck is my jacket? Bet that emergency phone of mine is on fire with missed calls. “I’m sure my mom and brother are freaking out….” Oh right. It’s upstairs in the Montgomery coat closet. Fantastic. “I can’t even remember most of the night, and now you’re telling me we hooked up—”
“Whoa.” He lifts his hands. “I did not say that.”
How the heck do I even get out of here? What if Ness’s parents are sipping coffee over newspapers in the kitchen? I don’t want them to see me leaving their house at this hour! I feel like such a stereotype…poor girl gets hammered and gives her cookies to some rich boy after crashing a party she shouldn’t have even been at. Might as well have a red letter T for tramp tattooed on my cheek. “Well, that’s what you implied with your sad face—”
“What?” Now he’s pulling his shoes on.
“You think I was born yesterday? Why would you be upset about my memory lapse if we didn’t hook up?”
He sighs and looks at the ceiling. Stands. “It makes me sad that you assume the worst of me, Danger—”
“Can we not do this right now?” Gotta be a clock around here somewhere…
6:47?!
I’m so dead.
Zan grabs his jacket from a chair in the corner I failed to notice. Mine is beneath it. He tosses it to me. I pull the phone out and check it—
Thirty-eight missed calls and twelve voice mails.
I try to listen to the first one, and the phone dies. I shove it into my back pocket.
I’m so so so so dead.
“Do you need to go to the bathroom or anything?” he says.
I jab my arms into my sleeves. “I’ll go at the store.”
“Fine.” He walks over and buttons my coat for me. (Is he serious? WE GOTTA GOOOO!) Then he’s taking my hand, interlacing our fingers, and pulling me down a short hallway to a back door.
* * *
—
The Montgomerys have a downward-sloping driveway that leads to a four-car garage at the rear of the house. That’s why I didn’t see Zan’s Jeep yesterday: it was parked in the back.
As he zooms us through the neighborhood and out to the main road, a million and one questions are tumbling around in my head.
“Zan, did we hook up last night?”
“No, Rico.”
“Tell me the truth.”
“I am! Though why you don’t believe me—”
“I just…need to hear you say it for real.”
His jaw clenches. “We. Did. Not. Hook. Up.”
“So what happened?”