Page 73 of Vicious Desire (Fallen Royals 4)
Dad wanted to cheer me up, and it just so happened that he had a credit card handy.
The desk is the same, although the chair is different. I took it from Mom’s home office, back when she had one. She hasn’t worked in years…
I clear my throat. “Are you done ogling? Because we need to catch up on all things you.”
She joins me on the bed, staring up at the stars glued to my ceiling. “At least some things haven’t changed.”
“How is it?” I ask, closing my eyes. “College, I mean. Living with Caleb. All that.”
“It’s good,” she says. “Different, you know? Like here, we’re so protected. And there’s a schedule. Now suddenly we’re adults figuring it out.”
I grunt. “Do the Jenkinses know you’re back?”
“No. We’re only here for the evening, Caleb and I. I think Theo and Liam are staying longer, but I have a meeting with my advisor first thing tomorrow morning.”
I glance at her. “On a Saturday?”
“Yep. She’s cool. We’re getting coffee.”
I try to picture myself ever meeting up with a teacher outside of school, but I can’t do it. College is weird.
She pokes me. “What about you, now?”
“What about me?”
“Eli works at the school.” She raises her eyebrows. “That can’t be easy. And did you apply to NYU? We have an apartment in our building that’s opening up next year. We can be neighbors.”
I shift. What she’s probably unaware of is Mom sleeping in her room at four-thirty in the afternoon, and how I haven’t seen Dad in two days. I can’t just admit that sort of thing.
And then there’s the financial aspect.
“I need our cross-country team to get to the state championships,” I say. “I’m hoping to impress some recruiters for a scholarship.”
“What’s going on with you?”
I sit up. “What do you mean?”
She joins me, leveling me with a glare. “Be honest.”
“Oh. Um…” God, when did I become that bitch? The one who can’t open up to her best friend? Talk about fear of judgement. “I think someone is messing with me.”
She tilts her head.
“So I was running earlier this month, and it was foggy, and I swear someone was following me. I fell, but when I did, I lost my water bottle. This one.” I grab it from my desk and shove it at her. “It was waiting for me in the afternoon when I was going to drag Noah out to look for it. We left the house and came back and it was on the porch.”
She shifts it in her hand. “So someone found it who knew it belonged to you?”
I shiver. “I feel like I’m being watched all the time.”
It’s the first time I’ve admitted that out loud. The constant niggling at the back of my mind, my skin crawling…
“Who would be watching you?”
“Well, there’s one obvious answer,” I murmur. “Eli.”
She grunts. “I guess. He was pretty torn up about your breakup, which you still haven’t told me anything about. You know he came to our apartment? Talked to Caleb at the crack of dawn about some sort of revenge plot.” She rolls her eyes. “That’s how Caleb and I started off, too.”
I grimace. “Eli and I are… complicated.”