Faster We Burn

next to me on my bed and putting her arm around my shoulder. “No guy who looks at you the way Stryker does wants to be just friends. He looks at you like no one else is around and he wants to throw you down on the table, right there, right then. Like you’re the only girl in the entire world and he’s ready to worship you.”
    If it wasn’t Lottie saying it, I would have thought she was mocking me, but she said it with such sincerity that I believed her.
    “Well Zan looks at you like he’s dying and you’re standing there holding the cure to whatever’s killing him.”
    She blushed and giggled.
    “Listen, we can trade these back and forth all night, but we should probably go to bed.” Giving me a quick shoulder squeeze, she got up and went to her dresser to get her PJs.
    “Speaking of Zan, why aren’t you staying the night with him?”
    “Because I figured he could deal with one more night without me. I don’t want to be one of those girls who can’t breathe without a man around all the time. Even if I do find it hard to breathe without him.” She traced the edge of a picture Zan had taken of the two of them. One of those where he had to hold the camera at arm’s length and they had to squish their faces together to get them both in the shot.
    Yeah, I wasn’t buying it. She was staying for me. She knew I knew, but I wasn’t going to say anything. So we got into bed and said goodnight and I closed my eyes and tried to think of anything but how much I wanted to call Stryker and talk to him. Even if he wouldn’t talk back.

 
     
    Chapter Sixteen
     
     
    Stryker
     
    I knew I was going to see Zan the next day and I knew he would be able to see what I’d done written on my face, so I skipped class and stayed at my apartment. Not that I would have been able to go, even if I’d wanted to. “Hung over” was an understatement. I was still hanging. I was also still hating myself for the night before. I checked my phone, but there were no messages from Ric, which was good, and there were a lot of messages from Trish, Zan and the rest of the crew, which was bad.
    I wasn’t going to be able to avoid them forever, but maybe I could get one more day.
    That one day lasted until two in the afternoon when my sister burst through my door and slammed it shut behind her.
    “You have got to be out of your fucking mind,” she said storming over the couch where I’d been tuning my violin. Hurricane Trish had arrived and she was pissed. Nostril-flaringly, violet eye-buggingly pissed.
    “You slept with Ric ?” That didn’t take long to get out. Trish came over and smacked me on the chest.
    “Ouch,” I said, putting my violin back in the case. I didn’t want it to get damaged.
    “That’s all you have to say, asshole?” She smacked me again and crashed down next to me on the couch.
    “Who told you?”
    “Well Ric couldn’t keep her mouth shut, and she told Zo and Zo told me. I wanted to believe it wasn’t true, but even Ric couldn’t make that up. Please tell me you’ve been to the doctor and that you have multiple personalities, or brain damage, or something to explain this excessively stupid thing you’ve done.”
    “Nope.” I flinched back before she could hit me again. “Just doing what I do best.”
    Trish glared at me so hard her eyes were just slits. I stared right back at her, not breaking eye contact. Her eyes widened suddenly, snapping open like shades being yanked upward.
    “You have got to be kidding me.” She got a hit in this time. Her jaw dropped as I tried to figure out what had gotten her so shocked. It couldn’t have been what I just said. There was something else she’d seen that had shocked her.
    “What?” I said, not sure if I wanted to know what revelation had made her look like that.
    And then she opened her mouth and said the last thing I ever thought she would say. “Oh. My. GOD. You love her. You fucking love her.”
    I nearly fell off the couch. It was a good thing I’d put the violin away because I might have crushed it in my hand.
    “W-what?” I stuttered. Trish leaned over and grabbed my face between her hands and stared into my eyes, searching for something. I was too out of it to stop her.
    “You. Love. Her.” Each word was like a punch she delivered to my brain with brass knuckles.
    Those three words made me come to my senses. I shoved Trish away and got off the couch. I didn’t know where I was going, but I had to get away from her and what she was