Page 34 of Ruthless Reign

“I’m asking you.”

She crossed her arms over her chest, knocking her back into the seat. She wasn’t leaving though, and I was taking that as a win. I remembered Ma telling me girls needed friends. People to talk to. Talk shit out with. Otherwise they just simmered until their bottles overboiled. That I did not want to see her overboil. She told me that right before slamming the door in my face and going back to talk to Tammy about some shit my dad said.

I wasn’t a girl, but I wished Becca would see that I was her friend. She could talk to me.

I tried to work it out for myself while she stewed, thinking back over the last few days before I remembered Hardin storming out of her apartment after we dragged her there to pack a bag.

“Wait, you’re not still mad that he called you Hawk, are you?”

Her eyes narrowed to slits as she glared down at the floor of the Bronco.

“Call it what it is. Hawkmoth. He thinks I’m weak.”

She looked away, out the window into the rain. “I am weak.”

“You are not weak, Vixen. Far fucking from it.”

She scoffed.

“And I don’t think he meant the nickname in the way you’re thinking he did.”

She rolled her head back to me, giving me a look that had more sarcasm than anything she could possibly say out loud.

“Ask him,” I encouraged her.

“Why bother? He’s clearly pissed at me for some fucking reason.”

I thought about that, too. He definitely was. It could just be that he could tell she was pissy with him about the nickname, but it seemed like more than that. Becca might’ve dropped the stick with the nickname already if he wasn’t being such a detached grouch the last two days.

“You didn’t make a real ugly painting of him by chance, did you?”

Her face screwed up and even though now was not the time, I couldn’t help noticing how fucking adorable she looked when she was pissed off and confused at the same time. Like a snubbed kitten with her angry winged eyeliner and her small nose all wrinkled up.

I fought the urge to grin because clearly this was all very serious and she was very seriously upset. No smiling. Easy.

“He went into your art class trying to see what had you so pissed off when you ran out Friday. He’s been even more quiet and brooding than usual since. I thought maybe…”

The sour look on her face broke, and her lips parted on a curse. “Fuck.”

“What is it?”

She muttered something to herself and looked out the window again into the rain like she could see into the building. See through the walls to where Hardin was no doubt still moping.

“You painted him with horns and a tail, didn’t you?”

“No,” she said, exasperated. “No, it wasn’t him. It was…a self-portrait.”

She winced.

“Maybe explain a little more because I’m not following.”

She bit her lip, unable to meet my eyes as she spoke. “It was a really fucking morbid self-portrait.”

Morbid?

Morbid how?

“I didn’t even mean to paint it like that. Not really. I didn’t mean to, it just sort of came out and when I saw it…”

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