Page 91 of The Sidekick

His glare intensifies. “The point is for you to speak to other people.”

“That’s your interpretation of it,” I sniff haughtily and sip my drink. “Plus, it says a safe group. This doesn’t feel like a safe group.”

They have the audacity to look offended, but Shade is relentless.

“Then you’ll get bonus points for venting in front of a bunch of assholes. Why do you look like shit?”

My lower lip trembles as I get close to breaking. The other guys look around the room as if they’re giving me privacy to decide, which is nice but not the point here.

“Tera,” Shade says in a warning voice with a raised brow. Darn him!

I spill everything. From Max calling for help to the nacho cheese, my panic attack and confrontation with the waitresses, then I stumble through the screaming at Satan thing. I start crying at some point, which makes it even worse. Felix is nodding along with my words with a frown of concentration. Blaze looks confused. Shade watches me with his emotionless mask in place.

When I’m finally done speaking, they give me a minute to collect myself before hitting me with questions.

“Why did you go there knowing it was a bad environment?” Felix asks thoughtfully.

“Max needed help,” I look at him like he’s dumb as his brother nods at him with aspeaking glance I don’t get.

“Are all women vultures preying on each other’s weaknesses?” Blaze asks with a curl of his lips.

My eyes narrow on him, “You’re one to talk.”

He has the decency to blush.

“We were suspicious of you,” Felix says grudgingly. “We took our assumptions too far and alienated you. Our intentions were to protect Andi from possible threats.”

“I can understand your point of view,” I frown as I mull over my own emotions on the subject. Now that I have some distance from the situation and we’re talking like rational people, it’s a lot easier and less painful. “I was mad because I’m the one that convinced Andi to let you guys stay. It took me a full week of arguments for her to agree. I even blocked her email access to her dad with a dummy account and pretended I was her when he sent her questions about you. And none of you could spare five seconds to speak to me.”

They look at me in surprise. I’m actually proud of myself for getting one over on them.

“I wanted Andi safe, and I made the call. Deal with it,” I blush and go to take a drink to find the cup empty.

“Why am I addicted to you?” I mutter and get up for more coffee.

“What else did you do?” Blaze asks suspiciously.

Shade wipes a hand over his face to cover his smile. “You asked for it.”

“I set up an account for her on the dating site Alec was on and figured out how to rig it until they paired up. I let the air out of Damien’s tires so that Andi would be forced to give him a ride home. I checked out a bunch of books in Andi’s name and hid them so Brian would have to meet up with her in person instead of watching her from a distance to collect the late fees. He was pining so hard. It was rough to watch. She had two boyfriends already, and you could just tell he was giving up.”

When I turn back, they’re gaping at me.

“What?” I ask defensively. “More people watching her equaled less alone time. Dating covered the whole who watches her at night thing. No one ever let her go out alone, and when she snuck out, it was with one of her boyfriends. All the angles were covered.”

“You set all of this up while we were tracking who was threatening her?” Blaze looks surprised at the news.

“Well, duh,” I roll my eyes to be petty. “Once you guys arrived, it freed me up to get creative. I didn’t have to go sleuthing in dangerous situations because you guys are trained for stuff like that. But Andi was a job to you, and once the villain was caught, you were going to go home. She needed more round-the-clock support after something that traumatizing, so I made it happen. Now she’s all happy and less harpy shrieky.”

“Tell me why you think you’re stupid again?” Shade asks with a smirk.

“I always thought of it as a banshee scream,” Blaze frowns at me like I spit in his drink, which I would never do.

I think about that as I retake my seat.

“You’re right,” I finally agree, and he grins in surprised triumph. “Do you think there should be a scale, though? Like an enraged battle cry to a scary, soul-crushing submission sliding scale?”

My phone rings, and I get back up to find it. “Discuss while I’m gone.”

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