Page 271 of Filthy Elites

Her gaze breaks away from mine, only for a split second, but it’s long enough for me to detect her guilt. She opens her mouth, fleetingly considers lying to me, then says in a conciliatory tone, “It wasn’t atest.”

“It was a fucking test.”

“You’ve been distant this week,” she whines, literally stomping her foot. Just once, but Jesus Christ.

“I’ve been busy,” I say carefully. “You gave me a fucking project, in case you forgot.”

“I definitely haven’t forgotten,” she mutters, looking down briefly before her gaze returns to mine. “If it’s taking up too much of your time…” She stops, looking uncharacteristically unsure of herself.

I can feel her wanting to call me off. I doubt it has anything to do with filling my schedule like she wants to claim, but she’d die before admitting it was anything else.

She also knows she risks looking like a human being with actual feelings if she tells me she wants me to stop talking to Aubrey. Vulnerability is unacceptable to Anae. I wait to see if she waivers, but when she meets my gaze again, her shield has slipped into place.

“I could get someone else on it,” she finally says.

I shake my head, looking off in the distance. “No.”

“No?”

“It won’t work. I haven’t made much progress. There’s no way someone else will make more.”

Anae frowns.

This isn’t how I wanted to do this, but the opening is here, so I dive in. “You left a lot out when you told me about this girl.”

“Like what?”

“Like her mom’s dying of cancer,” I say, raising my eyebrows.

“Oh. Well, I didn’t know that.”

“Yeah, well… She’s pretty preoccupied right now. You said she doesn’t seem to care about high school. I don’t think she has time to. Between single-handedly caring for her sick mom, working, and all this other shit, she doesn’t have time for some guy.”

“Even you?” she says, faintly amused by the idea that I’ve been outmaneuvered by some little nobody.

My pride doesn’t love it so my jaw tightens, but that’s the story I have to go with, so I nod tersely. “Even me.”

Anae nods like she’s considering, but maybe something doesn’t add up. “You haven’t madeanyprogress?”

That might be too big a claim, so I walk it back. “I didn’t saynone, but not as much as I expected to. You probably won’t want to hear this because you’re intent on hating her, but she also doesn’t want to get with your boyfriend. She doesn’t like you, but she doesn’t want to hurt you. She’s not like us, she’s an actual good person.”

Anae rolls her eyes. “Please.”

“She is.”

“Good people don’t exist. Some are just better at covering up their shittiness.”

“All right, well, whatever you want to believe. The point is, she’s not going to fuck me as long as we’re together, so unless you’d like to break up, I don’t really see me getting anywhere with her. It’s a waste of time and a much bigger waste of energy. You’ve done enough to her. Can’t you just call it a win at this point and back off?”

Anae regards me carefully. “I’m confused. Is the problem that she has a dying mom to focus on, or that you’re my boyfriend?”

“What?”

“Well, you said no one would be able to get anywhere with her because of some sob story situation with her mom. That’s why you didn’t want me to get another guy on her, right?”

Fuck.

“But now you’re saying she won’t sleep with you unless we break up. So, either the problem is that it’s you, and it makes sense to put someone else on it, or the mom is the issue and she’s too distracted to focus on anybody.”

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