Page 8 of This Is War: All's Fair Duet
“No problem,” he quips, running a hand over his muscled chest. “I’m just saying it seems like you all had way too good a time last night. Nice shirt, Rya.” He shakes his head as he pivots to leave. “See you later.”
As he walks out of the bathroom, she peeks down at herself. “What the hell? This is not my shirt.” And this is the first I’ve noticed what’s emblazoned across her chest. “Does that say what I think it does?” She looks up, her lip trembling.
The image of the baseball player taking a swing is innocent enough, but the slogan is crude at best. In fancy script, it reads,Balls Deep,then below the image in bold print,We don’t stop at 3rd base.My jaw tightens at the thought that someone put her in that T-shirt and thought it’d be funny. And the hell of it is it leads me to believe it’s one of the dicks on the baseball team—the same guys I’llbe living and breathing the game with starting this week when our practices begin.
Hazel holds up her phone. “I’m gonna text you, Rya. Let whoever has it know that we’re aware it was left behind.” Rya doesn’t say a word, just gives a weak nod of acceptance. She must really feel like shit because my usual happy Rya has left the building.
Voice gruff, I murmur, “Yeah. That’s a good idea.” While Hazel quickly shoots off a text, I touch Rya’s shoulder and give a jerk of my head toward the bathroom exit. “Do you feel well enough to go back to your room?”
She pauses a moment, doing an internal check. Finally, with one hand to her forehead and the other hand over her stomach, she nods. “Yeah. Let’s go. I think I might need to sleep this off.”
5
LOGAN
Poor Rya.Still pretty as ever, her face is a putrid shade of green. With Hazel helping me support her, we slowly make our way through the heavy door leading to our wing. We pass my room, and Hazel hurries to open theirs.
Once we get inside, Rya carefully sits on her bed, dropping her head to her hands with a soft moan. I wish there were a way to turn back time and steer her clear of the last twelve hours or so, but unfortunately, there’s not. I don’t know which will be worse for her, the hangover or Jaxon. Right this second, with her still looking like she might vomit, it’s hard to say.
Hazel paces the room, then pivots toward us, her lips pursed. “Okay, so assuming the phone is still at Tri-Beta, my first thought was that someone would see me trying toreach out. But maybe that’s not the best way to go about it because the odds of one of them knowing me or Rya to have our numbers is way low.” Hazel’s brow raises before flopping onto her bed. “But you know who I bet theywouldknow of?” She jerks a thumb at me. “Mr. Personality over here.”
Me.For some reason, people do tend to gravitate toward me and know who I am. It’s always kinda been that way. Am I a likable guy? Maybe on the outside. Most people don’t know the real me. I glance at Rya. Hell, even my best friend doesn’t know me as well as she thinks she does. But I kinda need to keep it that way because I can’t risk losing her.
Rolling my eyes hard at Hazel, I yank my phone out of my pocket. My text thread with Rya goes back more than a full year since shortly after we first met. I tap out a quick couple of lines, hoping someone will notice the incoming messages.
My friend would like to pick up her phone today.
It was left at the Tri-Beta party last night.
Will someone be available if I drop by?
This is Logan Kent.
I mutter, “I don’t have a fucking clue if that’ll work, butif we don’t hear anything, Tri-Beta is right on my way. I’ll just stop by when I head to the gym.” That’sifRya’s feeling better. I’m not convinced we shouldn’t make a trip to the health center on campus.
My friend looks up, her expression twisted by remorse. “Thank you,” she murmurs before shaking her head, careful not to do it too quickly.
“Hey,” I say softly, “you don’t need to thank me. This is what we do. Take care of each other.”
“Ugh,” Hazel mumbles. “You two are sickeningly cute. I don’t understand why you’re not dating.” She jams her earbuds in, not even waiting for our reaction before she gets lost in whatever she’s looking at on her phone.
I cringe internally. This comes up all the time. What the hell am I supposed to say? My best friend doesn’t think I feel anything for her… and I don’t wanna fuck up our friendship.
Rya looks away for a few seconds before taking a deep breath and returning her gaze to me. “While I appreciate so much how good you are to me, Logan, I feel like it’s so one-sided sometimes. Less of a give-and-take than it should be between friends.”
My brow furrows. “But sometimes it’s gonna be like that. Don’t worry about it. There will be a day when I’ll need you, and you’ll be there. Besides, I’d be a shitty friend if I was keeping track of favors you owed me.” I crouch onthe floor in front of her since she keeps staring down at her hands. Touching a few fingers to her chin, I force her to meet my eyes. “Right now, we need to focus on two things. Figuring out where your phone is and whose bed you woke up in.” I can’t stop the bite in my tone at that last bit. If they took advantage of her, I’m going to murder them in their sleep.
She exhales heavily and nods, her eyes crashing shut. “I wish I knew.”
I don’t have the guts to ask her about my final concern. She doesn’t know where the T-shirt she’s wearing came from or what happened while she was passed out. Surely, if she doesn’t remember anything, it wasn’t her who took off her clothes and redressed her in that joke of a shirt. I’m fucking terrified for her, but I’m too goddamn scared to ask if she feels like she was the victim of an assault. If the person who had her touched her in any way— My blood boils at the thought of it, undiluted fury bubbling up behind my eyes.
Just then, my phone buzzes. Rya and I stare at each other for a beat, and I pull it back out, looking down at the screen. My brow furrows hard. The texts aren’t coming from Rya’s phone, but an unknown number.
I have her phone.
Guess who?
A deep line wears a groove between my eyes.The fuck?Rya’s eyes roam my face, looking for clues as to the contents of the texts. “Who is it? What’d they say?”
