Page 25 of Test the Ice
“You need to come home.” Zoe’s tone is clipped.
“What’s wrong?” I ask, losing my battle with the Bluetooth button. “Is it Charleigh?”
Malaki stiffens, his hand forming a tight fist against his leg.
Zoe’s panicky voice pulls me right back to the phone call, and I ignore Malaki’s reaction.
“No.” She sounds concerned, which is never good.
I turn it off Bluetooth just in time.
“It’s that fuck face, Benedict.”
Shit.
“I’m on my way.” I hang up the phone, and silence fills the car.
I don’t even have to say the words for Malaki to catch the hint. The door opens, the unlock button causing me to jerk in the driver’s seat. Before he slips out to disappear into his apartment, he peers at me with one leg out of the car.
“I thought you said you were single.”
I open my mouth and close it again.What?
Malaki mumbles quietly to himself about me being a cheater. It does nothing but offend me.
“Iamsingle,” I stress, defending myself.
He chuckles, but I’m pretty sure it’s sarcastic. “Then who is Charleigh?”
I blink a few times, my thoughts a tangled mess.
But then it hits me.
Charleigh is a gender-neutral name, and his brain automatically went in the direction that I should have expected.
I could take the time to explain myself, but what’s the point? This was a mistake.
I break our stare-off and gaze out the windshield. “I have to go.”
I don’t like the way my stomach aches from the loss of something that was never mine and never would be.
He makes a noise of sarcasm, huffing under his breath. “See you around, Reese.”
As soon as he shuts the door, I take off in the direction of my shitty apartment.
Ten
REESE
I makeit home in less than seven minutes. The drive from Malaki’s apartment in the uppity part of the city is far enough away from downtown that being back at my place seems like a whole different world. The homeless wander about, and you never want to look at someone for too long in the eye.
I rush out of my car and lock it on the way to the stairs. I skip every other step with my heart in my throat. The long hallway comes into view, and I stop dead in my tracks at the sight of Benedict.
Why is he here?
“Nice place you have,” he muses without looking up from his phone. One shoulder is leaning against the wall with one foot crossed over the other.
I slow my steps. “Why are you here, Benedict?”
