Page 36 of Ecstasy
“Like the leather,” he says, pointing at my mini skirt. Yeah, that was a bitch to walk in. He seems to realize that’s exactly what I just did because he narrows his blue eyes and says, “Wait. Did you fucking walkhere?”
I nod once, throwing up my hands. “Yep. Sure did.”
“Why didn’t you tell me? I could’ve picked you up.”
I glance at the beer in his hand, see his red-rimmed eyes. But I don’t call him out on it. Driving a little drunk and a little high is probably nothing to Jax. I don’t point out that he should know I don’t have a car. I just shrug. “I don’t know,” I tell him honestly. I kind of like to walk. Back in high school, I’d go for runs at the park in Monkey Junction—where I grew up, and where Mom still lives, the next town over—all the time. Before my little problem started.
“Well, you look good,” he tells me, nodding.
I laugh, shaking my head. “Good. Let’s hope whoever I end up fucking tonight thinks so, too.”
He scratches his neck, takes a pull from his beer as he saunters into the kitchen. “Oh, come on, Za,” he says, his voice lazy as always as he opens the fridge and peers inside. “Don’t be fucking around too much. Not good for your soul. Besides, Alex is probably still drooling over your ass.”
He knows we broke up, because aside from Kylie, he’s the only real friend I have. And unlike Kylie, he doesn’t really give a damn I cheated on Alex.
He thinks Alex is a dick anyway. Which he is.
I don’t say any of that though. I don’t really want to talk about Alex, especially with whatever the hell it was that happened with Eli.
Instead, I just laugh out loud, flop down on the black leather couch and cross my legs at the ankle as I slouch down, fingers drumming against my bare skin beneath my crop top.
“Who you inviting?” I ask, changing the subject.
Jax pulls a baggie out of the fridge and I perk up but make myself stay seated.
His mention of Alex aside, I’m just relieved he hasn’t asked about the dead girl. Every time I close my eyes, I can see the eerie way her brown hair was just floating in tendrils around her head in the water.
I don’t want to think about it. Talk about it. Or, remember it. I didn’t really know her, and what I did know, I didn’t like, but seeing a corpse is kind of unsettling.
“You know. Just some people from around. None of those bullshit Caven athletes, don’t you worry. People I work with.” I almost laugh out loud at that. He’s a dealer, and that’s it. But looking around his house, it looks like that’s really all he needs to be. “Who knows who’ll end up showing up?” He sets his beer down on the counter in his kitchen, grabs a spoon from a drawer and comes into the living room, sitting right on the floor in front of his coffee table.
He sets the spoon and the bag which is full of white powder on the table and grabs his phone from the back pocket of his jeans. He scrolls through it a second and thenProblem$by Somber floods some hidden speakers, the bass thudding.
I like this beat.
I sit up, start dancing with my hands up, eyes closed, a smirk on my face, and I hear him laugh.
“Hey,” he says after a minute, and I pause my stupid dance moves, dropping my hands, and look at him as he scoops out half a teaspoon full of whatever is in that bag, “did you know that dead girl?” He sets down the spoon, pulls out his wallet, thumbs free a card.
Damn, it seems I can’t get away from her.
“Rihanna?” I shake my head. “Nah.” Technically true. “I was at the party though, when she was…you know.” I wrinkle my nose at the memory, wondering if Jax knows about the tit video. If he does, he’s probably too much of a gentleman to say anything about it. I walked by during the week to pick some shit up and he didn’t mention it then, so hopefully he won’t now.
He’s cutting the powder into a thin line with his card, but he pauses at my words, looks up, his blue eyes on mine. “No shit?”
I scoot to the edge of the couch, knees together, elbows propped up on them. “No shit,” I confirm. “I found her.”
His eyes widen a fraction. He’s always pretty high, so I don’t think he can actually open his eyes any more than that. “You all right?” he asks, blinking, then turning back to his lines.
I eye them, my mouth going dry and excitement making my heart flutter, but I keep myself contained. I don’t even know what it is yet. Not fine enough to be coke, not really grainy enough for ketamine.
“Yeah, I’m good,” I tell him honestly. I actually wish I felt a little more at her death, but I didn’t fucking like her and I didn’t really fucking know her.
Jax doesn’t judge though. He just nods once and says, “Let it be a lesson, Za. Don’t get fucked up around pools.”
I laugh, shaking my head. “Shut up.”
The corners of his mouth pull up in a smile and when his lines are nice and straight, he picks his head up and looks toward me, putting the card back into his wallet. “You ready?”
