Page 45 of Devil's Bargain

SEVEN

“You’re quiet,” Nina says at the lunch table the next day as I stare at my plate. I’ll see Rick if I look up, and I don’t want to do that. Not today. Not after what I allowed to happen in that hotel room. Besides, Scott sits at the teachers’ table across the room. I have caught him looking at me twice.

“I’m just tired.” I didn’t go home last night. I cried myself to sleep on the damp sheets and hard springs while the neighbors fucked next door.

Nina watches me for a moment. “Something is up, April!”

Next to us, Matt and Josh debate game consoles. Ben, Dallas, and Steph have gone to score some more weed.

“Drop it, Nina,” I whisper, my eyes still on the untouched food in front of me. My stomach growls, but I can’t make myself eat.

“Is this to do with a certain someone in a letterman jacket?”

I grind my jaw, shaking my head once. “He’s got nothing to do with it.” It’s part truth anyway.

“So it doesn’t bother you that he’s making out with Madeleine now?”

My gaze flicks up, but Madeleine is nowhere in sight, and Rick laughs with his friends. I glare at Nina.

She winks. “I got you to look.”

“Ha! Ha! Very funny.” I pick up my fork and stab at my food, piercing a piece of pasta, but it falls off again.

“I’m worried about you.”

“Don’t be.” I scoot my chair back. “This food is disgusting! I’m getting something else. Do you want anything?”

Nina shakes her head, her black bob swaying with the movement. “No, thanks.”

I unlock my phone as I walk over to the queue.

Rick: I know you felt it too.

I stare at his message, fighting the urge to type out a reply. I need to stay away from him, or his football career is in jeopardy.

“When are you going to reply to my text?”

I nearly jump out of my skin.

Rick smiles behind me as he collects a tray.

I pocket my phone, embarrassed that he caught me looking at his message. “What are you doing here?”

“Same thing you are. I’m getting something to eat.”

I fight the urge to look at him over my shoulder. I reach for an apple. “Are you stalking me, Rick?”

He picks up a bottle of water. “I wanted another drink. You happened to be here.”

I know he’s careful too. He doesn’t want Emily or anyone else to know about this weird friendship thing that we have going on. If you can even call it that?

“What a coincidence!” I catch a whiff of his cologne as he stretches across me to grab an egg sandwich.

“Isn’t it though?”

I bite back a laugh. It’s our turn to pay next.

“23 Hedgewood Gardens.”

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