Page 74 of Made of Steel (Made of Steel 1)

I shrugged.

"No, really. Clearly you have an idea if you want to ransack his place. Do you think he's cheating on you?"

I laughed. "No. It's just..." I let my voice trail off. Why was I keeping the fact that I had met the vigilante a secret from her? Kins would be the perfect person to talk to about my feelings for him. Or maybe she'd try to steal him away. If there was one bad boy in town worth swooning over, it was the vigilante. Did crushing on a masked stranger really make me that odd? It would probably just make me fit in even better. What am I doing? I was done trying to fit in. It didn't even matter if I let anything slip anymore. I was leaving. And just the thought made me start crying again. I didn't want to leave. Kins was the first real friend I had made in years.

"The suspense is literally killing me," she said and continued to rub my back. "Spit it out, Sadie!"

"I met the vigilante." It felt good to tell the truth for once in my life. It felt like a weight had been lifted off my shoulders. Or maybe I just felt better because she had been comforting me. It was nice having someone who truly cared.

She laughed. "Wait...really? Oh my God. Tell me everything."

"There isn't much to tell." He's watching out for me. He knows me. I like him but I'm leaving. "We did kiss."

"Shut up."

I laughed.

"Was it the best kiss ever?"

I thought about the kiss that I'd always compare to all others. Miles. I remembered being on the roof of my grandmother's house, staring at the sky with the boy I loved. That kiss had always been the epitome of romance to me. There was something so pure about it. Something so hopeful. Thinking about it made my chest hurt. Thinking about it now filled me with this feeling of loss. Was the kiss with the vigilante better than that? With the vigilante it wasn't just romantic. It was sexy. Just thinking about it made my whole body feel overheated.

"You don't have to say a word," Kins said. "The blush on your face says it all."

I couldn't even argue with her logic. Thinking about the kiss I shared with Miles so many years ago made me feel sad, whereas the kiss with the vigilante made me feel alive. He pulled me into the present like no one else had ever been able to. He took away the feeling of pain. Just thinking about him dulled the smell of blood in my nose and the red seared in my mind.

"Okay, so you think Eli might be the vigilante?"

It was easier to play along with him possibly being the vigilante than it was to tell her that it felt more like he was the villain in this scenario. The scorching way his fingers felt on my skin made a lump form in my throat. "I have no idea. But he's definitely hiding something." I'd just never find out what it was.

"It's okay, we'll figure it out together."

Just hearing those words made me breathe a little easier. I wasn't alone here. It wasn't like Don could just nab me from my dorm without anyone noticing. I was in the city that never sleeps. Maybe I was safer than I realized. I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to swallow down the taste of blood in my mouth.

Chapter 36

Wednesday

It seemed like yesterday was a terrible dream. I couldn't eat. I couldn't sleep. I pulled out my phone for what seemed like the millionth time. All day long I had waited for Mr. Crawford to call me back. I had called a few more times, but it always went straight to voicemail. I was starting to worry that something had happened to him.

I had called out sick from work again. Joan had sounded worried about me on the phone. It was nice that she cared. I was starting to notice all the things I'd miss once I left New York. Her, Kins, Miles, Eli, the vigilante... I sighed. Kins had been so worried about me that she basically pulled me out of bed after I missed my first two classes. I pretended to leave, but really I had just been sitting in the common room downstairs staring at my phone. The dorm was safe. I wasn't stepping foot outside of it.

I opened up the door to my dorm room. Kins was already getting ready for our dinner at Eli and Patrick's. I was about to tell her I wasn't up to going, when I noticed the box wasn't sitting under my bed.

"Kins?"

She smacked her lips together and smiled in the mirror. "Yeah?"

"What happened to the box under my bed?"

She turned to me. "What box?"

"The box I got in the mail yesterday?"

"I literally have no idea what you're talking about." She turned back to the mirror to apply more mascara.

"Of course you do. You left it for me on my bed last night."

"I never but a box on your bed last night. And I never saw one under it. Just your suitcase."

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