Page 16 of Pleading Innocence

We were all on edge. Tiffany was strained, I was nervous, and poor Mario was locked up like a prisoner. All three of us were hanging on the edge of hope. The hope that Chris would get the fuck out of our way. On one hand, it was thrill-inducing, and on the other hand, it was pretty fucked up and sad. Because I really did miss my best friend and wanted to spend the day getting drinks with him, catching up.

“Okay, if you’re sure,” he said to Tiffany. Like he could hear my thoughts, he checked his phone again and said to me, “If we can make it quick, we can still grab those drinks.”

Ooh, that was spooky, and I didn’t like it.

I didn’t want to imagine Chris being able to read my thoughts. But going by the fact that I was still standing here without my face pummeled in, I was able to come to the relieving conclusion that that was only a coincidence. Whew. Shit.

I couldn’t believe I was freaking myself out so bad that ‘mind-reading Chris’ became a legitimate fear of mine for a second.

“Yeah, I don’t know about that,” I said with a sharp intake of breath. “It’s getting pretty late.” My sigh was too dramatic as I rubbed my chest.

Chris looked at me, raising his brows in suspicion. “Since when do you care about being punctual?”

I chuckled awkwardly because he was right. I didn’t care, and I didn’t know what to say to that. My throat went dry until he chuckled as well.

“Oh, I know what this is all about,” he said, wagging a finger at me.

Again, going by the fact that he was laughing and wagging his finger at me in jest, I was going to guess that he didn’t know what was really going on. Either that or he was going to do a complete 180 and that chuckle would fall away with an unsuspecting blow to my head.

“Yeah, and what’s that?” I asked him, sounding confident enough about the fact that he had no idea.

He looked between Tiffany and I, waning my confidence a little bit.

He leaned in with a grin toward Tiffany. “Let’s just say, Anthony has a lot of friends here,” he said, shielding his mouth away from me with an open palm as if I couldn’t hear what he was saying. He started laughing before turning toward me. “I know the reason you’ve lost interest in having the drinks is because you want to revisit one of the women you’ve slept with here,” he said out loud, making the whole act of covering his mouth pointless.

I let out a breath and an uncomfortable giggle—because he wasn’t wrong, that was my intention. I gulped, and when I turned to look at Tiffany, she gulped. Despite her cold expression, her body was the biggest chatterbox of all. Her skin had gone completely red and Chris's laughing face soon morphed into complete horror as his own skin grew red to match hers.

There was a thud at the door of my ass as panic began to settle in. I knew with complete certainty that he’d guessed it now. He’d figured it out and he looked like he was about to be sick. I eyed the pale blue door behind him, marking the exit, and thought about how I could still make a run for it. I still had the option of being decent enough to face the music of my actions. Damn it, I only wished to have another taste of her before having to face the fact that I might not live to see another day. But it looked like my time was up.

I braced myself for his wrath because I’d done what I knew I shouldn’t and now I was sure as hell I was going to be punished for it. I held my breath and steeled myself in anticipation of a whopper of a knockout.

Chapter 12

Chris

Aflutterthatfeltlike thunder in my chest slowed to a stop so abruptly, my body jerked. The room was being deprived of oxygen somehow as the lump in my throat grew larger and larger, making my face feel like it was going to explode. My eyes bulged and I found grace as my pulse tried to stabilize itself, making me grateful I hadn’t dropped dead.

Why had I said those words?

I knew why I’d said them. I’d said them because I knew Tiffany had a thing for Anthony. And though I was trusting Anthony not to make a move to seal the deal, I opened my big mouth to hopefully deter my sister from wanting to get with someone who had already fucked through her entire apartment complex.

Instead, all I had done was inject the thought of sex into the conversation again, into their minds, and I wished with all my might that I could withdraw my stupid words. Anthony was looking at me with shifty eyeballs and Tiffany had grown as red as me. Now I was the one responsible for the awkwardness in the room, for the conjuring up of Anthony’s sexual conquests. And as the words left my mouth, I realized that she too lived in this apartment complex. By the look on her face, it seemed she didn’t mind being one of those conquests.

There was no way I was going to allow that to happen. I was not leaving this apartment building without Anthony in tow. All I had was his word, and unfortunately, I’d decided just now that his word was not good enough for me, not after the pounding in my chest triggered the fight-or-flight response. I had no problem fleeing the discomfort I’d caused, just as long as Anthony was fleeing with me.

“Sure you don’t want to grab those drinks?” I asked him.

He was looking at me with eyes full of skepticism or confusion. Something had him standoffish, but I was guessing that it was all because of the awkwardness I’d caused. Either that or he had something to hide.

“Uh, no. I really should be getting back. Maybe another time, eh? When you’re not too busy with whatever this is,” he said, flapping his hand about in disinterest.

I sighed, wanting to be relieved, but still on edge. “Okay, I guesswe’dbetter get going. If you ever need to talk, I’m just a phone call away, okay? I’ll text you some contacts to some law firms and put in a good word for you,” I said to Tiffany, with a hug and a kiss on her cheek.

“Um, thanks. Sure,” she said, her mood seemingly soured. The tension in the room was so thick it was like a dense cake.

I started to feel self-conscious as I made my way over to the door. Her mood didn’t seem soured a while ago when I’d just made the comment. Maybe it had just sunk in? I wasn’t sure what to think. All I knew was that I was ready to put some distance in between her and him.

I held the door open and waited for him to walk through. He didn’t waste any time, stalking past her without even as much of a glance, stepping out in the hallway.

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