Page 2 of Mad As Hell

“Then it’s her funeral, too,” I answered coldly. I looked at two of my closest friends. “Can you both handle that?”

Linc grunted, his jaw clenching as he made up his mind. “She made her choice.”

I stared at Court, knowing this would be harder for him, since he and Bex were the ones with history. It had rocked him when Dean threw Bex back into our orbit with that stunt at the beginning of the year, but I could see what I had known when we were kids: Bex got under his skin.

Cutting her out of his life one more time might be more than was fair to ask of one of my oldest friends.

“It is what it is,” he finally replied, reaching for the bottle.

“Yo!” Ash yelled from somewhere in the house. “Where are you guys?”

“Out here!” Linc called, taking a drink and passing me the bottle once again.

Shit, at this rate we were going to need another one.

My head lolled back as I watched Ash walk out onto the deck, his laptop tucked under one arm.

Smirking, I extended the nearly empty bottle of vodka to him. “Come to join us?”

Linc shifted his sprawled legs up to give Ash a seat, but my best friend shook his head and waved us off.

“All right,” I muttered, looking down into the bottle. “More for me.” I lifted it to my lips.

Ash slapped it away, and the bottle shattered on the deck.

“Dude, what the fuck?” Linc whined. “That was a three-hundred-dollar bottle of—”

“Does it look like I give a shit?” Ash cut him off coolly, his green gaze focused on me.

My eyebrows lifted. The alcohol had settled like a blanket of indifference around me, but I could feel my anger scratching under the surface, begging to break free and spew havoc and pain on the world. “Clearly not. So fuck off and let us drink.”

“You mean let you pout?” Ash corrected. “Because that’s what it looks like your bitch-ass is doing.”

I shoved myself to my feet so fast the chair I was in hit the wall behind me. Thankfully I didn’t sway too much as I stared down my friend. “The fuck did you say?”

“I said you’re out here pouting like a little bitch,” he sneered, shaking his head in disgust. His gaze jumped past me to our friends. “And you two dipshits are cosigning on it.”

Court frowned, and Linc started shaking his head.

“After the shit that went down?” Linc gave a low whistle. “I think Ryan’s earned himself a fucking keg of whatever helps him forget what happened last night. We all have.”

I clenched my jaw hard enough that I worried my teeth would shatter. No amount of alcohol would help me forget the way Maddie had torn my heart out of my chest and used it as a soccer ball.

The alcohol just made the memories a little fuzzier and helped me settle on anger instead of letting the pain or the amazement that I had been played so totally settle in my heart.

No, anger was better.

I needed more to drink.

“Sit down,” Ash ordered, like he knew I was about to bulldoze through his ass to find something else in the house to drink.

I let out a soft chuckle that would have most people backing away. “You gonna make me?”

“Depends,” he said, not budging, “are you going to keep acting like a spoiled brat? Or are you ready for some truth?”

“What the fuck does that mean?” I spat. My head was spinning, and I was too irritated for word games. “If you didn’t come out here to help me—”

“I did come out here to help,” Ash cut me off, his green eyes flashing, “but not by letting you get blitzed.”

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