I shouldn’t be surprised she cared. She’d been so good with my sister. Hell, I bet she’d be good with my whole family.
Don’t do that. Don’t.
The time for all that had passed, and I’d made sure of that. This girl wasn’t just not in my life anymore. I’d completely kicked her out of it.
I guessed, in the end, that was what I’d wanted.
*
A beer in my hand later that night, I had every intention of getting drunk off my ass. Niko had ditched me tonight, something about being busy, so instead of wallowing by myself, I decided to blend in at one of Alexi Marvelli’s strip clubs. I figured a lap dance or two might get me out of my head, make me not think so much about earlier events.
Immediately upon entering the joint, I was swarmed, tits and ass in my face right away. I spent a fair bit of money at these clubs when I went, so I wasn’t surprised. I was tugged by a couple girls to take the show elsewhere, and though I’d intended on spending my money privately tonight, I ended up at the bar with the rest of the patrons.
I came to a less flashy club tonight, one where I could blend in closer to campus. My hand gripping my beer bottle, I lounged back and watched the show, trying to clear all the shit raging around in my head with perky tits and shaven pussy. When I felt compelled, I tucked a twenty between the breasts shoved into my face, mostly to get the girls to back off. I felt a vacancy behind my eyes as I watched them, unable to concentrate on anything else but Billie and the fact that she was moving. I hadn’t said shit to her today when she told me.
I just let her walk away.
Fuck, I’d packed her car for her, never one to give an inch. I couldn’t get over my own self enough to apologize to her, easier than admitting the truth.
The truth being that she broke me in the end. Hell, she nuked her way through my entire life.
I pulled out my phone, that bored in the strip club. Apparently, I’d rather scroll social media than watch the girls on the bar.
I kept off Billie’s feed entirely, not really wanting to know what she was doing to put more space between us. It was none of my business anyway, the beauty queen not my concern anymore.
Swallowing hard, I dashed a thumb across my phone and ended up with her name under my digit. I told myself I hovered over her name to copy her contact and send the information over to my sister. She had told me to give it to Dasha after all.
But then I pressed the call button, and I knew my reason for finding her contact had less to do with my sister and more with me. I’d wanted to talk to her, about what I didn’t know.
I almost allowed the call to go through before another came in. I clicked over, ending that call when I saw it was Niko.
I frowned. “What the fuck you want?”
My “friend” had ditched me tonight, ditched me every goddamn night. I felt like I hadn’t seen him in goddamn weeks. He was always out with an excuse, a party, social engagement, or whatever. And after finals week, I basically hadn’t seen him at all.
Some panting hit the phone, and I narrowed my eyes. “Nik—”
“Jay?” He huffed, heavy breaths dragging into the line, and I rose up. Niko moaned. “Jay…”
“Niko?” He had my full attention now, not sounding right at all. “What’s going on?”
“I fucked up, Jay.” His voice sounded so weak, strained. “I messed up, man. I need your help.”
Warning bells shot off in my brain and so loud even the club music couldn’t drown it out. I wet my lips. “Okay. What’s going on? What do you need?”
“Can you come…” A harsh growl, then a groan. “Come to me? I need help, man. I’ve been shot.”
Shot…
I was off my barstool, asking more questions with my valet ticket in my hand. Outside, I exchanged it for my car, my buddy telling me exactly where he was as I got behind the wheel.
I thanked fucking God I hadn’t drank more, able to cut away from the club completely sober. I hit my foot to the metal with complete adrenaline turned on, Niko sounding so weak in my ear. I told him to stay with me, to not panic, but I couldn’t in good faith tell him everything was going to be okay. I didn’t know, hadn’t seen him.
And he’d been shot.
He didn’t tell me much, mostly because I told him to save his energy for when I got there. He instructed me to come to some motel, a sketchy-ass place on the other side of town. I must have gotten to the right place because when I rolled up, Niko’s red Mazda was parked outside.
I passed the car and nearly cringed at the sight of blood on the door handle, fingerprints. The same was on the door knob of the room he’d told me to go to.