“The fuck you can. How long has this been going on?”
“It’s none of your business,” Chandler declares before I can say a word.
I shake my head. “She didn’t mean that.”
Chandler whips around. “Don’t speak for me,” she snaps. Her eyes narrow, skipping from me to Davis. “I see what this is.”
I don’t like her tone. “Now, Chandler—“
“Don’t Now Chandler me.” She jerks her dress down. “You guys all stick together no matter what. I told you that Davis and I didn’t have a thing, and you chose not to believe me. Now you’re telling him you can explain? Explain what? What we do”—she breaks off and shakes her head—“no, what I do with my body and my time is my own damn business.”
We’re all too stunned by her speech to move, and it’s not until the back door slams behind her that I pop out of my daze and start after her. Someone grabs my arm. I shake it off.
“No. Let her go. She doesn’t want you up in her business.” It’s Syracuse. If it was Davis, I wouldn’t have listened, but Sy has a lot of experience with girls.
“Why not?”
“Because when they’re mad, they’re mad. Let her get it out of her system, and once she’s done being angry, you can explain things. Besides, don’t you need to talk to him?” He tilts his head toward Davis, who is standing stiffly in the middle of the room, his hands fisted as his side, his eyes blaring holes through my skull. “Come on, Mike. Drive me home. I think the latest Madden is done downloading.”
Mike frowns. “Didn’t know you played those sport games anymore. You said they were boring as fuck and you preferred—“
“I love them now,” Syracuse interrupts. He grabs Mike by the neck and drags him out.
“If she’s crying, tell me,” I order as they leave. If she’s in tears, then I’m not giving her any space.
“No problem, captain.” Syracuse gives me a fake salute and disappears out the back. The door slams shut again, leaving the two of us alone.
I wait for Davis to ask me a question, but he only continues to stare angrily at me. Maybe it’s Davis that needs to be left alone to work things out of his system until he’s calm. If he was thinking rationally, he’d understand why I couldn’t keep my hands off Chandler. She’s a goddess, and ever since I got the green light to worship at her feet, that’s what I’ve been doing.
“Look, man—” I start, but Davis holds up his hand.
“I don’t want to know. Here’s what we’re going to do. We’re going to pretend I didn’t see you pawing at Chandler like she’s some piece of trash you picked up on the side of the road. You’ll forget that you’ve ever had your hands on her, and we go back to how it was.” He pushes by me and starts picking up the things in the pantry that got knocked over when we were fighting.
Go back to the way things were before I told Chandler I loved her? Before I heard those sweet words gasped or shouted? Before I had my dick in her sweet pussy? Before I tasted her tart honey? I think the fuck not.
“No.”
Davis shakes his head. “Yeah, because if you don’t, you’ll end up breaking her heart, and then it won’t be the three of us. I’ll have to choose to remain friends with you or her, and I don’t want to do that.”
“I’m not breaking up with her.”
“We had a good thing going,” Davis says, pretending like he doesn’t hear me, “And I’m only doing what you asked.”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
He places a cereal box on the shelf and turns to me. “Don’t you remember? That night we caught your old man with that girl. You said you were afraid of your own genes and wondered if you would end up like him—cheating on someone you were supposed to love. You told me that if you ever showed signs of getting close to a girl, I should remind you of who you came from. So this is me reminding you that your old man has been cheating on your mom for years and that you worry about her mental health because of how he treats her, and that’s why you’ve never dipped your wick inside a girl’s pussy in the past.” He arches his eyebrows. “Remember now?”
I slump against the wall. Every word Davis said was true. I had nearly begged him to make sure that I didn’t turn out like my dad. I had shoved that fear down deep when Chandler opened her heart to me because I hadn’t wanted anything to stop me from taking her. Oh, sure, I’d hid behind my friendship with Davis for a long time, but the real reason I stayed away from Chandler, the reason I never wanted to acknowledge my feelings, was that I might be just as big of a bastard as my old man.