Before (After 5)

“What, fucker?” I ask him, chugging the water.

“Nothing, man.” He laughs and shares a shitty look with Logan.

“Am I missing something here?” My hand waves between the two of them.

“Nope.” Logan puts his hand on my shoulder, and I move away. “Why are you looking for her, exactly?”

“Why do you think?” I say quickly, unsure whether I’m lying to them or snapping back into the Bet. Yes, I’m still into the game, but at this moment, I just want to know where the fuck she went.

“Right.” Nate nudges Logan like me and my mates used to nudge each other when we were in grade school. “Well, she’s gone, anyway. I saw her walk out the front door.”

“And you just let her?”

“Let her? Why would I care if she walked outside and left? You shouldn’t care either . . . I thought,” Nate says, his eyes meeting Logan’s.

“Where’s Zed?” I ask them. Hopefully the question will make them think I’m more worried about him getting a leg up on me than anything else.

They both shake their heads and shrug their shoulders, then go back to shooting the shit together like they’ve already lost interest in all of this.

As I walk away from them, my hands ball into fists. Maybe she called a friend to pick her up? Does the girl even have any friends? She seems like the judgmental type that no one would actually want to be friends with. Like me, in that way. Except she’s slightly more likable. Slightly.

I’m sure she isn’t stupid enough to try to walk three miles back to her dorm.

Stupid enough? No.

Stubborn enough? Hell fucking yes she is.

I walk through the halls upstairs one more time to be sure she actually left the house. My room is empty; I was hoping she would be annoying and break into my room again. I was kind of hoping I would catch her sitting on my bed with one of my books in her hands.

But no, of course she had to be ridiculously difficult and leave the house. Alone.

Alone.

Fucking hell, she’s walking the damn streets alone.

What kind of . . . Goddamnit, she pisses me off. Could we have chosen a more difficult girl for the Bet? Not bloody likely.

“Nate!” I shout his name over the music as I rush down the stairs.

“What? You in a hurry?” he says to me, a slow smirk rising to his face. I slow down as I reach the bottom.

“Nah, I just . . .” I push my hair back from my forehead. “I’m looking for that brunette—the one wearing a black tank top, huge tits.” I hold my hands out in front of my chest to mimic having this made-up woman’s body.

Nate’s eyes lower and he smiles. I can barely see the words inked into the inside of his bottom lip when he says, “Oh, I get it.”

He winks and Logan laughs.

“Well, I’m going to go find her . . .” I turn away from them quickly. I can hear their faint shit talking as I walk away. I leave the house without looking back and get into my car. The streets are empty. Completely fucking empty, and she’s nowhere to be found.

After a few more circles around the block, I decide to just head to her dorm. She has to be there by now. Has to be.

When I get to the dorm, I realize I’ve been out for about two hours already. At her room, the door opens without any hesitation and I find Steph and Tristan lying on her bed. Her shirt is off, her hands roaming his shirtless body. She removes her mouth from his and sits up.

“Can I help you?” Steph licks her lips, smearing the last bit of lipstick down across her mouth.

“Where’s Theresa?” I ask them. Tristan reaches for his shirt, and Steph grabs it from him, tossing it onto the floor. “Well?” I push.

“Not here. We passed her on the way.” Steph latches her mouth on to Tristan’s neck, and I gag.

“Passed her? You saw her walking and you didn’t pick her up?” I bend down and grab Tristan’s shirt, tossing it to him, covering both of their faces with it. Tristan moves from the bed, and I back away toward the door.

“Steph told me not to stop,” he says while getting dressed.

“What the fuck?” I turn to her.

She chuckles. “She’s fine. She could use some walking.”

“Hey.” Tristan nudges her, a disapproving look clear on his face.

Steph rolls her eyes.

“Get dressed, both of you, and leave. She should be here soon,” I say to them.

“This is my room. I’m not leaving,” Steph says.

“Come on.” I scramble for a reason for her to leave. “I need some alone time with her.”

She laughs. “For what? To fuck her?”

“To work toward that, yes.”

“Let’s just go to my place. Nate probably won’t be there,” Tristan says, and tucks Steph’s hair behind her ear. She smiles, nodding in agreement.

Once the room is empty, I sit down on Tessa’s bed. As I’m trying to decide whether or not to look through her stuff out of curiosity, the door opens. There she stands in the doorway, looking a few inches taller, her hands in tight fists. Her eyes are wide; she’s bursting at the seams with carefully held-back irritation. When I smile at her, she tears up.

“You’ve got to be kidding me!” Her voice is high and loud as she throws her hands into the air.

“Where were you?” I calmly ask her, my tone the opposite of the fire quickly growing inside of her. “I drove around trying to find you for almost two hours.”

“What? Why?” she asks me, her expression a mixture of exasperation and confusion. Her cheeks are pink from the cool fall air, and her hair is windblown, not the neatly curled mop I’m used to seeing on her.

I struggle to say something to explain it all, but only come up with “I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to be walking around at night, alone.”

She bursts into laughter. Laughter, of all things. What is wrong with her? Her laugh is wild, completely opposite to her controlled smiles and faked laughs. She looks half mad.

“Get out, Hardin—just get out!” she says as her laughter grows softer.

“Theresa, I’m—”

But a pounding at the door interrupts me.

“Theresa! Theresa Young, you open this door!” a woman’s voice shrieks through the air.

“Oh my God, Hardin, get in the closet,” Tessa whispers, grabbing my arm and yanking me from the bed.