Dane
“She text you back?”
I snap out of a daze and glance toward West when he emerges from the fieldhouse, hiking his practice bag higher on his shoulder. To my surprise, both my brothers are taking the shitshow from last night seriously. There hasn’t been a single joke.
Not yet anyway.
I shake my head. “Nope. Nothing. I heard her moving around inside her room this morning, on my way here for practice, but I didn’t bother her. If she wanted to talk, she would’ve opened the door last night.”
Thinking about it, everything, I feel sick to my stomach.
“Did she say anything when she left the bathroom and went to bed?”
I shake my head again. “I didn’t wait around to see. After a few hours of not getting any response, I walked to the drugstore, got that pill, then set the bag on her bed.”
West’s brow quirks. “And… you’re sure no one shared that shit with Pandora?”
“Honestly, I was so fucked up at the time, I didn’t even think about it. Guess the only thing to do at this point is pray she has mercy if someone did. Like before,” I add, remembering how not so long ago, Pandora withheld a few details to cover our crew while our father was still on the streets, raising hell.
“Yeah, maybe,” he concludes.
Sterling finally joins us, and we head toward the parking lot slowly. My damn head’s still in the clouds, trying to process everything.
“Any clue how it happened?”
I glance toward Sterling after he asks. “How what happened?”
“How the condom broke. It’s never happened to me.”
Taking a breath, I shrug. “Beats the hell out of me. Just one of those things, I guess.”
“What’d you do, run out of Magnums and tried to use a regular one?” There’s a laugh in West’s voice that has me shaking my head.
“No, dipshit. I’m not an idiot.”
“Well, at least you tried to prevent this. My dumb ass thought I was invincible and raw-dogged it, which landed me knee-deep in the Casey situation,” West adds.
The situation he speaks of happened years ago and isn’t one we talk about often. But with all the shit swirling around inside my head, I’d forgotten all about it.
“So, do you think Joss took the pill?” Sterling asks.
“Probably,” I answer, but then backpedal. “Fuck if I know.”
He thinks for a moment, then hits me with another question. “If she didn’t and… you know… what’s your next move?”
I try to imagine it, going through that scenario with Joss.
“You mean aside from being scared shitless?” I ask with a short laugh. “I guess once the shock wore off, I’d man up and get shit done, step up for her. With her,” I add. “For some reason, because it’s Joss… it doesn’t feel like it’d be the end of the world. Because it’s her, I know we’d find a way to be okay.”
We all fall silent when a group passes by, knowing how info flows through this city like water if we’re not careful.
“Oh, Rose is gonna love this,” West says, the statement dripping with sarcasm, but she hadn’t even come to mind.
“Doesn’t matter what she thinks. I fired her ass last night. I swear she hexed me, though. Damn witch.”
My brothers run out of things to say, because there isn’t much to say. Not to them, anyway. The one I need to be having this conversation with won’t even talk to me, but that has to change tonight.
“You’re taking off?”
I nod, doubling back toward my car, instead of toward West’s truck like we planned. “Yeah, just need to figure shit out. I’ll catch up with you guys later.”
Hanging with them for a bit would help keep my mind off things, but that’s the opposite of what I need right now. I need to focus, figure out what to say to Joss once I do finally convince her to talk.
Because whether she likes it or not, I won’t let her shut me out again.
I drove around all day, making myself scarce. Hopefully, it gave her time to think and calm down.
I let out a breath as I unlock the door to the loft, a little surprised to find it’s completely dark inside. There isn’t even a light coming from Joss’ bedroom, which is unexpected. I thought she’d be hiding out in there, hunkering down until she’s ready to face me.
I drop my practice bag, lock up, then walk that way, to where I hoped to find her. But when I flip the light switch, it’s like hitting a brick wall. Her bed’s made and everything’s in place as usual, but… something feels off. For some reason, my first thought is to check the dresser and what I find there has my heart racing.
Or rather, what I don’t find there has it racing.
She’s gone. The plane ticket’s gone.
I’m in a full panic now, dropping down to the edge of her bed to scroll Pandora’s posts. If anyone knows where she’s gone, it’d be her. I sift through image after image and nothing.
“Fuck!”
The one time I need this bitch to have information, she fails.
I’m on my feet again and storming toward the door with absolutely no plan. If Joss did leave, there’s no telling how long she’s been gone, but if she got on that plane…
Don’t think like that. You can’t possibly know she left.
But… I also know what it looks like.
I feel myself coming undone, losing my shit. I have to find her, and the odds are better if I have help. The thought of us falling apart over this, over something that was completely out of my control, has my head spinning with disbelief.
As hard as I try not to think about it, all that’s cycling in my head is how she believed we were doomed from the start, destined for disaster. My biggest fear in this relationship is proving her right, and, despite what I keep telling myself, I’m not convinced this isn’t that.
One big fucking disaster.
