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I probably wouldn’t either. Not with everything that just happened.
I could use a laugh or two. “Only if you don’t fucking talk. I hate when people talk while I’m watching stuff.”
He lifted a hand, then proceeded to turn up the television. This was not how I’d thought the evening would go, and though Ares’s laughter boomed over the set almost right away at the show, his distraction didn’t annoy me. If anything, his laughter made me laugh too.
We laughed together which should be weird, but as we watched, it wasn’t. Actually, watching TV with him felt a lot like painting with him. It felt, I don’t know, easy.
I really didn’t think I’d sleep that night, but my lids definitely started feeling heavy during the show. I fought sleep for as long as I could, but I must have drifted off sometime between episodes. I was totally in and out of sleep because, at one point, I thought I felt a set of hands tugging my blanket up when it slid.
“Night, P,” I heard a voice say, but that couldn’t have been true. My name didn’t begin with a P.
I must have been dreaming.
Chapter Twenty-One
Sloane
A crash jerked me awake, my head rising from a couch pillow.
What time is it?
I looked around for my phone, but then I realized I’d left it in my bag. I pulled my legs off the couch only to hear a thud hit from inside the house. It sounded like something literally hit a wall.
“Dorian, bro, calm down.”
What the fuck?
Wide awake now, I got feet to the floor. That sounded like Ares’s voice.
“This was your plan the whole fucking time?” Another thud, something physical colliding with something else. “Alcohol and shit? You fucking sleep with her?”
“Nah, man. It’s not like that.”
This time, there was no thud. There was no crash.
This time, it was a smack like flesh hit flesh, and I got up, stumbling a little. I was disoriented. I’d fallen asleep on the damn couch, and I’d also had shots last night. I didn’t feel hungover or anything, but I definitely had a strong headache.
I padded my way through the house, pausing when I made it to the foyer.
My lips parted where I stood.
Down the hall, Dorian Prinze had Ares against the front door. He had his fist raised, his hair tousled. His shoulders roved under a thin T-shirt, and a crush of red tint crept from the neckline of his shirt all the way up to his chiseled cheekbones. He looked pissed, and his fist raised in his friend’s direction only made the fact more obvious.
Dorian’s nostrils flared. “What the fuck, Ares?”
“Come on, D.” Ares’s voice was even, calm. He was clearly trying to talk down whatever this was. He placed a hand on Dorian’s fist. “It’s not like that with her. Believe me. It’s not like that at all.”
“What’s it like, then, Ares?” Dorian’s jaw worked, and between the two boys, they filled the small hallway. Ares had height, but Dorian was huge too. The football player crushed dudes well beyond his height, and I’d seen it on the field.
Really, the two of them barely fit in my entryway, and what the fuck was all this? I started to move in that direction, but Dorian slammed Ares against the wall.
“You let me in here, and all I see is fucking shot glasses and her sleeping on the goddamn couch.” Dorian leaned in, his Adam’s apple flicking. “So tell me what it’s like?”
“Not what you’re thinking.”
“Fuck you, Ares,” Dorian growled. “The guys told me you were hanging with her, but I passed that shit off until your phone showed me where you were. We can track each other’s phones, and you know that.”
Ares’s blink was slow. “I had to. She needed help and texted me. Her brother—”
