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If anyone was going to be bursting, I definitely did not want to literally be caught with my pants down. I threw myself into the bathroom, stashing my panties in Cy's hamper because I wasn't going to be wearing those two days in a row, and shimmied into my leggings. "Why are they coming here?" I asked as I rummaged through his drawers to find a spare toothbrush and his tube of paste that was in a weird sweet mint flavor that I felt said something about him. Like those freaks with their cinnamon toothpaste. How many hours until that stuff wore off so you could drink your coffee?
"Word is out about you and Cy," she called back and I could hear clicking as she moved around like, maybe, she was cleaning up the clothes scattered about, making me realize that I was braless. I was suddenly somewhat thankful that I didn't have a whole lot on top to worry about. "Which you and I need to talk about. How could you not tell me? You told Kenzi!"
"Kenzi caught me," I admitted, walking out, trying to finger-comb my hair into some kind of order. "Wait, did you tell..."
"I'm not giving up your secrets, Ree, but you know that the longer you keep this from them, the more questions they are going to have about why. And I don't think..." she trailed off as a chorus of female voices came from the main room.
"I'm not ready for this." I dropped down on the edge of the bed, staring at the door like some three-headed beast was going to barge in.
"None of us ever are," she agreed, sitting down beside me. "But you're part of the club now, so there is no avoiding this."
As the voices came down the hall, I heard another one that was distinctly familiar. "Wait, Alex knew and didn't try to warn me?"
Elsie gave me a brow lift and half-smile. "Come on. You know Alex. She likely thought it would be fun to catch you off-guard."
"And Amelia?" I asked, feeling betrayed by half my people.
"She has a group session this morning actually. She will be completely in the dark until one of us gets ahold of her sometime later today. But aside from her and Summer, obviously, everyone else is here."
And with that, they were.
There was one short knock before the door pushed open. "What if she isn't dressed?" a pretty blonde asked even as the others moved inside.
There they were.
The girls club.
In all their varied glory.
"Damn it Else," Alex grumbled, shaking her head. "You ruined the surprise."
"She wasn't even awake yet, Al," Elsie shot back.
"They burst in on me once too," the blonde who had tried to knock and stop everyone informed me, looking apologetic.
"What? Like we're the Inquisition here to burn you at the stake for having PMS or some shit?" a short, slight, black-haired, tattoo-covered woman asked, rolling her brilliant blue eyes. "We just wanted to meet her, Penny."
"That's Janie, or as many of us call her, Jstorm," another woman said, moving forward from the group. She was tall and fit, but stacked, with long medium-blonde hair, and brown eyes, wearing sage green utility pants and a long-sleeve white tee.
"And I'm Lo. Now for the rest of our ragtag group of various pains in the ass," she went on, giving me a smile. "We have, Maze with the purple hair. She is with Repo. Then there is Penny who is with Duke," she explained, motioning to the woman who had tried to champion my cause.
"Amelia isn't here. Elsie, you obviously know. There is Mina," she said, gesturing toward a woman with exotic Asian, but something else too, features, dressed similarly to Lo. "She works for me at Hailstorm, and is with Renny. There is Bethany," she went on, waving toward a woman with a delicate face and short, shiny black hair. "She's with Laz." Laz, I was sure, was short for Lazarus, who had given me the water the night before. "And then that is Kennedy," she concluded, waving toward the pretty blonde who had told Roderick to leave me alone the night before. And you," she went on, "are Reese."
All eyes on me, I had to answer, so I swallowed hard, and nodded. "I'm Reese."
"Okay," Maze, the one with brilliant purple hair interjected. "I am just going to go ahead and ask what we're all thinking. Cyrus? How? I mean, seriously," she said, coming closer. "How?"
"How what?"
"How did you get that flirt to settle down? Don't get me wrong," she went on when I went to open my mouth. "We all love Cyrus. Actually, he is like the big brother in our group. He has crashed more than a few girls club nights. And has been a voice of reason when some people are being irrational."
