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Suddenly, Victor stopped walking, and Kota and Silas paused to wait for him.
In the split second after they stopped, Victor lunged forward as Sang crashed into him. He stumbled a half step. His face turned bright red. She backed up, quickly covering her mouth a little with her fingers.
“Christ, you scared me. I was just wondering where you’d gone.” He touched the back of his neck, raising an eyebrow and looking very confused.
Silas wasn’t really sure what happened, since Kota had been in the way. How bad did she crash into him? Did she accidentally bite him or something?
“Sorry,” Sang said. “I didn’t mean to be following you so closely.”
“You shouldn’t be walking behind us,” Kota said.
Silas agreed with him. They were supposed to be showing her a good time, and they were walking off without her. “Yeah,” he said. “Come on. Walk with us up here.”
He reached out, taking her wrist to urge her to walk next to them.
She winced, but he had barely touched her. He thought again that maybe he was scaring her... until he noticed the bandage at her wrist.
Silas reconsidered why she was here. The bandage... and why Kota was being so mysterious about her. “Who did this to you?” Silas asked. With the things they did in the Academy, he fully expected the worst answer.
Her eyes widened just a little, like she didn’t want to say.
“It was Max,” Kota said. “He jumped on her, and she didn’t expect it.”
Kota answering for her reminded him that he wasn’t supposed to be asking too many questions.
If it was the dog... so what? What was the big deal?
But Max would have never jumped on someone without Kota requesting it. If the Max part was true, it seemed likely Kota was the one to ask Max to jump on her.
Since her face was turning red, Silas put the questions aside. “I’m sorry if I hurt you,” he said.
“I’m fine,” she said, although she avoided looking at him.
He wanted to express some sympathy for whatever she was going through. Whatever was going on, she could trust them. Only she didn’t know it. Yet.
So maybe that was what this was about. Show her a good time, build some trust.
This time, Silas reached for her elbow. He barely touched it and simply urged her to stand next to him.
She did so, and seemed a little relieved after. Victor and Kota stood on his other side. When Kota started moving again, they all walked together.
They followed the concourse. Silas wondered why he was the one reaching for Sang and getting her to stand next to him. It wasn’t like Kota and Victor were socially inept. Now Silas wasn’t sure about the interest level of Kota or Victor for her. Maybe this was simply a case of them helping her out.
He looked at her when she was distracted. Was she not their type? She was pretty. He knew not to try to get involved with a girl if she was in trouble. It was sometimes problematic. But somehow, it felt like the guys had zero interest in her at all, just by the way they were behaving.
“Where are we going?” Sang asked after they passed by a few more shops.
“We’re going to get fitted for some new suits,” Victor said casually.
Silas held back a grunt. It wasn’t exactly a normal thing to do. Or maybe it didn’t feel normal because he knew the real reason they needed to do this today.
She glanced at them. “All of you?”
Silas bit his tongue, and when Kota and Victor nodded, he did the same. He was hoping she wouldn’t read too much into it.
“Are these school clothes?” She scratched a little at the bandage on her wrist.
Now Silas wished they had warned him about her before coming over. How much had they told her about the Academy, if at all? Did they tell her it was a school, so she assumed that was what the suits were for?
Or was she talking about the public school they’d be going to? Since she lived in Kota’s neighborhood, she was most likely enrolled there.
Silas shoved his hands into his pockets. He wasn’t going to answer. He couldn’t tell her the real reason they needed them. He left it up to Victor and Kota.
“Sort of,” Kota said. “Just for the nicer events. We thought it’d be easier to get it done now instead of when all those formal dances start happening.”
Silas shot a look at Kota and at Victor. Their eyes were wide. They were not the best liars. No one should believe that.
Still, she didn’t say anything. She didn’t seem happy with the answer either. Silas didn’t blame her.
The men’s clothing store was opened as they approached. There were wide glass displays out front, with dark mannequins posing against a white backdrop. They wore variations of different suits.
The store was a sea of displays and racks of men’s suits, mannequins and neatly folded shirts, ties and pants. Dark colors dominated.
Kota sought out an attendant and approached him to check in for their appointment.
Silas and Victor lingered behind with Sang.
Silas stepped in front of her to get her attention and dug his hands into his pockets. “Did you want to go look around somewhere else?” Maybe they should’ve just canceled this appointment.
“Have her stay,” Victor said. Silas looked at him, but Victor was looking purposefully at Sang. “There’s usually a couch or something around here.”
That didn’t sound like a good time. “I don’t want her to get bored,” Silas said.
“She won’t be bored.” Victor stepped closer to her, his eyes widening. “Do you have a phone on you?”
She shook her head, and then her cheeks turned pink again.
Silas wanted to comment that she didn’t have to be embarrassed for not having a cell phone. He hadn’t even had one until a year ago. Victor was the one that insisted he carry one around. There was no way to really word the comment, though, without possibly embarrassing her more, so he didn’t say anything.
Victor reached into his back pocket. “See, Silas? If she walked off, we would have to hunt her down. I don’t want to lose her.”
Lose her in a mall? It didn’t seem like a great reason for her to have to stick around. However, when Sang didn’t say anything to the contrary, Silas dropped it. Maybe she wanted to stay close.
Victor passed her his cell phone. “Play some Angry Birds. Download whatever app you want. We won’t be long.”
She took his iPhone into her hands carefully and press the phone to her chest.
Victor’s phone probably had a few Academy things inside. How could he trust her with it? Silas clamped his mouth shut.
The more he thought about this whole thing, the more confused he was about it. He wasn’t sure how to talk about this with Kota or Victor. However, he did need a lot of clarification.
If they were going to be around her, and they had to be careful around her, he needed to know what he could say and what he couldn’t.
3
Silas trailed behind Victor and Kota as the attendant led them to the back of the store and into a hallway. Along the left side was a line of dressing rooms with oak-framed, frosted glass doors. The lights were off behind most of them, and they appeared empty. It was highly possible they were the first ones in, as Kota wanted.
Further down, the last dressing room was bigger in size. They entered, and Silas flinched at first when spotting the surrounding mirrors and themselves reflected an infinite number of times. One paneled wall close to the door was the only plain wall, and that had hooks for clothing.
The attendant wore dark slacks and a black top. There was no name badge, but his face looked familiar. It was very possible Silas had been here before. Gabriel liked to work with the same people.
“So,” the attendant said, “shall we do this one at a time, or all at once?”
“All at once is fine,” Kota said.
“Right,” the attendant said and looked down at his clipboard. “I already have sizes here. But do you want me to double check th
e accuracy?”
“That’s probably a good idea,” Kota said. “Those measurements were from six months back.”
The attendant partially lifted his head to respond when he stopped and refocused on his clipboard. “You already have suits picked out?”
“Yes, there should be one for each of us. Untailored, but that’s why we’re here. So this shouldn’t take too long.”
The attendant probably had a spiel about brands that were on sale and was ready to make suggestions. However, the cost of the suits Gabriel selected weren’t cheap, so there was little to complain about. They were pretty much a guaranteed sale.
“Sounds good.” The attendant put his clipboard under his arm and nodded to Kota and then the rest of them. “I can run and get those suits. If you don’t mind, if you’re wearing anything bulky, remove it. I’ll be right back.”
