I shook my head. “I’d really prefer she figure it out on her own. It’s the only way she’ll believe how serious I am about her.” I lifted my eyes to Alyssa. “And I amreallyfucking serious about her.”
She smiled sadly and nodded before leaving me alone with my anguish.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Sophia
I woke up witha pounding head, a dry mouth, and Leo Harrison sitting in my bed. I groaned at the light spilling in and pulled the pillow over my head.Why the hell does it feel like there are drums beating in my head right now?
“Soph,” Leo whispered.
I lifted the pillow just enough to peek out and look at him.
His eyes were intense. There were dark circles underneath them and his jaw was tight.
“Leo?” I asked, my voice weak. I reached for my throat, wondering why it was so scratchy.
What the hell did we do last night? Do I look as bad as he does?
He scurried to grab a bottle of water from the nightstand and held it out to me, pulling on my shoulders and forcing me to sit up. “Here, drink this.”
He kept a grip on my bicep like he was afraid I was going to fall over if left unattended. I looked down at where he gripped me and back at his face, my eyes roaming over him as I drank the water. He was fully clothed, and he looked on edge in a way I’d never seen before. He was usually so relaxed, it was disconcerting to see his brow furrowed and his muscles stiff.
“What’s going on?” I asked, rubbing my head “Why do I feel like I was hit by a semitruck and why are you here? We never do sleepovers.”
Leo took a deep breath, looking like he’d been dreading the question. He took the water bottle back from me, set it on the nightstand, and turned to face me. He pulled me toward him until we both sat cross-legged on the bed.
“Soph, first I need you to know that I’m almost certain nothing happened before I got there,” he said, his throat bobbing as he swallowed. My heart rate spiked and my skin tingled.
Something’s wrong. He’s acting weird.
“Leo, you’re scaring me,” I said, struggling to take a breath.
“Do you remember going to Devon’s party last night?” He grabbed both of my hands and made an alarming level of eye contact.
I nodded. But I didn’t really remember anything else. Jia and I got there, she was flirting with Rickles, and then it was all kind of a blank blur.Did I play beer pong?
Leo took another loud, slow breath, pulling me from my thoughts. “Devon’s brother roofied your seltzer last night.”
My stomach dropped and the room started to spin. “What?” I asked as my skin broke out in goose bumps and tingled with a cold sweat.
“It happened shortly before I got there. According to Jia, she’d been with you until about twenty minutes before I arrived and it takes thatlong for the drug to start working. I was trying to find you, and when I did, you could barely stay upright.”
My stomach rolled, bile rising, and another wave of nauseous sweat broke out on my skin.How long was I like that before he found me? How did he know? What did I do?The room tipped again and the skin on my face felt cool, like it had been coated in peppermint, while the back of my neck felt warm and sweaty.
“Soph?” Leo asked, raising one hand to my cheek. I tried to focus on his face but it looked like there were two of him in front of me.
I let my head drop like a weight into his hand. “I feel really sick,” I managed to groan, leaning into his hand more.
Maybe he can hold my head up because it feels really heavy.
My head dropped as his hand disappeared and Leo jumped off the bed. He grabbed a trash can next to the bed—not where I kept my trash can—and thrust it in front of me just in time. I gripped it with both arms and threw up. Thankfully, my hair curtained around my face, blocking Leo from my sight. The last thing I needed was to be able to see him and know that he was watching me wretch repeatedly into the garbage.
The bed shifted behind me as I continued to empty my stomach into the trash and then warm hands brushed against my face as my hair was swept out of the way and held in place at the nape of my neck. Leo’s hand searched around on the bed for a moment while I spit into the trash can, hoping I was done. He pulled a hair tie over his hand, securing my hair in place.
“Sorry,” he said. “That must have fallen out since the last time.”
“The last time?” I asked before spitting again.
