Page 100 of After Midnight

There’s no sound behind her, just the sunny interior of the vehicle, and nothing immediately looks wrong.

But obviously, something is wrong. Remi isn’t the type of person to cry alone in a parking lot for no reason.

“Rem,” I say, softer this time. “What is it?”

This draws her gaze back to mine. Sniffling, she reaches out to clip her phone into the dashboard holder, then sits back in her driver’s seat. Now I can see she’s wearing that same Panic! At The Disco T-shirt that she had on when she picked me up from the airport, the night we went grocery shopping together and then ate tacos at her place. Her hair is twisted into two braids, and she has a thin golden chain around her neck.

Remi lifts her hands, using both to wipe the tears from her cheeks. For a moment, she looks angry at herself, and her fingers close into fists.

“Rem.” Her name is just a whisper. “Do you want to tell me what’s going on?”

Finally, she meets my eyes again. Her mouth opens, then closes. She bites her bottom lip.

Then, in a quiet voice, she says, “It’s not a big deal. I’ve been having some trouble with a regular at the club, and I . . .” She has to take a steadying breath. “I thought I saw him at the grocery store. That’s all.”

My chest tightens up.

“But it’s fine,” she continues, sitting up a bit straighter, and it’s almost like I can see her putting her armor back on, one piece of metal or swipe of mascara at a time. “I can handle it. I’m handling it.”

Handling it? Handling what?

“What did he do?” I ask, leaning forward on the couch, as if I can somehow get closer to her that way. But I can’t. She’s still almost three hundred miles away from me, and I can’t be there for her right now—not in the way I want to be.

Remi takes a steadying breath and looks around. In the sunlight, the moisture in her eyes turns her gaze an even lighter shade of blue.

“He . . . knows about you. Mentioned it before I came to visit. So I know he was following my Tribe page before I deleted it. And . . .” She looks down, and I can’t see clearly from here, but I think she’s fiddling with the hem of her T-shirt. “And then when I got home from work on Saturday morning, I found flowers on my porch. I thought they were from you.”

I blink.

There’s a sudden rushing in my ears, and that tightness in my chest constricts even more.

“He sent you flowers?” I ask, voice low.

She nods once, but her bottom lip looks like it wants to start trembling again.

I don’t mind other guys flirting with Remi—I expect it—but no one from the club should have her address. If he knows where she lives . . .

“I’m going to tell him not to come into the club anymore,” she says, voice a bit stronger now, bottom lip no longer quivering. She takes a steadying breath and rolls her shoulders back, sitting up straighter in her driver’s seat. “I’m going to cut it off with him.”

My heart is beating harder now.

Remi’s been dancing for years, and those few times I watched her at the club, I got the feeling she’s always in complete control of any situation inside Caliber’s walls. So for her to be sitting in a parking lot crying means this guy has truly scared the shit out of her.

And it makes me clench my jaw, hot anger building inside me.

I’m angry at him for making her feel this way. But I’m angry at myself too, angry at this whole fucking situation, angry that I’m here on my couch instead of in Vegas with her, being there for her, even if she doesn’t need me. Just because she’s capable of handling things on her own doesn’t mean she should have to.

“Rem—” I start to say, but another call comes through on her phone, and her gaze goes distant as she reads the name.

“Hey, Riley’s calling,” she says, her voice changing immediately. She reaches up to wipe the last few trickles of tears away, and I literally watch as she puts her big-sister mask on, everything she just poured out to me vanishing under a smile of calm composure. “I’ve got to take this—she’s been having car trouble again. But I’ll call you later, okay?”

“Okay,” I say, trying to smile at her, but my face feels too tight, my efforts at concealing my own feelings straining at me.

Remi blows me a kiss, then says softly, “Bye, Seb.”

A moment later, the video call disconnects.

I sit there for a minute, staring at the phone in my hand, feeling the heavy beat of my heart.