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ALEXANDER
“Didyou hear what they were saying?” Ezra asks, using his thumb to fiddle with the ring on his finger. He and Vance are staring at their computers, concentration knotting their brows.
The three of us are seated at the dining table in my living room. I’m slurping down my third cup of coffee—I can’t smoke around these motherfuckers—while they play private investigator.
“I already told you,” I mumble, looking at the black liquid sloshing in my ceramic mug. “I was too far away to hear.”
Ezra grunts his response, leaning back in the chair. Vance has been quiet since they got here, whatever he’s doing on his laptop has his undivided attention. The heavy hand-hewn dining table is big enough to seat eight—I’m at one end, Vance at the other, and Ezra between us.
The silk curtains billow in the slight breeze flowing through the open window, doing little to block out the sun. It’s around midday, but I just rolled out of bed a few minutes ago. Ezra doesn’t have a class until the afternoon, and apart from practice this morning, Vance is free for the entire day.
I’ve missed three classes so far today.
Finals start next week. I should be at those classes, if only to get one of the nerds to give me their notes. But it’s impossible for me to focus on anything right now.
I take another scalding gulp of the coffee. It’s as much as I can stomach right now. I’m not hungry, even though I’m closing in on sixteen hours without a meal.
All I want is a fucking smoke.
I run my hands through my hair. “How long is this going to take?” I hiss.
Ezra’s dark eyes snap to my face. “As long as it takes to find out what those motherfuckers are up to,” he says, not even bothering to hide the contempt in his voice. “You’re in a shit mood. I thought your little reconnaissance mission last night would have fixed this.”
I put my arms on the table. “I thought so too, but…” I say, one of my hands drifting to my sore nose. Fortunately, Tara didn’t break it. There’s only some slight bruising now. “She said it wasn’t her.”
“And you believe her?”
I nod slowly. “Yes, that’s the fucked up part.”
I’m still stuck on the fact that I let Alize’s real name slip from me in conversation to Tara. Had it happened with anyone else? If so, then all thiscouldbe my fault and I don’t think I can live with that.
But I don’t want to consider that yet.
Ezra narrows his eyes, shrugging. “I’ll see if anyone else has heard anything,” he begins. “Afterwe find out what Keller’s up to.”
There’s a warning in his voice, like he thinks I’m going off script to be so invested in getting Alize to believe I wasn’t the one who put her in danger. I have half a mind to toss my cup of coffee at him, but then I wouldn’t have anything to distract me.
Ezra wouldn’t understand. I’ve never seen him lose his bearings like this—not even when Keller slept with his girlfriend. Even in the throes of his supposed heartbreak, he was calm, calculating. He’s never experienced what Alize and I have.
He’s never been in love.
Another waterfall of hot coffee cleanses the thought from my brain. It’s still a hard thing to wrap my mind around, and I don’t know if I’lleverget comfortable with it. But I can’t deny it’s true anymore. I only ever feel alive around Alize.
I need things to go back to the way they were.
“Found it!” Vance exclaims.
Ezra and I look at him expectantly. He ruffles his hair and pops the collar of his varsity jacket. He’s smug, and I hope to god it’s a fucking good reason for it. Vance is just as tech-savvy as he is talented on the soccer field—if there’s something swimming around on the internet, he can find it. He’s a Computer Science major, after all.
“Well?” I urge. “Spit it out.”
“I found the connection,” he begins, his fingers gliding over the keyboard in snappy keystrokes. “I’ll share it with you guys. It’s the missing piece of the puzzle.”
A second later, my phone chimes with a notification—Ezra’s laptop makes the same sound as well. I click to accept the file Vance has sent.
There are three things in the folder.
Two newspaper articles and a picture.
