Noticing me, they freeze for a second.
“Hey,” I cut in, trying to sound casual. “We have a room.” I dangle the key.
Banks goes to stand, and in a seamless maneuver, he clasps the backs of Sulli’s thighs and hoists her up higher on his back as he rises to his feet.
Her lips part with heady breath. Her arm instinctively curves around his collar. Legs tightening around his muscular waist.
Banks has Sulli secure in a piggyback.
And my heart has stopped pumping blood. Because I can’t get over how she’s looking at him. Her eyes roam over Banks like he just made love to her in a motel parking lot.
A knot lodges in my throat.
Banks doesn’t have view of her face. He can’t even see her expression. Or the way she drinks in his hands that grip the bare flesh of her legs. He’s just hawkeyed on me, and slowly, he sets her feet on the ground.
For my sake.
Why does Banks have to be such a good dude? I wish he were a complete bastard so I’d have reason to separate them. To protect her.
I’m just the asshole keeping them apart.
“There’s only one key?” Banks asks.
“Just one,” I nod. Coming up to Sulli, I steal the Philly baseball cap off her head and try to fit in on mine, but it’s tight.
She smiles a little, and I tell her, “Banks and I will take the floor.”
Sulli passes me and Banks, then grabs a couple sleeping bags from the trunk. “If the bed is big enough, we can all just camp out on the mattress in sleeping bags.”
Banks’ hot gaze is on me. Waiting for me to make a decision. I am the leader, and I don’t want to make a big deal out of this right now.
She pauses in my silence. “If that’s…fucking cool with you?”
I wipe all thoughts about popping cherries and Sulli clean.
“Yeah, it’s cool with me.” I take the sleeping bags from her. “We’d need these anyway. Who knows what’s living in the sheets?”
She grimaces. “This is why camping is fucking superior.”
“Not a fan of motels?” Banks asks her and tosses me my backpack.
I sling it on.
“Tents are better,” she replies.
“Five-star resort hotels are even better,” I pipe in.
Banks cocks his head. “You are the bougiest of the three of us.”
“Can’t disagree,” I say easily, wanting to smile. But I keep replaying the way Sulli looked at Banks.
It stays with me as we all gather the rest of our overnight things. I lock up Booger, and we make the short trek to room 4.
When I open the door, the verdict is in.
One bed.
A full.
Not even a fucking queen mattress could come out and save this situation.
Banks and I sweep the room quickly for recording devices in the lamps and drawers, while Sulli drops her Patagonia backpack on the ground.
Coming out of the bathroom, I see her tear down the blankets and inspect the state of the sheets and mattress. “Um…fuck, what is that?” She inspects a stain with a cringe, then catches my gaze. “Hey, if you don’t mind, Kits, I think I’ll take the floor.”
“That bad?” I ask.
“It’s beyond fucking gross.” She assesses the room. “There’s enough space for all of us to crash on the ground, I think. I can grab the sleeping pads from the Jeep.”
“I’ll do it,” Banks says. “You said you wanted to shower.”
She must have told him that when I was grabbing the key.
She smiles, her cheeks and neck reddening. Absentmindedly, she runs her fingers through her hair but tugs on a tangle. “Yeah, thanks…I need to shampoo this mess.”
“Looks pretty to me.”
“Pretty dirty.”
“Nothing wrong with that, mermaid,” Banks says before he leaves.
She stares faraway at the closed motel door, at his shadow. And as soon as she turns to me, her smile falters. “What…?”
What expression am I even making? Horror? Concern? Jealousy? Some unknown emotion that keeps ravaging my insides? My stomach has coiled into a tight fist.
All I can say is, “You like him.”
It slams into me now more than ever before.
She really likes Banks Moretti. My friend.
That’s a good thing, Nine.
Sulli bends down to her duffel, resting near a dusty nightstand with a broken digital clock. “Yeah, I thought that was fucking clear when I told him it’d be cool if he took my virginity.”
What is air?
I’m barely breathing.
But I walk closer to Sulli. “I meant that you like him as more than just a friend.”
Her brows pinch, staring at the discolored carpet. Then she takes out a toiletry bag. Standing up, she faces me and steals her hat back, taking it off my head. “So what if I do?” She fits on the baseball cap. “It’s not like he likes me as more than a friend.”
I frown.
She doesn’t think Banks likes her?
Really?
I shift my weight. Sulli hasn’t realized he’s blatantly flirting with her. How? How is that fucking possible? It’s so obvious, it smacks me in the face on a daily basis.