Chapter Seven
Amir
Thenotesweregood.So good, I didn’t even look at my own as I wrote my report. This girl had been meticulous, with her bullet points and highlights. She went above and beyond, and it pissed me off. I couldn’t even explain why. It wasn’t guilt. I didn’t feel guilty over having this hold on Zadie. Not in the least. Hopefully she’d walk away at the end of the semester having learned to be more selective in who she let inside her. No more Elliott fucking Schiffers in her life or her bed.
Heels clicking upstairs turned my attention from the screen to the ceiling. She was up there now, getting ready to go out with us. That was after she’d cooked us dinner and folded my laundry. After she’d laughed with Julien, spoken softly to Marco, and barely looked at me. She’d barely looked at me since all this began, so that wasn’t new.
Every time she was in my house, ants crawled under my skin. She was toogood. Too sweet. Too pretty. Too smart. Being in the same room with her made me want to tear shit apart. My mind needed to be elsewhere, focusing on the fight I was facing in a couple hours, or, at the very fucking least, on the paper I was attempting to pound out, but every time those heels clicked, I was back to Zadie and all the ways she wastoo.
A cabinet slamming, followed by a grunt and clattering on the granite counter had me shutting off my laptop and striding into the kitchen.
Julien shoved Marco hard, knocking him back a couple steps. “Fuck off. That bitch ismine.”
“We both know you snuck down here last night and ate half a dozen,” Marco gritted out.
Julien thumped his chest. “I didn’t sneak. I marched my happy ass down here and ate all the crumbs. The crumbsyouleft on the counter afteryousnuck your ass down here.”
Marco clicked his tongue. “That’s only because I knew you’d be a sneaky little shit and keep all that lemony goodness to yourself. And I wasright.”
I slammed a hand down on the granite. “Enough. Do I live with toddlers? Look at you.” Shouldering them out of the way, I grabbed the plate holding the last lemon bar and stalked to the other side of the island. “If anyone’s eating this lemon bar, it's me. Pretty sure my pet baked it forme.”
I shoved the entire bar into my mouth, using my middle fingers.
Marco and Julien turned on me, looking prepared to murder me. It was Saturday night, we all had more important shit to be fighting over than baked goods, but none of us were backing down. Between the two of them, they’d packed away twenty lemon bars since Zadie had left them here last night.
“I hope you get nailed in the gut and spew lemon all over the place,” Julien sneered, but there was no real heat behind it. No doubt he’d enjoy the hell out of seeing me take a gut shot tonight, though.
Marco shook his head. “You never eat before a fight.”
I scrubbed my hand over my mouth. “Never had anything good to eat.”
Julien patted his stomach. “Gonna get fat and happy with that girl coming around every night, and I’m gonna love every minute of it. Maybe I’ll get her to make me my own dessert next time so I don’t have to share with you two assholes.”
“Never happening.” I slowly shook my head. “She’s here for me. You’re lucky I share what I do. That’s all you’ll ever get from her.”
Rubbing the top of his head, Marco exchanged a glance with Julien. “What about when you’re done with her?” he asked.
My fingers dug into my palms. “If that happens, we’ll talk about it then.”
Julien raised his eyebrows. “If? Are you thinking you’re going to have a human pet forever?”
“That’s not your concern.” The thing that sucked about knowing him since we were kids was he wasn’t intimidated by me. I could hold a gun to his head, tell him to get fucked, and he knew with one-hundred-percent certainty I’d never pull the trigger. Therefore, the glare I shot him only served to amuse him when anyone else would have been pissing their pants.
“You’re keeping that girl indefinitely?” Julien pressed.
“I’ll do whatever the hell I want with her. You don’t question me when I throw away an old pair of sneakers, don’t give me shit about her.”
Marco hissed. Julien glowered. “What the fuck? You’re equating Zadie to raggedy-ass sneakers?”
I folded my arms. “Zadie is my property, nothing more. What don’t you understand?”
Movement in the door had all three of us whipping our heads in that direction. Zadie was there, her cheeks flushed crimson, winding the hem of her shirt around her fingers. She looked all pretty and sad, and it churned a frothing ball of fire in my gut.
“Hey, I just wanted to let you know I’m ready to go when you are.” Teeth clamped on her bottom lip. “I’ll wait outside so you can finish up your conversation.”
She wasted no time darting toward the front door, and Marco groaned. “If she cries, I’m gonna be mad uncomfortable, man.”
“She knows where she stands in this situation.” I refused to be apologetic for anything I said. It wasn’t like I hadn’t said the exact same thing to Zadie’s face. “If she cries, it won’t be from anything I said.”