Micah might want me to sit around and do nothing, but after hitting Sterling the other day, I knew I had to do something. Of course, I roped in my best friends to help me out. It felt like I’d taken back my power, and I wanted to keep that momentum going. For days, I’d been chewing on the same question. What had happened that made Sterling hate Micah so much? My gut told me it was important I find out.
Who knew what Sterling had planned next, but I wasn’t about to twiddle my thumbs and wait for him to do something. At some point, he would stop using me to hurt Micah and would just go straight for the cause of his hatred.
My friends came prepared. Josie pulled out a case of booze she had stashed under her bed—not the least surprising thing to find under there. Ainsley grabbed her insane collection of black candles, lighting and placing them around the room, making it look like we were holding a seance or a witches' coven meeting. And Kenna brought the snacks. With all essentials covered, girls’ night was about to commence. It got me out of bed. It was a start.
The guys had their crew, and we had ours. They just didn’t know about ours.
Kenna hauled a platter and two bowls into the center of our room. “We need a name.”
“The moment we give this a name,” Ainsley began, sticking a finger in the air and circling it between us, “is when the guys find out.”
“She has a point,” Josie agreed, tossing pillows onto the floor for us to sit on.
The goal here was to uncover where his vendetta against Micah stemmed from, and to destroy anything Sterling might have in his possession to use in hurting or manipulating Micah.
Was this dangerous?
Probably.
Was it stupid?
Definitely.
Was I still going to go through with it?
Hell yes.
Candlelight flickered around the room as the four of us sat in a circle on the floor between Kenna’s and my bed. Josie passed out cans of Twisted Tea as Kenna opened a bag of tortilla chips and poured them onto the patter around two bowls of dip.
“Where the hell did you get guacamole and salsa?” I asked. Only Kenna would bring chips and dip as a snack. The rest of us were thinking popcorn, candy, the shit you get out of vending machines.
Not Kenna.
“I placed a carry-out order at the Mexican place just off campus. The one where everyone goes to get tacos,” she explained.
“Julio’s?” Ainsley supplied.
Kenna nodded, sending her dark ponytail swinging. “Yeah.”
We were straying way off topic, but that was pretty damn typical when the four of us got together. Our mouths flapped, one thing led to another, and before you knew it, what was supposed to be a serious powwow turned into a discussion about tacos.
It felt so normal that I didn’t even mind.
Popping the top on my warm tea, I took a swig before steering the conversation back on course. “First, let me say that none of you have to do this. If you’re just here for snacks, drinks, and to provide input, I’m completely cool with that. I promise we’ll still be friends.”
“Fuck that,” Kenna disputed, taking a chip and dipping it in the gauc. “This is ride-or-die. You’re either in or you’re out.”
“So eloquently put,” Josie mumbled, stretching out one of her legs to the side.
Setting the can between my legs, I tossed my hair up into a bun for some serious dipping. I was suddenly starved and secretly wished Kenna had gotten tacos too. I hadn’t had a decent meal in days.
Kenna tapped a nail against the side of her drink. “I think we’re all here for the same reason. No one hurts one of ours. It isn’t just one of us Sterling is fucking with. It’s all of us. And we’ve put this off long enough.”
True, seeing as last Friday I’d been drugged, an incident I both wanted to forget and remember for the rest of my life. It was a mindfuck. I wish there was a way to separate the two from my brain. My mind needed to compartmentalize. Get rid of the bad and hold on to the good. Except that even the amazing sex was tainted by the morning after.
Too bad my brain didn’t listen to my wants and needs. I swear to God, it had a mind of its own. My brain had a brain.
“Isn’t tonight the Chi Sigma secret rush event?” Ainsley asked, shoving a chip smothered in salsa into her mouth.