Inferno Anthology (115 page)

I hold up the hot pink giraffe we lugged home. “And what will we tell, Lucy?”

“Lucy?” She bats her lashes at me, and it takes all of the restraint in the universe not to kiss her. Oh, hell—I bend down and kiss her, long and strong, right here outside the door to our apartment, and I swear to God I can hear Cole sharpening the kitchen knives from inside. I pull back slowly, and my lips hold their puckered position a moment longer than necessary. “I thought she looked like a Lucy, but if you prefer Zelda we can negotiate.” I give a crooked grin.

“Lucy it is.” She takes the overstuffed giraffe and hugs her.

We head in, and, so far, the coast is clear, no sign of Cole or his many concubines.

Baya drops her bags on the floor and pulls a pen off the counter. She heads over to the scoreboard and pauses as she studies my side of the wall with a renewed interest.

“Whoa.” I speed over but not before she adds a single tally mark toward the bottom. “You don’t belong up there.” I twist my lips at the sight.

“Oh, yes, I do. I
earned
my spot, and I won’t let you take it away from me.” She gives a little wink.

“Here.” I swipe the pen from her and draw a heart around the line she inscribed. “We should at least get it right. I mean, you
are
the last.”

“Really?” It comes from her weak, as if it were the last thing she expected.

“Yes, really.” I brush my hands over her hips and brazenly steady her in front of me. “There’s no one else for me but you, Baya. This is it,” I whisper. “I’m all in.”

She melts into me and wraps her arms around my neck. “I love you so much,” she whispers with tears glittering in her eyes.

“I love you, too.” I launch an all-out viral assault over her mouth as our teeth graze over one another, our tongues lash out with something just this side of anger. There’s no way I’m going to be able to sleep at night knowing she’s less than ten feet away in the next room. It’s not right. She should be safe in my arms as often as possible and, for damn sure, at all hours of the night.

The door to Cole’s room rattles, and Baya launches across the room like a missile. By the time I look over she’s lounging on the couch reading a book—spinning it until its right side up. It’s Cole’s hunting and surviving in the wilderness manual—something that I’m going to need once he gets wind of what happened between his sister and me.

“You’re back.” Cole struts out, looking like hell, and I peer into his bedroom for evidence of a female suitor, but nothing. “You have fun? How’s Annie?” He heads into the kitchen with his hair sticking up in the back, his body stuttering forward like he just got electrocuted. It’s obvious he just woke up. Maybe he’s slept through the weekend?

“Annie is great. Just dropped her off. We did nothing but watch lame chick flicks all weekend. How about you?”

“Chicks and flicks, just like you bro, but I did it a hell of a lot better.” He plucks a beer from the fridge and pauses once he spots Baya. “Hey, kid, you’re back, too.”

Baya cuts a glance over to me. I can tell it frustrates her when he treats her like she’s twelve. Of course, my body can attest to the fact she’s all woman, perfectly functioning in every capacity, sweet as sugar in all the right spots, and now I’m hungry for more.

“Yeah, well, I’ve been here for a while. Thanks for noticing.”

Cole tilts his head as if he’s ready to call bullshit. He looks back at me and over to her as if he’s doing the math, and I pretend not to notice.

Fuck.

“What the hell’s that thing in the corner?” He nods over to Lucy, our overstuffed lovechild. “It looks like it’s getting ready to attack.”

Baya bites down over her lip as if she’s holding back a laugh.

“I got lucky this weekend.” She lets her words linger in the air, and I drink them down, enjoying the hell out them right to the dregs in front of her pompous brother of all people. “I won it in a raffle. I guess I can donate it if you hate it.” She gives me a quick wink.

“No, it’s fine.” Cole seems pleased that Baya brought a toy to the apartment thus firming up his theory she’s the mental equivalent of a thirteen-year-old. “It’s kind of cute. Does it have a name?”

“Lucy.” Her pink tongue twitches between her lips when she says it, and my dick perks to life, wagging in her direction—begging her to come out and play. If my dick had a mental age, it’d probably be about thirteen too, not that Baya is. She’s miles ahead of me in that department. Why the hell can’t Cole see her for the intelligent person she is? I really don’t get it. It’s not like I’m busy coddling Annie.

Cole takes a seat on the stool with a bowl of cereal under his chin as if it’s always been there. “Aubree Vincent dropped by.” He narrows his brows into her. Cole has the big brother intimidation factor down to a science. “She said they had a couple of dropouts last minute, and you were eligible to rush.” He swallows hard. Cole looks hurt, vulnerable, and, for the life of me, I can’t figure out why.

“Really?” She looks to me as she considers this. “Maybe I will.” She glances back at her book. “Maybe I won’t.”

“Well, you can’t stay here.” Cole drinks down his milk from the side of the bowl. “You’ll finish your back off sleeping on that thing, not to mention what you’re doing to the couch.”

“Gee, thanks.” Baya pinches her lips to the side. “I guess if you really don’t want me here, I can always go back to Jeanie.”

“Speaking of Jeanie—I put a complaint in at the dorm.” Cole gets up and dumps his bowl in the sink like it’s no big deal and grabs another beer from the fridge.

“You
what
?” Baya jumps off the couch and springs over to his side, good and pissed. “What the hell did you do that for? She’s going to hate me now.”

“Relax.” He darts around her and heads to the couch. “She doesn’t even know who the hell you are. Besides, it’s not cool that she’s disrespecting you like that. Even
I
have the decency to shut the door.” He raises his beer at me.

Baya boils over. “Cole, you can’t just do things like that behind my back. I can fight my own battles.”

“Oh yeah?” He bears into her stern as shit. “Then why are you here?”

Baya sucks in a breath that tells him to fuck off far better than words can.

“You’re nothing but an asshole.” She picks up her purse and storms out the door.

“Baya!” he shouts after her, but she’s long gone. He looks over at me visibly pissed. “What?”

“Go easy, will you?”

“I can’t dude.” Cole blows a breath through his cheeks. “She’s been lying to me.”

“What do you mean she’s been lying to you?” My gut flinches like I just got sucker punched.

“There was no fucking book club weekend getaway. When Aubree came and I told her where Baya went, she said she went over to the dorm because she wanted to drop in on them and tell her the good news herself. She came back in less than fifteen minutes to let me know there was no book club. She asked if she was seeing anyone—trying to insinuate that Baya was hiding some guy.” He shakes his head.

Fucking Aubree. My blood pressure skyrockets as my adrenaline kicks in. She knew exactly where the hell Baya went, and she decided to start shit. A part of me wants to storm off and shake her, and, yet, the other part, the part that still has a foot in the past will never forget the day she looked me in the eye and said,
You did this—you took away my best friend.

“Anyway”—Cole flops on the couch—“so, I went over to Prescott and found Jeanie bent over her desk with Stuart Saunders of all people.”

Stuart was our third roommate a few years back before we found out he was helping himself to our wallets. He’s damn lucky to still have air in his lungs, let alone the equipment necessary to bend Jeanie over.

“It’s no surprise. That girl has always had bad taste.” I snap a water bottle off the counter and take a seat across from him. “She slept with
you
didn’t she?”

“You, too if I remember correctly—on multiple occasions. Anyway, turns out, Baya wasn’t lying about Jeanie. I tried to see if they could pair her with a freshman, but Prescott’s full. If she doesn’t get into Alpha Chi, we’ll be stuck with her the rest of the year.”

I shake my head at the thought. Little does Cole know, I won’t mind one bit.

I’m hoping to be “stuck” with Baya Brighton for the rest of my life.

Baya

The sky above Whitney Briggs is a colorful palate of pinks and golds. Fall has come, full force, with the temperature dipping way past the sweater zone and into the cocoon-me-in-a-down-parka territory. I speed over to Prescott like I actually have someplace to go, and with each step it feels as if I’ve tucked a sandpaper tampon high up inside me—a half a dozen of them at least that have been soaked in kerosene and lit with a match. I was a little thankful when Bryson’s mother shouted she was back from the other side of the door this morning. I used it as an excuse to hit the shower, but, truthfully, I don’t think I could have stood another round of rock the cock without having medicated myself with a morphine drip first. I whimper a little because that’s how its going to be in the future, me running from the sword dangling from his legs, and him trying to lure me back to the bedroom by way of higher power pharmaceuticals. I knew I’d be sore, but this was too unfathomable for me to have ever imagined. It’s hard to believe other girls go through this all the time. I
want
to have sex with Bryson again, it’s just that I’m not a big fan of having a blowtorch shoved up my nether region. And now I’m plain scared spitless to go there again.

Prescott comes up on my right, and I pause—too humiliated to step inside.

Freaking Cole. It’s embarrassing to hear how he “handled” things for me while I was away. Who the hell cares that Jeanie Waters is trying to launch herself into Guinness by way of her love glove? I certainly don’t give a flying fuck—and believe me I’ve seen her attempt “flying fucks”—it’s
so
not pretty. Even Thing One and Thing Two looked terrified. Clearly they were unwilling participants in the failed acrobatics.

I head into Prescott and head up to Roxy’s room hoping she’s around.

The cat with its blunt F.U. greets me until the door finally opens revealing a puffy-faced rendition of Roxy that I hardly recognize.

“What happened?”

She lets me in and I spot Laney sitting on the bed, Indian style.

“Baya!” Laney jumps up and offers a quick hug. “Did you get laid?”

I scoff at her dime store description of what happened this weekend, but I won’t indulge her with all the dirty details until I find out if Roxy is okay.

“More like rammed with a backhoe, but what the hell happened to you while I was gone?” I pluck a tissue off the desk and offer it to Roxy. The light from the window falls over her magenta highlights and makes her look even more gorgeous than she already is.

“Bad break up.” Laney nods. “She’s been dating Aiden Ryerson for the last three years. They like to break up now and again to keep things interesting.”

I tick my head back a notch. I’m pretty sure no one signs up for that type of misery, at least not willingly.

“So, what happened?” I ask.

“Same thing as last time,” Laney offers. “He
cheated
.”

“That’s terrible!” I can’t imagine how hurt I’d be if Bryson did that to me. Of course, I’d go into a psychotic rage at first and mutilate his reproductive organs, but I’m sure once I settled into prison life, I’d be pretty damn hurt.

Roxy takes a seat on the bed and starts to bawl. I lean in and rub her back while Laney rolls her eyes as if it were unrequited drama taking place.

“Don’t bother feeling sorry for her.” She makes a face. “Once a cheat always a cheat.” Laney plucks at Roxy’s arm until she’s looking at her. “Don’t waste this opportunity. This can be a totally empowering moment in your life if you let it. You need to embrace the pain. You should write this new skank a thank you note for finally opening your eyes to what an asshole this guy has been all along.” Laney’s curt demeanor is doing nothing to soften the blow, but I don’t dare tell her.

“She’s right,” I whisper to Roxy while pulling back her heavy curtain of hair. “I bet there’s a special guy out there just waiting to meet you. Someone who will love you with all his heart and soul.” Last night comes back to me in snatches, and I cinch my legs together with a rush of pleasure. “He’ll come to you at the right time.” A vision of Bryson bounces through my mind as he trembled over me while my insides tore apart at the seams.

“And in the meantime?” She darts a look in my direction with her eyes like two red nests.

“I don’t know.” I glance around, and her laptop catches my attention. “Watch YouTube. You can log all kinds of insane hours watching kittens sleep and…Meerkat soaps—trust me Meerkats can be much better to spend time with than people.” God—note to self: discover new ways to cheer friends the hell up without dragging poor defenseless mammals into the equation.

“Yes!” Laney bounces into Roxy. “I spent all day yesterday watching an entire season of
Downton
Abbey
—
of course it was a remake with Legos which only made it that much more fascinating.”