He glances over his shoulder. “Ah. Sorry. You can wait out there if you want.”
“What the hell…who are you watching?” On the screen there were four people having sex. And one person was watching, curled up on a couch against the wall. There was something about her that was familiar. Long red hair, pale skin… “Is that…?”
He jams his finger against the keyboard and all the windows flip to his desktop. “Never mind.”
“I don’t want to know, do I?”
He shrugs. “We do crazy things for love, man.”
“Speaking of crazy, I’m in the mood to shoot, you interested?”
“Sure.”
We’re all members of an indoor range below an office building on K Street. Officially, there aren’t any indoor ranges in the District of Columbia. Unofficially, this one is close and convenient and very protective of its members’ privacy.
Only the Secret Service has a better deal, and that’s because their ammo is free.
Sometimes we get creative, but today I just want to unload my Browning High-Power a few hundred times. Wilson surprises me by pulling out a light Ruger SR22.
“Doing some plinking?” I ask as he shoots me the finger.
“It’s a gift,” he mutters.
“For the redhead?” It’s still bugging me how familiar she looked.
“Forget you saw her.”
“Deal.” I don’t need to worry about his woman problems. I’ve got my own. “You wrapped up in her?”
“Yeah. It’s complicated.”
“Isn’t it always?”
He blinks at me. “Is it?”
“Has been for me.”
“I wouldn’t know. I’ve never…done this before.”
I don’t think he’s talking about stalking a woman and sending her a gun. For Wilson Carter, that’s probably a textbook definition of romance right there.
“I have. Fucked up my entire life. I’m pretty adamant about not doing it again.”
“That why we’re shooting today?”
I shrug. “Yeah. Maybe.”
“Who is she?”
I could tell him.
“Nobody needs to know, right?”
“This is our secret.”
No, I couldn’t. “Someone I met at Georgetown.”
“A student?”
“Yeah.”
He gives me a look that says everything I’ve been thinking. I’m fifteen years past the point of dating co-eds. But one in particular has dragged me back into the land of flirting and teasing and hook-ups just for fun.
No drama, no worries.
“She’s good for me,” I finally say, loading my pistol. “Now let’s see how many paper bad guys we can kill.”
—thirteen—
Alison
Scott didn’t come over last night.
That should be fine, because I promised him—and myself—that we were just having fun. No expectations.
But I’m still bummed.
So when my phone vibrates at my feet, ten minutes into my Research Methods class, I try to ignore it.
I try hard.
I last twenty seconds, tops, before I drop my pen and lean over to “pick it up,” sneaking a glance at my phone in the process.
S: Sorry I went radio silent yesterday. Something came up. Heading to New York for a few days.
I stare at the screen, considering my options for responding. Really, there’s only one thing to say.
A: No prob. Travel safe. Text when back.
My instructor’s voice jerks me back to the class. “Ms. Reid, does whoever you’re texting have something to share on this subject matter?”
I shove my phone in my bag, my cheeks flaming red as I straighten up. “I’m sorry, Professor. It won’t happen again.”
“See that it doesn’t. And what assessment issues do you see in this particular example?”
I blink at the white board. Shit. In front of me, Corey clears his throat and taps on his notebook. In big, block letters, he’s written objectives=measurement=assessment. A wave of relief rolls over me.
“They could correlate more closely to the objectives. It’s not necessarily a fair measurement tool.”
The instructor narrows her eyes at me, but then nods and moves on. I ignore my bag for the remainder of the class, and sag in relief when we’re released.
“Thank you,” I whisper, leaning over Corey’s shoulder. “You just saved my butt.”
“It’s a butt worth saving,” he teases, turning his head to look at me. I give him a reproachful look. “I know, and it’s not a butt that’s interested in me at all.”
“And we don’t talk about that, right?” It’s too weird, how Corey brings that up from time to time. I lust after Scott incessantly, painfully, and I almost never bring it up with him.
Okay, maybe I’m being too hard on Corey.
So when he laughs and stands up, I stand up, too. We’re friends.
And when he says, “You can make it up to me by coming to the casual mixer on Friday night,” I say yes, because we’re friends.
I’m not going to sleep with Corey, but I can hang out with him.
I sling my arm around his waist. “We’ll find you a nice girl on Friday night. Okay?”
He shrugs. “Okay.”
If only Scott were this easy to handle.
— —
No more texts from Scott the rest of the week means that come Friday, I’m ready to party—as hard as senior level poli sci nerds go, which isn’t that hard.
I get to McAllister Lounge shortly after eight, armed with bourbon and Coke and a jumbo bag of party mix. The social space on the top floor is unofficially reserved for upper years, and tonight someone has paid for a bouncer who is checking ID.
That’s a problem.
I linger toward the back of the line, waiting for a glimpse of Corey. I might be the only senior who’s not legal yet, and I don’t want to put the bouncer in the awkward position of kicking me out if it can be avoided.
A girl three people ahead of me in line doesn’t have her wallet. “Seriously?” she protests, hands on her hips. Tits out. Not a bad plan. “I walked over from my dorm.” She waved her lanyard at him. “Anyone here can vouch for me. I take Modern International Relations with Saxon. Sax! Bud!”
It totally works. Saxon comes over and flashes his “my daddy’s a senator” smile, and the girl is in. Anabeth? Anabelle? Whatever, she’s in, it worked for her, I’m totally trying it. I shove my wallet deep into a skinny pocket inside my backpack, beneath the package of tampons I keep there, and hope that if Bouncer Guy decides to look inside my bag he doesn’t want to dig past the lady supplies.
Before I get to the head of the line, Corey bounces into my side. “You made it!”
“Of course I did.”
“You usually don’t.”
“But I owed you.” I winked at him.
“You wound me. That’s the only reason you’re here, isn’t it?”
Since I’m hoping Scott might be back tonight…yeah. “I promise, this is as exciting as my social life gets.”
He snickers, slinging his arm around my shoulders. “You didn’t get the party gene that your sister got?”
I stiffen and shrug off his arm. “Leave that alone.”
“Shit. Sorry.”
“It’s okay. Just…not funny.”
“Too soon?”
“Yep.” We’re at the head of the line and I give the bouncer my student card. He looks me up and down. “Driver’s license?”
“Don’t have one,” I say with a warm, apologetic shrug. “But I promise I’m in my final year. I’ve got the study lines to prove it.” I point at my eyes and squint.
He snorts and turns to Corey. “ID?”
Corey hands over his license and we’re waved in. I add my drinks to the communal table and rip open the bag of party mix. Anabeth or Anabelle squeals about how much better pretzels are when they’re mixed in with the other stuff—“‘cause they get the powder on them! Ohmygod!”—and I’m reminded why I don’t usually party hard.
Or at all.
I pour a big drink and find a seat in the middle of the room. Trick learned from being raised in a family of extroverts heavily involved in politics: it’s easier to hide in plain sight and let the conversations swirl around you. If you hug the wall, someone well-meaning and totally clueless will try to drag you into a conversation you don’t want to participate in. Or even worse—introduce you to someone they think will be your new bestie.
Always super awkward. Easier to dive right into the middle and just go to the happy place in your head while people talk at you.
I pull out my phone, but Corey snatches it out of my hand. Where did he come from?
“Seriously? Are you doing some reading?”
“No.” I snatch it back. “And don’t touch my stuff.”
“Don’t be antisocial.”
I glance at my messages. The exchange I got busted for in Research Methods is the last communication I’ve had with Scott. I take a deep breath and put the phone on silent. “Fine. I’ve turned it off for the night, are you happy?”
He grins. “I will be once we start dancing.”
I roll my eyes. That is so not happening. I turn to Saxon. “Hey, do you have your summer research project lined up?”