The Lover's Game(41)

“You’re right,” I replied, unconvinced. “I should give up on fun altogether.”

“That’s not what I meant. But drinking yourself into a stupor so you didn’t even recognize the devil? That’s...”

Figuring that Sylvie would go on for a while, I stopped listening. As I crossed my legs on the bed, I noticed a blue bruise on my thigh, and I realized it must have happened when I stumbled. Fuzzy images began to flood my mind.

Even though I hadn’t realized it was him, Jett had managed to break my fall. I remembered the way the stranger had held me, his arms wrapped around my waist, his hot breath on my face as he said something I couldn’t remember. While I knew for a fact that I had barely had one and a half cocktails and the alcohol might have wreaked havoc on my body, was it enough to make me believe I was in a dream and cause trouble remembering specific details such as the events after my fall?

Possibly.

However, not likely.

And why had I kept seeing a wolf? It must have been some kind of hallucination, brought on by Jett’s intimidating flair.

The question that bothered me the most was why spin a concoction of phantasms rather than just recognize Jett? Sylvie was right: Even under the influence of alcohol, that part made no sense.

I closed my eyes, because I couldn’t believe what I was about to say. “Jett asked if I was high. It didn’t strike me as odd at the time, but now...” I opened my eyes. My gaze scanned the room before settling on the bucket, and a horrible thought crossed my mind.

Sylvie spoke out the obvious first. “You think your drink was spiked?” she asked, narrowing her eyes. I grimaced but didn’t respond. “Do you think he would—”

I shook my head, horrified at the thought. “No. That wasn’t Jett. Gina bought all the drinks.” I paused long enough to notice Sylvie’s frown, then added, “She’s someone I met at work.”

“I see,” Sylvie said, deep in thought.

I didn’t like the look on her face and almost feared what she’d say next, but to my surprise, she just leaned back on the bed for a minute.

“Back when we were in college, my mom always had that irrational fear that we’d get into drugs, remember?” Sylvia finally said.

I nodded, unsure of where she was going.

“It didn’t exactly help that some guy smoked pot in the communal kitchen right before my mom popped in for a surprise visit,” Sylvie continued.

I grinned, remembering the scene vividly. Her mother had been livid, and back then, I was sure I’d never see Sylvie again. She never told me how she managed to diffuse that bomb.

“She bought a couple home drug-testing kits to detect the presence of common street and prescription drugs—you know, the usual, like ecstasy, amphetamines, opiates, and that stuff.”

“Really?” I stared at her, open-mouthed. “I didn’t even know they make such a thing. No wonder you never told me.”

Sylvie waved her hand, her expression betraying her annoyance. “Wait, that’s not all. Whenever she made one of her surprise visits, which was often, she insisted that I do the test. If I refused she’d cut off my allowance.” She grimaced, and her expression darkened just a little more. “Anyway, my point is that the test is 99.9 percent accurate. Were it not for the negative results, my mom never would have believed I wasn’t taking anything because she has this unnerving tendency not to trust anyone, including her own daughter.”

“Wow. Your mom...” I shook my head in disbelief. “I don’t blame her for what she did though. We used to party pretty hard.”

“Yeah, like crazy.” Sylvie let out a high laugh as her expression adopted that faraway look that screamed she was being transported back to a different time in our lives. “Anyway, I still have a kit in my room. If you unknowingly took any drugs in the past forty-eight hours, we can know for sure within a few minutes. So...” She looked at me, surveying me for a moment. “Are you up for it?”

“What? Now?”

“Yeah, now.” She jumped up and pulled me to my feet. “It’s probably expired, but we could still give it a shot.”

I nodded, even though the idea wasn’t exactly appealing. How would I react if the test came back positive? What could I possibly assume other than that Gina might be into drugs and that she might have thought she was doing me a favor, helping me loosen up? It wasn’t unusual or unheard of. I had grown up in an area where teens offered others drugs, because they assumed their friends wanted to give them a try, too. But would Gina do that without even asking me? I just couldn’t believe she’d sneak it on me, without even telling me.