Page 26 of Yesterday I Cared
She thinks for a second, eating a spoonful of ice cream before her eyes light up. “Oh, my god, Bryce started this new thing whenever he works out…”
And that’s how I spend the rest of my night, hearing my very happy friends talk shit about their boyfriends. For the first time in a long time, I get to tell my own woes from the world of dating apps. It almost feels like we’re back in high school or college with the whole world ahead of us. A movie about the power of sisterhood in whatever form it takes plays in the background, and I realize how lucky I am to have these ladies in my corner.
Mia has been avoiding me more than usual. Which is saying something because her normal level of avoidance is pretending like I’m dead. But this is different, because when she’s not avoiding me, I keep finding her watching me with an unreadable look on her face, like I’m a puzzle she’s trying to solve. It’s a look I’ve seen her make before, but to have it directed at me specifically is unnerving.
“Is everything okay with Mia?”
Carter looks up from his stopwatch to glance over at where she’s pointedly not looking at me now and shrugs. “I think so. She’s been normal with me.”
“Well, that’s not something I can measure up with, is it?” He frowns at me. “Come on, Carter, you know she hates me. Normal for you would be a miracle for me.”
“All I know is that she and Josie crashed at our house the other night for a girl’s night. She was fine in the morning—maybe a little quiet, but overall fine.”
Frowning, I glance back at Mia, only to find her no longer there, and looked back to Carter. “All right, thanks, man.”
He nods, already turning his focus back to the stopwatch and the kids in the water before I walk away. Emmie is supposed to be herein about half an hour for her next private lesson, and I have some prep to do, anyway.
When I enter the lobby, Josie smiles at me, and I know she’s probably the only person with answers. “Hey, Josie.” I lean against the counter, grinning down at her. “Is there anything going on with Mia I should know about?”
Her smile falters and I worry she’s not going to tell me anything. Neither one of them is ever willing to betray the other, which is something I find admirable, but don’t see how it could matter in this situation. It’s not like she’d be betraying her trust too badly.
Still, I don’t want to force her to tell me something she’s not comfortable sharing. I stand straighter. “Never mind. It’s not a big deal; I was worried.”
“She didn’t know you are the founder and president of Operation Fly.” I lean back against the counter, frowning slightly. “Kat and I were talking about it the other night when we were hanging out. She overheard and asked about it. Honestly, I thought she knew the whole time and didn’t want to talk about it because of whatever happened between you two.”
There are a lot of things Mia doesn’t know, but despite Bryce’s comment when I first saw Emmie, I didn’t think this was one of them. “She really didn’t know?”
“I know, right?” Josie replies. “She was always the one doing research on things we should support, and she dug deep, making sure it was something we believed in. The only thing I can think of is that it was gaining traction as we were making our exit.”
Or she somehow knew it was me behind it and chose not to support it. “Maybe.”
Josie must sense my uncertainty because she’s shaking her head. “She really didn’t know, Ronan. Trust me, Mia can keep a lot ofthings concealed, but she cannot lie to me when I ask her something. She has a tell.”
“A tell?” I don’t want to use the information against Mia, but if I knew what her tell was, I could figure out if she’s being truthful about Omaha not being the real issue. “What kind of tell?”
“Absolutely not.” And just like that, Josie was back to being the defensive best friend. “I am not telling you that. She considers it a sign of weakness.”
And the last thing Mia wants to do is let her guard down around me. “That’s fair. Thanks for the information, Josie.”
Her grin is back in place. “No problem.”
Every time I talk to Josie, their friendship makes more and more sense to me. Mia’s seen as the badass who’s unafraid of anything, but there’s a spark of that in Josie, too. The way she can bounce from a stone wall of protection to openly happy and warm can be startling. She might be underestimated, but she can easily hold her own.
As I’m heading up the stairs to my office, I pass Mia. She pointedly doesn’t look at me, which isn’t surprising. The part of me that’s always tempted to push her buttons—see how long we can go before I push her too far—wants to make a comment, but I refrain.
She comes to a stop a couple of steps ahead of me, hazel eyes narrowing in such a glare that there’s no green to be seen, only the thick dark ring surrounding it. “Let me guess, Josie told you?”
I slow to a stop, keeping a careful distance between us. “Told me what?”
“Don’t play innocent, Ronan. You know what I’m talking about.”
“I do, but I don’t see why you’re making a big deal out of it.” Maybe if I go easy on her, it’ll help ease the weird tension between us. “You didn’t know I run a national charity, and now you do. It’snot that big of a deal. I made sure to keep my name out of it as much as possible.”
“But that’s what I don’t get,” she snaps. “I know you, Ronan, you love the spotlight. Why wouldn’t you want your name all over it?”
Something in me snaps—something that’s been brewing from the moment I walked into this place. “Youdoknow me, Mia! You’re choosing to pretend you don’t by parroting the bullshit the media spread about me. Every media outlet but you.”
“Well, I’ve learned I’m blind to people sometimes.” She crosses her arms over her chest and in the V-neck maroon T-shirt she’s wearing, it’s hard to ignore the way it accentuates her breasts. I fight to keep my gaze from drifting down, but I can’t stop the quick peek, which makes a shriek leave Mia’s mouth. “Are you shitting me right now, Ronan?”
