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“Is this the uncle the cops caught?”

“Yeah. I heard he died in jail, but I never followed up.”

“Hey,” she takes my hand, lacing her fingers into mine before I can hide inside myself again. She was right, she’s learned my triggers and tells—or at least most of them. “You wanna go to a petting zoo?”

Sure enough, there’s a nearby petting zoo. I take a million photos of Lexi feeding every animal she can. She even threatens to take one of the guinea pigs home, and I have to compromise by promising we’d get a dog. When we get back on the train, I’m exhausted. The late night and early morning finally hitting me and the next thing I know the train lurches to a stop and we’re back at Union Station. Lexi is asleep, her head resting on her crossed arms on the table, and I’m wrapped around her protectively.

“Morning, beautiful.”

“Afternoon, handsome. Ugh, I think my back is permanently fucked from that position.”

“Lucky for you I know some positions to loosen you right up,” I laugh, and she elbows me in the ribs. I still can’t get over how good it feels to laugh, to honestly laugh. “Okay,” I check my watch, “I think we can go to your place and pick up your stuff, have sex, go to my place, have sex again at least twice, and then mess around in the shower before we head out to Hell on Earth—I mean Malibu—for dinner with the Satans.”

“You are a menace! Don’t forget, we’re dog sitting at Chase’s house tonight since his brother is on a road trip.”

“You just want to fuck in his pool.” Before I can kiss her, my phone goes off, nearly falling off the table. I grab it just before it goes and flip it over. Steve’s calling me. He never calls.

“Hey Ste—” I don’t even get the rest of his name out.

“Dude, I’m in jail. You gotta come get me.”

“You’rewhat?”

I talk Steve down and finally figure out what’s going on, then agree to meet him as soon as I can. I hang up and shake my head. “I need to cancel all the fun we had planned. Steve got pulled over last night on the way home and the cops arrested him. They impounded his car, and he’s a fucking mess. They just let him out.”

“Why did they arrest him?”

“He said they let him go, claiming it was a mistaken identity issue or something. Fucking Elle, more than likely.”

“She can do that?”

“She can…and she already hates Steve. I wish I knew what the fuck she was up to.”

“I’ll text my mom that we can’t make it.”

“No, it’s fine. We’ll go back to my place, I’ll go take care of Steve, and meet you at your parent’s place.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah. We’ll get through dinner, go feed Lulu and Pongo, and after that I’ll do all kinds of dirty things to you in that stupidly big shower of his.” I kiss her and get up to gather our things. “It will be payback for him not being in town to help me with Steve.”

CHAPTER32

PAINT IT, BLACK

CIARA

I checkmy phone again for what has to be the hundredth time, and I know my mother has noticed. James said he’d be here by now, but he’s not answering his texts or calls and it’s making me nervous. I don’t have Steve’s number and calling Chase is useless since he’s in Atlanta. I’m not worried he’s having another episode, but I am worried something else has happened.

So many people have lied to me, this shouldn’t surprise me. Broken promises to be there and failed to show. My father promised he’d see me after school. My ex promised he’d help me move out of my parent’s house. My new boyfriend stands me up for dinner with my parents. The problem is, this time it doesn’t feel right. Not after the time we’ve been spending together. It doesn’t make any sense.

“So, I invited your new…friend. Where is he?”

“He had to work late.”

“Mmmhmm. So he stood you up?”

“No, Mother. He had some important photos that had to be processed tonight so they could be delivered to the client first thing in the morning.” I lie.