Curiosity has me turning it on, and although I get a low battery warning, the screen lights up and asks for the passcode.
Since the code on the phone I have is set as my birthday, I try that first, and when it unlocks, I feel my heart sink.
This phone must be Corey’s. It’s hidden in his room and has my birthday as a code. I just can’t figure what he’d need it for or why he’d kept it a secret.
Sitting on his bed, I start reading through his messages. There only seems to be one sender, and he hasn’t got their number stored under a name. I click to open one of the image files sent, and when a picture of a naked woman comes up, I quickly place the phone on the bed, screen down so I don’t have to see it.
What the hell…? There has to be some kind of mistake. This phone can’t be his; Corey paid no interest in other girls. He wouldn’t have spoken to one the way these messages are reading.
I manage to pull together enough courage to pick up the phone, and as I scroll through the messages between him and whoever this girl is, it becomes very clear that they had something between them.
Almost all the messages are sexual, and there's more than just one inappropriate picture of her.
I feel tears building in my eyes when I get to the messages between them that mention me. How could he do that? How could he discuss our private, intimate details with this woman who, by the way, looks like she could be one of the whores from the club?
I’m too shocked by what I’m seeing to believe it’s true. Corey loved me; he was so patient and committed. He wouldn’t have spoken to another girl about our relationship the way he has inthese messages, and there's no way he would have had sex with someone else.
What I’m reading sounds as if it’s been written by a completely different person from the one I knew.
I scroll to the start of the messages, finding the one where they arranged to meet, and when I type the address she’d given him into my own phone, I see that it’s an apartment above a bar on the outskirts of the city.
The area isn’t nice. My dad’s always warned me about going there, but I guess these days I’m done doing what my daddy tells me.
I jump when I hear a horn blast outside. Alicia must be here already, so I quickly scramble through the rest of Corey’s drawers until I find the jeans I’m looking for. Then, putting them on, I take the phone with me and head outside to meet her.
“Morning.” Alicia’s wearing a sassy smile and looking at me over the roof of her car when I step out the door. Vike nods his head at me from where his bike is pulled up behind her, and when the phone in my hand feels as if it’s burning through my skin, I know we won’t be heading to the club like we planned. I’m going to have to investigate what all this was about.
“I don’t know if this is a good idea.” Alicia looks up at the building, the maps on my phone directed us to, and when there’s a sharp tap on the glass of her window, she lowers it so we can hear what Vike has to say.
“I thought you went off track to get food. We can’t be here.” Vike pokes his head through the window, looking really pissed off.
“I’m sorry, but there's a girl who lives here that I need to speak with. She was messaging Corey before he died, and I want to know who she was to him.” I look between them both.
“I think it’s pretty obvious what she was to him, don’t you?” His eyes move up to the neon sign of a woman with her legs split open above the door, and Alicia gives him a stern look that makes him sulk off back to his bike, pressing his cell phone to his ear.
“Vike’s right, this place is…it’s seedy, Millie. I’m sure Trinity said she used to work here before she came to the club.” Alicia taps her fingers against her steering wheel, looking anxious.
“Alicia, I’ve just found out that all the promises Corey made me were lies. I really need to speak to this girl. So I can find out the truth.”
“But why?” she questions. “Corey’s dead. You and Dev are…Well, he made you his old lady, Millie. You don’t need to be here.”
“I need her to explain all this because this behavior wasn’t like the Corey I knew. He wouldn’t have done this to me,” I assure her. “You don’t have to wait if you don’t want to. I’m fine going in by myself.”
“As if I’m going to let that happen, and Vike isn’t gonna let either of us go in there without him either. We’re all in this together.” Alicia takes a deep breath and gets out of the car. “Come on, we’re going in,” she calls over to him, slamming her door and looking in full control.
“Going in?” Vike’s eyes widen as he quickly hangs up the phone. “Alicia, I don’t need to tell you what kinda bar this is, and we…The Souls got no influence over this joint like they have the others around town.”
“Influence?” Alicia looks as confused as I am.
“A lot of places like this one pay the club for protection. The owner of this place don’t. Let’s just go back to the club andleave this for Dev to deal with.” Vike talks to Alicia as if I’m not standing right here next to them.
“This isn’t for Dev to deal with,” I tell them. “One of the girls who works here was sleeping with Corey while I was with him. I need to speak to her.”
“Millie, I don’t mean to be insensitive, but she’s just a whore; it’s what whores do.” Vike scratches his beard, looking more and more nervous.
“They were talking like they were friends.” I hear the sadness in my own voice as his betrayal cuts me a little deeper.
“A whore will talk to ya however you want her to,” Vike sighs. “Please talk this through with Dev first, he ain’t gonna be happy about you being here.”
