Crushed (24 page)

Their
gaz
es tangled for a moment before she
retrieved her
wrist from him, darted insid
e and closed the door behind her
.

***

“Oh my gosh. I can’t believe I ate all that,” Lauren groaned. She pushed her
empty
plate away, slumped back in her seat and put her hands on her stomach.

“And I’m betting you’ll still get popcorn at the movie,” Emma said with a laugh.

“Well, yeah, that’s still a few hours away,” Lauren pointed out.

Luci was invited to spend another night with her new friends. Emma jumped right on
that and insisted on an impromptu girls’ night.
They’d met as soon as Cleo had gotten off of work. They
’d just finished devouring cheeseburgers and fries and had some time before the movie
started.

Her stomach flipped over when she
noticed Mia
was walking over to thei
r table. Really, of all of the people to have the misfortune of running into…

“Mia,” Lauren grumbled, “don’t start.”

“Start what?” she asked. Her eyes were all wide and overly innocent. “I was just coming
over to say hello.”

“Hello and goodbye,” Emma said. She matched
Mia’s
annoying
expression with one of her own.

“You don’t have to be so rude,” Mia shot at her.

“You’re one to talk,” Lauren shot back.

Mia sighed and looked contrite. “I know. I actually wanted to talk to Cleo about that.”

Cleo fought the urge to roll her
eyes.

Mia
shrugged. “Maybe I was out of line the other day. I mean, he just gave you a ride.
It wasn’t a big deal. I mean, he’s obviously moved on.”

“Obviously,” Cleo said as she
faked a smile.

“I mean, it’s just like Reece to help the less fortunate.”

“Right,” Cleo
said with a little nod.

“I mean, I’m sure he can’t help but feel sorry for you,” she said
amiably
. “The poor little pitiful
orphan.”

“Mia, go away,” Emma
snapped.

“I’m just saying Cleo and I both know how Reece is. How adorable he can be.
How sweet.
Especially when he does that thing where—”

Lauren snorted
, cutting her off
. “You mean the thing where he cringes at the sound of your voice? Or the thing where
he breathes a sigh of relief every time you walk away? Because yes, Mia, we are all
aware of how he does
that
,” she calmly replied.

“
There you go, being rude again,”
Mia admonished.

“We all know the only reason you’re standing here, making a fool out of yourself,”
Emma poi
nted out, “is because you’
re so insecure. Your relationship with Reece is a joke. You know it. We know it. Reece
definitely knows it.”

Mia bristled. “After what happened between us last night, I would have to disagree.”

Cleo knew she shouldn’t say it. She
shouldn’t
.
She hadn’t
intend
ed
to but the words fl
ew
from her
mouth anyway.

“Reece was with me last night.” The smug sm
irk
she
fe
lt
fighti
ng to come to life suddenly died
. She
realized that while he
had told her
he was going
straight home that was before she
had
worked so h
ard at pushing him away again. She had
told him to go back to
Melanie’s and maybe…maybe he ha
d.

But Mia’s smile falter
ed as fast as Cleo’s and she
kne
w he
ha
dn’t.

Her words sliced through the air. “I don’t believe you.”

Cleo
shrugged. “I don’t care.”

But Cleo knew they were both lying because she could see it in her eyes. Mia did believe
her. And even though Cleo didn’t want to
,
she
definitely
did
care.

She
want
ed
her to know.

But more than anything, she
just want
ed
her to leave.

“I don’t get you Mia.
I’ve never bothered you. I’ve never tried to be your friend or hang around you.
”
Cleo knew there would be no point. She was trash as far as Mia
was concerned. “You’ve always acted like I’m so far beneath you. And yet, you still
spend an awful lot of time going out of your way to harass me. Why can’t you
just leave me alone?”

Before Mia c
ould
respond Lauren cut in.

“Just
…G
o
. A
way,”
she
said as she made a shooing motion.
“No one wants you here. No one cares what you have to say. All you do is make yourself
look like a needy old hag. We all know the only reason you treat Cleo like you do
is because you feel so threatened by her.”

“You’re jealous Mia,” Emma chimed in.

“
Hardly
,” Mia said, her voice oozing derision.

“Definitely,” Lauren growled back. “Y
ou’re pathetic Mia. You’re mean and
vindictive
.
I
f Reece wasn’t so out of his head right now, he’d never even look twice at you.”

Cleo
cringed. That was harsh, even for Lauren.

She
could feel
Mia’s
gaze burning into her. She didn’t look up. She
b
usied herself tearing her
napkin into shreds. Afte
r all of the nasty comments Mia had made to her—about her
—
over the years, she tried telling herself she shouldn’t feel bad about what she
’d
just said. But she
d
id
.
Because it was mean and she
’d
let
her
emotions get the best of
her
.

“Seriously, Mia, get out of here,” Emma ordered. “You’re even stupider than I thought
if you really think you can come over here to
our
table and insult
our
friend right in front of us.”

“You’re right,” Mia said
lightly
, “you are all a complete waste of my time.”

“You were with Reece last night?!” Emma whisper-yelled once Mia had gone.

Cleo
glanced up. Both she and Lauren had huge smiles on their face.

“We were talking. That’s all. I swear.”

Lauren put her hands up. “Hey, I’m not judging. I’m all for you being with Reece.”

Cleo
sighed. “It wasn’t like that. It was more like…I think we were just getting some
closure.”

“Closure?” Lauren s
coffed
. “For there to be closure, you would have to be over. You two? Are far from over.”

Cleo just shrugged. She
didn’t want to argue.

When she
didn’t say anything Lauren started in again.

“So
guess where I’m going,” she commanded in an oddly airy tone
.
Cleo wasn’t sure why Lauren’s attention was direction solely at her and not on Emma.

“Where?”
she
asked
,
both her tone and her
expression mirroring the question.

“To the
Lightning’s
season opener,” Lauren admitted
with a grin.

“That game is always sold out,”
Emma said. H
er tone
was
laced with suspicion.

Lauren leaned across the table, her whole demeanor conspiratorial.
“Adam made me promise not to tell,” Lauren admitted. “So if I tell you, you have to
promise not to repeat it.”

Cleo
didn’t waste time pondering the irony of her statement. Or why
Lauren thought she
would be any more—l
ess?—trustworthy than she
herself
was. Cleo
simply said, “I promise.”

Lauren
treated
her friends to
a devious grin. “Okay. Apparently that class you h
ave? Community Participation?” Cleo
nodded. “Well, Reece made Adam trade projects. Only Adam didn’t want to trade projects.
Until Reece made him an offer he couldn’t refuse.”

“What offer?” Of course the memory of Reece pulling Adam off to the side
that day
flitted around in her
head.

Lauren
paused dramatically. “He gave Adam the tickets to opening night, the game against
the
Wolverines
a
nd
he let Adam pick the game against the
Maverick’s
. Because…” she paused longer this time, until
Cleo
made a motion for her to continue. Then she rolled her eyes—maybe she’d be
en waiting for
Cleo
to guess.
She
couldn’t.
She
didn’t want the answer to be what she was sure it was going to be
.
“Because he wanted you to have the project you wanted. Not the crap one he accidentally
got you guys signed up for.”

“
Awww
,”
Emma
cooed from beside her
. “That’s so sweet!”

Cleo
groaned.
“He can’t be doing things like that for me.”

Lauren smirked. “I’d like to see you try to stop him.”

Chapter 1
4

“You have got to get up Sweet Pea, we’re going to be late,”
Cleo said as she
gave Luci another shake.
Luci
had her own alarm clock
. B
ut she shut it off almost every morning, completely ignoring that it had gone off
at all.
She groaned
and burrowed down deeper under her covers
. “See, this is why I wanted you to stop staying up so late over summer break. It
just makes it harder to adjust once school starts. You nee
d to start going to bed earlier, starting tonight. And from now on, you should probably
start
setting out your clothes the night before, too.
”

“Fine,” she mumbled as she flung her covers off. Her normally big blue eyes were squinting
to keep out the sun.
She’d thrown off her blankets, but she made no move to actually get out of bed.

“Pancakes or waffles?”
Cleo asked as she
started to step out of the room. As usual,
their
mornings were rushed.

“Waffles,” she replied as she yawned hugely. She stretched, baring her midriff in
her almost too
-
small pajamas.
Cleo realized she
was going to need to remember to pick her up a new pair. Maybe next paycheck. Getting
some cash from Paul for some of her school clothes had been enough of a battle.
She
wouldn’t bother with the pajamas
.

She
made her
way into the kitchen, listening to be sure that
her sister
really got up.
Luci
had a bad habit of
pulling the covers back up
and dozing off again. When
Cleo
heard the bathroom door close,
she
was satisfied
Luci
was fully awake.