They don’t look my way, just keep glaring at the other. “You know I’m right, man,” Slade says, roughly trying to catch his breath. “This is something more and you’re too fucking chicken shit to give it a shot.”
Damian glances away and gets to his feet. “Fuck you, Slade,” he grumbles low, scooping the basketball off the ground, his eyes down, refusing to look my way. “I’m out.”
He strides past me and as he goes, I see a shadow hiding behind his eyes. Something is haunting him, something deep that’s screaming at his insecurities and as he walks out of the park, I can’t help but notice the way his shoulders slump.
My heart shatters for him and I find myself glaring at Slade. “What the hell was that?” I demand as he wipes blood from his lip and gets to his feet with a groan.
“What do you mean?” he questions, walking toward me with his hand against his ribs, clearly in pain. “He was after a fucking fight. He knew what he was doing when he was getting into you about Lucien and then getting all pissy about Nessa. I just gave him what he wanted.”
“No, you gave yourself what you wanted and used Damian to do it,” I snap. “Can’t you see that Nessa has him all fucked up? You kept pushing when you should have left it alone.”
“It’s fine, babe,” he groans, not in the mood to defend himself as he reaches for my waist. “He’ll get over it.”
I push Slade’s hands away and step out of his reach. “You’re a dick,” I say walking away.
“Where the fuck do you think you’re going?” he throws at my back.
“Where do you think I’m going?” I yell back. “Someone has to go and check on Damian and seeing as though you have an issue keeping your hands to yourself, I guess it has to be me.”
“Are you kidding? It’s not even been an hour since you heard that Lucien is missing and you think it’s a good idea to go walking around the fucking area that he’s been visiting by your-fucking-self?
I tune him out. I know he’s right and my head is telling me to turn back around and put myself right by Slade’s side. I know I’ll be safe there, despite how pissed I am with him, but my stubborn nature wins out. It always does. “Who knows, maybe you’ll get lucky and he’ll take me away. Then none of us have to worry about any of this shit anymore.”
“Fuck,” he growls through the park. “Babe, get your stubborn ass back here.”
“Fuck you, Slade,” I yell, continuing to walk away as I flip him the bird over my shoulder. “Oh, and do yourself a favor and don’t fucking follow me.”
Chapter 17
Fuck, Slade was right. I shouldn’t be walking these damn streets alone. Every tree I pass, my mind tells me that Lucien is hiding behind it, every car that zooms past has my mind convinced it’s a blacked-out SUV, every person is him, every noise is him, every fucking tiny thing is him.
Lucien would be thrilled to learn that he’s screwing with my head like this. In fact, how do I know that the call from the cop today wasn’t just some random dude that Lucien has in his back pocket? Maybe he wanted to freak me out. Maybe he intends to have me running scared, looking around every corner and shitting my pants every time I hear a creak in the night.
I try to put it to the back of my head. This shit ain’t healthy. Though actually thinking about something else is a lot harder than it has the right to be.
I get all the way to Damian’s place and am not surprised that I didn’t find him along the way. The fucker has legs twice as long as mine. While I’m huffing and puffing, the walk for him would have been as simple as waking up in the morning.
Trying the door handle, I let out a breath of relief to find it unlocked. There is a slight chance that he went back to school or went somewhere else, but honestly, where would he go? I’m positive that he’s here and more than pissed that he left his door unlocked. How fucking stupid could he be? He knows what’s going on and despite him not really being a main target of Lucien’s, he’s also a way to get to both me and Slade. He needs to be just as careful as we do.
I creep through his home, hating how quiet it is. It’s like an unspoken rule when I walk in here that there’s always some kind of noise. It’s either a game on the TV, Damian’s PlayStation, music coming from his younger sister, or at least voices, but right now, it’s dead quiet and I don’t like it.