Deeper (Caroline & West #1)(27)

He pulls me closer with one hand and smashes an imaginary fist into my face with the other.

I know why he does it. He doesn’t want me to get close.

I don’t know why.

But I see. I understand.

I remain.

We’re a mess, West and me.

He cleans the tables off, his movements abrupt and jerky. Agitated. When he switches to dishes, he’s slamming the pans around instead of stacking them. He’s so caught up with the noise he’s making that when a figure appears at the back door, West doesn’t notice.

I do, though. I look up and see Josh there. He used to be my friend, before. Now I see him around with Nate. I think he’s going out with Sierra. He’s standing with his wallet in his hand, looking awkward.

“Hey, Caroline,” he says.

“Hey.”

West turns toward me, follows my eyes to the doorway. He frowns deeply and stalks toward the door. Josh lifts the wallet, and West kind of shoves it down and aside as he moves out into the alley, forcing Josh to step back. “Put your f*cking money away,” I hear him say as the door swings closed. “Jesus Christ.”

Then the kitchen is empty—just me and the white noise of the mixer, the water running in the sink.

When he comes back in, he’s alone, his hand pushing something down deep in his pocket. “You didn’t see that,” he says.

Which is dumb.

I guess he thinks he’s protecting me. If I can’t see him dealing, I’m not an accessory. I’m the oblivious girl in the corner, unable to put two and two together and get four.

“Yes, I did.”

He levels this look at me. Don’t push it.

I haven’t seen that look since the library. It makes me dump my book on the floor and stand up, and when I’m standing I can feel it more—how my chest is still aching from the hurt of what he said a few minutes ago. How my heart pounds, because he hurt me on purpose, and I’m angry about it.

I’m angry.

He turns his back on me and starts to wash a bowl.

“What kind of profit do you make, anyway?” I ask. “On a sale like that, is it even worth it? Because I looked it up—it’s a felony to sell. You’d do jail time if you got arrested. There’s a mandatory minimum five-year sentence.”

He keeps cleaning the bowl, but his shoulders are tight. The tension in the room is thick as smoke, and I don’t know why I’m baiting him when I’m close to choking on it.

He’s right to try to protect me. My dad would have kittens if he found out I was here, with West dealing out the back door, selling weed with the muffins. He would ask me if I’d lost my mind, and what would I say to him? It’s only weed? I don’t think West even smokes it?

Excuses. My dad hates excuses.

The truth is that I don’t make any excuses for it. I turn myself into an accessory every time I come here and sit on the floor by West, and I don’t care. I really don’t. I used to. Last year I was scandalized by the pot.

Now I’m too busy being fascinated by West.

And then there’s the money. I think about the money. I wonder how much he has. I know his tuition is paid, because he told me, and that he caddies at a golf course in the summer, because I asked why he had such stark tan lines.

I imagine he’s paying his own rent, paying for his food, but as far as I can tell he doesn’t have any hobbies or vices. I can’t figure out why he works so many jobs and deals pot, too, if he doesn’t need all that money just to get by. And he must not, right? He must have more than he needs if he’s buying weed in large quantities and making loans.

“Drop it,” West says.

I can’t drop it. Not tonight. Not when the pain in my chest has turned to this burning, angry insistence. I’m too pissed at him, and at myself. “I’ll have to ask Josh,” I muse. “Or Krish. I bet he would tell me. I bet when people show up at your apartment, you don’t turn your back on Krish and make him sit alone while you deal outside on the fire escape.”

I’ve never been to his apartment. I only know about the fire escape because I drove by.

I’m possibly a little bit stalking him.

West drops the bowl in the sink and rounds on me. “What are you in a snit about? You want me to deal in front of you?”

Do I?

For a moment I’m not sure. I look down at the floor, at the spill of flour by the row of mixing bowls.

I remember the first night I came in here and the first thing that’s happened every night since.

How’s it going, Caroline?

“It’s bullshit,” I say.

His eyes narrow.

“It’s bullshit for you to pretend not to be dealing drugs out the back door, like you’re going to protect me from knowing the truth about you. It’s not fair that I’m supposed to come in here and bare my soul to you, and you don’t even want me to touch your stupid cell phone.”

West crosses his arms. His jaw has gone hard.

“You’re a drug dealer.” It’s the first time I’ve ever said it out loud. The first time I’ve ever even mentally put it in those words. “So what? You have some dried-up plants in a plastic bag in your pocket, and you give them to people for money. Whoop-de-do.”

He stares at me. Not for just a moment, which would be normal.