Price of a Kiss (Forbidden Men, #1)(74)

When he slipped from the empty classroom, he left the door hanging open.

His departure annihilated me. And let me tell you, the gloomy, miserable, angst-ridden look so did not look good on me.





CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE




The rest of the day passed in a blur. After my fight—or whatever it was—with Mason, I drove home and skipped my afternoon classes. Eva did too. She and Alec had broken up, and when she saw my car pull into the drive, she arrived at my apartment to cry on my shoulder.

I think consoling her was the only thing that kept me from sobbing for myself. It felt as if I’d lost Mason forever.

God, maybe I had.

When E. curled up on my couch and took a nap, I called Ethan and broke off my plans with him, since I knew that was going to be a flop before it even started.

He didn’t seem too surprised, though he did have the grace to sound disappointed. “Lowe didn’t take the news well, did he?”

I couldn’t think up a reason to lie, so I shook my head. “No, he didn’t.”

After a moment of silence, Ethan said, “You know, you don’t have to turn me down just because he…” He must’ve realized he was about to say something that would totally offend me because he stopped abruptly, his words fading into a sad chuckle. “Right. Good luck with him, then.”

Good luck. Yeah, I needed more than luck to get Mason back. I needed a freaking miracle. Or maybe a crowbar to beat some sense into him. Or maybe I needed to beat some sense into myself, because hell, I couldn’t tell which one of us was being the stupidest right now.

The only good thing about all this was that I was too heartbroken over Mason to worry about my paranoia over Jeremy. I still locked all my doors and checked my purse for my mace and Taser, but at least my fear had settled back down to the level it had been before my mom’s fateful phone call.

Damn, had that only been last Saturday that she had called? So much had happened in the past six days. So many people had been hurt.

To avoid the pain, I decided to keep going and follow my typical routine, hoping the regularity of my actions could settle me into a blank state of blissful oblivion.

At my regular babysitting time, I arrived at Dawn’s house, opening the front door without knocking and stepping inside. The television ran the evening news with the volume turned low.

I thought about calling a greeting but decided to go the sneaky route and surprise Sarah. She did like the attention of people jumping out at her and screeching, “Boo.”

I had a feeling my little buddy was the type who would adore bloody, slasher, horror movies, but I wasn’t ready to go there quite yet, mostly because I was definitely not that type. Give me romantic comedy any day of the week. Or Harry Potter; that was about as dark as I got.

As I moved down the narrow passage toward the kitchen, I approached Sarah’s bedroom and noticed immediately that across the hallway, Mason’s bedroom door hung open.

He never left his door open. What was more, there was someone talking inside his room.

I paused. He wasn’t home, was he? Crap. I hadn’t paid enough attention when I’d pulled to the curb to remember if his Jeep had been sitting in the driveway or not. I wasn’t sure if I could face him right now without breaking down and weeping.

But I was curious to know what his room looked like. I crept forward, stepping easily so the creak midway down the hall didn’t give away my presence.

The lights were off inside, but I knew he—or someone—was in there when I heard bedsprings squeak.

The talking paused, only to start again. The voice sounded vaguely familiar, even as muffled as it was. I scanned the dark blue walls before I had a full glimpse inside, surprised he wasn’t the messy type. He didn’t hang many pictures and he didn’t have a cluttered floor. I wouldn’t have called the space stark, but he definitely wasn’t a junk collector.

Then I saw his bed with a plaid comforter thrown neatly over the mattress. Mason sat on the edge, his feet on the floor as he focused all his attention on his cell phone he held in his lap. He was watching a video where a fuzzy image shifted across the small screen.

“…be Eva instead,” the pitchy phone speakers blared out my voice. “Good morning, Mason. Looking good today. What say we skip classes and have some...fun.”

My mouth dropped open as I watched a grin spread across his face. He wiped his thumb over the phone screen, touching the video version of me.

Oh, my God. He hadn’t deleted that stupid, impulsively made video yet?

Oh, my God, times two. Was he watching it again?

I clapped my hand over my mouth because my grin kept spreading wider and wider as a smile consumed me. My eyes grew watery.

He loved me.

If this didn’t prove he loved me, nothing did.

Mason Lowe loved me.

Sensing my presence, he lifted his face. When he saw me, his eyes grew big. He dropped his phone screen-down on his bed and surged to his feet. “Reese! What’re you doing here?”

He was dressed to go to work, his brown loafers adorning his size-twelve feet and his pale blue Country Club shirt tucked into his pleated slacks. I had to look away because staring at him made me feel achy and full of depressing angst.

“It’s Friday,” I said blankly and shook my head, confused. “I always babysit on Friday.”

“But...” He glanced down at his watch. “Shit. I’m running late.”