The Deal (Off-Campus, #1)(79)

So why does the thought of not spending any more time with Hannah bring the oddest clench of regret to my gut?

She tries to take a step down the hall, but I tug on her hand and kiss her again, and this time it’s not a peck. I kiss her hard, losing myself in her taste and her heat and every damn thing about her. I never expected her. Sometimes people sneak up on you and suddenly you don’t know how you ever lived without them. How you went about your day and hung out with your friends and f*cked other people without having this one important person in your life.

Hannah breaks the kiss with a soft laugh. “Get a room,” she teases.

I decide it might be time to reevaluate my stance on girlfriends.

*

Hannah

“Bwahahahahaha! Happy Halloweeeeen!”

I turn away from the closet—where I was just in the process of trying to find a Halloween-esque outfit that’s not a costume because I f*cking hate dressing up—and gawk at the creature gracing my doorway. I can’t make heads or tails of what Allie is wearing. All I see is a skintight blue bodysuit, lots of feathers, and…are those cat ears?

I steal Allie’s trademark phrase by demanding, “What on God’s green planet are you supposed to be?”

“I’m a cat-bird.” Then she gives me a look that says, uh-doy.

“A cat bird? What is…okay…why?”

“Because I couldn’t decide if I wanted to be a cat or a bird, so Sean was like, just be both, and I was like, you know what? Brilliant idea, boyfriend.” She grins at me. “I’m pretty sure he was being a smartass, but I decided to treat the suggestion as gospel.”

I have to laugh. “He’s going to wish he suggested something less ridiculous, like sexy nurse, or sexy witch, or—”

“Sexy ghost, sexy tree, sexy box of Kleenex.” Allie sighs. “Gee, let’s just throw the word sexy in front of any mundane noun and look! A costume! Because here’s the thing, if you want to dress like a ho-bag, why not just go as a ho-bag? You know what? I hate Halloween.”

I snort. “Then why are you going to the party? You should go hang out with Garrett. He’s sulking at home tonight.”

“Really?”

“He’s anti-Halloween,” I explain, but saying it out loud doesn’t feel right.

I got the strangest feeling last night that he has a more serious reason for hating Halloween rather than just “it’s a pointless holiday.” Maybe something terrible happened to him many moons ago on Halloween night, like he got egged by hooligans when he was a kid. Oooh, or maybe he watched Halloween and was then plagued with nightmares that lasted for weeks, which is what happened to me when I watched my first and only Michael Myers movie at the age of twelve.

“Anyway, Sean’s waiting for me downstairs, so I’m taking off now.” Allie pops over and smacks a huge kiss on my cheek. “Have fun handing out drinks with Tracy.”

Yeah, right. I’m already regretting agreeing to help Tracy with the dorm crawl. I’m not in the mood to wait around all night for drunken college kids to wander into Bristol House so I can hand them drinks and Jell-O shooters. In fact, the more I think about it, the more I’m tempted to back out, especially when I picture Garrett at home by himself, scowling at his reflection in the mirror or throwing a tennis ball against the wall like they do in prison.

Rather than continue my search for a non-costume costume, I duck out of my dorm and walk across the hall to knock on Tracy’s door.

“Coming!” She appears nearly a minute later, running a comb through her curly red hair with one hand and applying white powder to her cheeks with the other.

“Hey,” she chirps. “Happy Halloween!”

“Happy Halloween.” I pause. “So listen…how badly will you hate me if I bail on the dorm crawl? And then when I add insult to injury and ask to borrow your car?”

Disappointment floods her eyes. “You’re not coming? Whhhhhhy?”

Shit, I really hope she doesn’t start crying. Tracy is the kind of girl who bawls at the drop of a hat, though in all honesty, I think her tears are of the crocodile variety because they always dry up way too fast.

“A friend of mine is having a bad night,” I say awkwardly. “He could use the company.”

She gives me a suspicious look. “And does this friend go by the name Garrett Graham?”

I smother a sigh. “Why would you think that?”

“Because Allie said you guys are dating.”

Of course she did.

“We’re not dating, but yes, he’s the friend I’m talking about,” I admit.

To my surprise, Tracy breaks out in a huge grin. “Well, why didn’t you lead with that, dum-dum? Of course I’m going to let you off the hook if it means you get to go and f*ck Garrett Graham! Note to you—I will be living vicariously through you, because Oh. My. God. If that hottie so much as smiled at me, my panties would probably melt away.”

I don’t want to touch even a single part of that response, so I ignore it altogether. “Are you sure you’ll be okay?”

“Yeah, I’ll be fine.” She waves a hand. “My cousin is visiting from Brown, so I’ll just recruit her.”

“I heard that!” a female voice shouts from inside the room.