Complete Nothing (True Love #2)(34)

“Who’re you texting?” I sounded mad, even though I hadn’t meant to.

She texted back before answering me. “Oh, just this guy I met today before rehearsal,” she replied. The waitress put her bag on the table and she took it, pocketing the phone.

She’d met another guy today? Where were these dudes coming from?

“What guy?” Definitely mad.

For a second it looked like she was going to answer, but then her mouth clamped shut.

“No one you know,” she said with a tight smile, looking me in the eye for the first time. “Have fun with your cheerleader!”

Then she breezed right past me and out the door. Through the window, I saw her read another text and laugh again. I felt like I was gonna hyperventilate. So it was true, what people were saying. Claudia really was on the hunt, or whatever. We’d only broken up twenty-four hours ago. Practically. What the eff?

“Dude! What’re you doing? Get over here!” Lester crowed. “Gavin just told us he wants to be an astronaut!”

“That’s not what I said,” Gavin grumbled. “I just think I’m gonna focus on science, that’s it.”

Outside, Claudia got into her white Prius and pulled out of the parking lot. Probably headed home to keep texting this tool while she ate her usual salad. I looked at Josie. She was putting on lipstick and made a kiss toward her pocket mirror, then smiled at me in the reflection.

Fine. If Claudia was already flirting with random guys, texting some other dude, and throwing it in my face, then fine. I wasn’t going to feel guilty about moving on either. I shouldn’t feel guilty. I was a senior. I was the star of the football team. I was out with my friends and two of the hottest girls in school.

Who cared if I didn’t have a career mapped out or a major to declare or any applications done?

It was well past time to have some fun.





CHAPTER SEVENTEEN


True


I had been at work for about an hour when Hephaestus wheeled through the door. Instantly I tensed and started straightening the pretty, handwritten cards in the display case, bearing the names of each of the cupcakes. He rolled his chair to the counter and stopped directly in front of me. He was wearing an aqua-blue T-shirt under a brown leather jacket with the collar turned up, and he caught more than one admiring glance from our patrons. More than ten, actually.

“So that went well,” he said.

“What did?”

“The thing at the physical therapist’s office,” he replied. “The guy thought I was insane, going off about tingling in my toes, but I kept him away from your girl for at least fifteen minutes. If she couldn’t close the deal in that time, she’s never gonna close it.”

“Yeah. Great,” I said, closing the case with a bang. “I’m actually kind of busy, so . . .”

“I don’t get a thank-you?” Hephaestus joked lightly. “Why am I even helping you?”

“That’s a good question, Heath,” I said, glancing at the line of customers growing at the register. My coworker Torin was helping them, but it was only a matter of time before he asked me to jump in. “Why are you helping me, exactly?”

Hephaestus blinked, surprised. “You know why. Because Harmonia asked me to.”

“Harmonia. Right.” I crossed my arms over my chest. “Let’s talk about you and Harmonia for a second. Are you two a couple or what? Are you in love? How did you two even become friends?” I asked, trying to push his buttons—trying to elicit a reaction. “When I think about it, I realize that Harmonia never really told me. It was just suddenly one day, there you were. There you always were.”

Just tell me the truth. Tell me the truth and I’ll know I can trust you again, I willed him silently.

Hephaestus wheeled himself to the end of the pink counter, far from prying ears, and I followed. He leaned toward me, his jaw clenched.

“It’s a tad difficult to be in a couple with someone when the two of you live on different planes of existence,” he snapped. “What’s with you lately? Why are you so damn tense?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” I said, throwing up my palms. “Because the love of my life, the very person I’ve been banished to this hellhole for, has no clue I exist? Because my two worst enemies are doing everything in their considerable power to get sent here so they can rip me limb from limb? Because I am no closer to forming my second couple than I was two days ago?”

Because I have no idea who I can and can’t trust, I added silently. If only he’d told me about him and my mother from the beginning. Or, better yet, if only he’d told me and Harmonia back in the day. But he hadn’t, and now I didn’t know if he was a friend or yet another insidious foe.

The door opened, letting out its signature tinkle of bells, and Claudia traipsed in. She was still dressed in her ballet gear and holding a brown bag that looked like takeout. Her eyes lit up when she saw us.

“True! You’re here!”

“Hi, Claudia,” I said, trying to smile.

“Oh my gosh, you’re never going to believe what just happened,” she said, popping up onto her toes. “I was texting with Keegan and I bumped into Peter. It was totally perfect. I’m ninety-nine percent sure he was jealous. Of course he was out with that awful balloon-lipped girl, and I was kind of rude to her and her friends, which I feel sort of bad about . . . but . . . anyway, he was definitely angry that I’d met someone else. That’s good, right?”