"E?"
I come out of the memory and relax my expression, finding Atticus frowning up at me. "You good?"
"Yeah, man. I'm fine."
A loud buzzing fills the room, and I whirl, looking for the source. "What is that?"
Atticus stands, and his chair screeches against the floor, waking Sev and Aurora, who groan as they untangle themselves.
I search through the mess of files Atticus put back on the table—the floor around it.
"Fuck, I think that's my phone," Aurora says groggily.
"Where is it?" Atticus asks, picking up the discarded bits of her clothing from the floor.
"Purse," she says, pushing herself up to sit on the cot, holding the blanket around her torso with a shiver.
"Shit, will my phone track that I was here all night?" Aurora's grip on the blanket tightens.
Atticus gets to her purse and opens it, but the buzzing has stopped by the time he unzips the opening and pulls it out. "No. I shut down the location tracking before we left the party."
She sighs, and I'm so fucking glad we have him to remember all that shit we never do.
He looks at her phone screen with a scowl, carrying it over to her. "It was Ambrose."
"What?"
She takes the device as Seven pushes up on one arm and sniffs, rubbing the sleep from his bleary eyes as he tries to look at the phone over her shoulder. "Looks like he left a message."
We all crowd around the cot and her phone as Aurora taps the button to play the message.
"Hi, um, it's me, Ambrose De La Rosa?—"
No shit.
"I'd hoped to speak to you directly, but it's important you get this information as soon as possible. We have a bit of a problem…"
We all share a look.
What is this?
Ambrose clears his throat. "It seems the media has somehow gotten hold of some information. My team is working to figure out where the leak came from, but regardless, the cat's out of the bag. I have some people in place near Boone?—"
You mean right outside her apartment?
"They'll do what they can to keep the press away from your apartment, but we need to get ahead of this. I'm so sorry this happened. I've set a press conference for later this evening in Charlotte. I'm hoping you'll be able to stand with me when wemake the announcement. Please call me back when you get this message."
"Fuck," Aurora snaps when the line goes dead. "What does this mean?"
Atticus is already back in his chair, sliding into place in front of the monitors, using keywords to bring up any and all news related to Aurora and Ambrose. Multiple windows open, flooding the screen with rumors and reports about Ambrose's #FindDelilah campaign finally having the happy ending it deserves.
"They know you're a student at ASU," Atticus growls. "Fuck!"
Aurora's phone buzzes in her hand, and she flinches when the message passes the screen.
"What is it?" I ask.
"It's Maisie," she says. "She's seen the headlines already. She's asking why I didn't tell her." Her attention snaps up, eyes narrowing on the back of Atticus's head.
