He needs therapy, not exploitation.
I want Haven and Kai…but I don’t need them to hate me even more.
I lock my phone and set it face down on the desk.
But I don’t turn off the notifications.
And I don’t put it on silent.
Chapter 17
Haven
“He’s not going to call.”
I look up guiltily from the phone Idefinitelywasn’t checking. “What?”
Kai’s jaw is tight, his highlighter abandoned on the open textbook between us. “Rooke. That’s what you’re waiting for, right? His call?”
Every alcove and study desk inside the college’s library is crammed with students—either hunched over textbooks, or typing furiously on laptops, or staring into space with the hollow-eyed look of someone questioning their life choices.
Normal midterms chaos.
Which is ironic, because nothing about my life is normal anymore.
“I’m not waiting for anything,” I lie.
“Sure.” He picks up the highlighter again and goes back to frowning at a psychology textbook like it personally offended him. “And I’m not thinking about putting my fist through his face.”
I toss the phone Bastian gave me back into my tote bag and drag my hands through my hair.
Since yesterday, me and Kai have just been existing in the same space. Making sandwiches. Studying. Watching TV without actually watching it. And while we went to sleep in the same bed, there was a swathe of no man’s land between us.
I told him I was going to campus early to study, and he grabbed his stuff and tagged along like I couldn’t be left alone for fear of inadvertently getting him tossed in jail again.
Wish I could blame him.
I still haven’t forgiven myself for making such a reckless, dumbass move.
But I also can’t stop checking my phone.
No messages.
No missed calls.
Nothing.
Bastian said he’d call. Told me to answer when he did. In the woods, after he—after I?—
My thighs clench involuntarily at the memory.
…you will answer when I call…
That was Saturday. Today’s Tuesday.
Three days of cortisol-spiking radio silence.
Is this part of the game? Making me wait, making me wonder, making me check this fucking phone every five minutes?
