Page 337 of Call Me Baby 2: Side B

He’s trying to catch up.

“I’m so lost right now…”

His gaze drifts slow to me,

eyes searching my face.

“5% Survival Rate?” he asks.

“But I’d 100% let you do it again,” Ace, Diggs, and I chorus, hitting Andrew with his own words at once, totally unplanned.

Andrew’s blank expression rewinds, a slow-motion trainwreck piecing back together.

The text message he sent me.

After the Thanksgiving Gala.

Where I left him on his knees,

holding my drink.

His jaw locks up as he turns away⁠—

half-ashamed,

half-betrayed as if I sold him out.

Then he glances down at me. “I hate you,” he bites out through a crimson laugh.

“No worries, mate,” Diggs brushes it off. “Allie keeps it strictly professional, doesn’t she?” He lifts his chin at Ace. “Proper class, I promise you that.”

Ace nods. “On my life, brah. Real lady-like.” He gestures between Andrew and me. “What happens there, stays there.”

Right then⁠—

a cold, slick palm slides over my back.

I tense,

instantly knowing it’s not Andrew’s.

Raymond breaks the circle, his voice slithering across my ear, “Digby, Ace, hope you’re enjoying yourselves tonight.”

They both shake his hand.

Then those cold eyes drift to Andrew,

giving him a once-over.

Raymond holds out a hand with a fake-as-hell smile. “I don’t believe we’ve been introduced. Raymond. Allison’s stepfather.”

Andrew’s eyes dart to me,

then Raymond, narrowing,

not knowing that piece of information.

But before Andrew can match his grip