Page 47 of Protect Me
Vik straightened like an interested cat. He blinked, peered at her, and smiled. A strange tightness overtook his face. His casual mien didn’t fool me, because I knew the real Vikram.
Whatever washed over him was someone else altogether.
“Blanca?”
The lovely girl beamed, murmured something to the male at her side, and headed down the row. Vikram followed, walking away from me, and they met in a friendly hug on the stairs. The other man lifted an eyebrow, his neck tight.
Feeling awkward—and way too aware of Vik’s hand lingering on Blanca’s shoulder—I gathered my jacket and slid my arms inside. My gaze diverted away from them as he laughed. I shuffled through my purse, praying for a text message to distract me.
Something.
Anything.
Another laugh pealed out from the stairs, where Blanca pressed a hand to her chest. “Oh,” she cried, “you always made me laugh.”
Desperatenotto hear, I scrambled for any reason to get out of there without looking like a jealous psychopath.
Nothing came to my rescue.
“It’s been awhile,” Blanca murmured more quietly. “How have you been, Vik?”
A false note of brightness infused his tone. “Nothing too exciting for me. How about you?”
“Just moved back home for a bit. My Mom is sick.”
“I’m sorry.”
Blanca’s head tilted, cascading glossy hair to the side. Her lips pursed in a pouty, sad gesture. “It’s been rough.”
“I’ll send out good vibes for her.”
C’mon, Vini!I thought.Send me a text! Why don’t you call?
Not a single message appeared on my phone. No emails. Why couldn’t spam callers ring when it would be advantageous, like right now? Then I could escape with a plausible reason that didn’t taste like egregious envy. That ugly, green, creeping monster, far more destructive than any of the beasts in monster movies.
“Thanks.” Blanca sighed. “I appreciate that. It’s always nice to get out of the house and away from it for a bit, even for a scary movie with way too much blood and gore.”
She tacked on a too-high laugh. Her date put a hand on her back, his other tucked into his jean pockets. He eyed Vikram. I turned my back and rummaged through my purse without seeing a thing.
“Are you still driving the trains?” Blanca asked.
“Not right now. Switched to something else.”
“That’s Vik.” Another false laugh. “Always moving, always shifting onto the next exciting thing.”
The bitterness in those words definitelywasn’tmy imagination. Neither was the blatant desperation, thwarted love, in her too-wide eyes. Like she scrambled to hold onto something slippery, ethereal, uncatchable.
Wasn’t that Vik?
Slippery.
Uncatchable.
What was I doing here? What had I been thinking? I’d combined safety and my lifelong love for Vikram up together, and blurred the safe lines my rules provided. This was dangerous ground, as shaky as anything I’d ever stood on before. Like living on a fault line. I’d have no one to blame but myself when the pain returned.
Frantic now, because I’d be expected to join them next, I clicked through my phone settings, picked the right spot, and tapped on the screen. A sample phone ring trilled into the air, loud against a sudden quiet spell. I feigned surprise and silenced it by pretending to answer a call that wasn’t real.
Vikram’s voice quieted behind me as I flung my purse over my shoulder and became engrossed in a fake conversation. With a hand held out in both greeting and apology, I hustled down the hallway and threw myself through the double doors. The glaring lights in the foyer calmed my alarm enough to think.
