Page 97 of Forecheck
Now, he didn’t even meet my eyes or look in my direction at all.
“Shower,” he said, tone clipped. “I have to be at the airport in a few hours.”
Before I could protest, he slammed the bathroom door shut. That alone would’ve been enough to tell me he didn’t want me following him…and then he locked the door behind him.
Fuck. What had I done?
After our tiff the previous morning, Brent had been chilly with me. I didn’t push him on it, mostly because I didn’t have the energy for a knockdown, drag out fight. When he left for the airport after hardly speaking to me all morning, he offered me nothing more than a chaste kiss to the corner of my mouth and a “see you” as his parting words.
The beast inside my chest wanted to rage and scream and claw at him for acting this way, but I held myself in check.
I only had myself to blame.
Thankfully, between classes and my Bar study group that was meeting that evening, I was almost busy enough not to dwell on it.
Harper Park and Ryan Boyce had been my law school friends and comrades since the first week of classes three years previously. We’d met by chance, having chosen the same study table in the library and bonded over the first week madness.
Tonight, it was my turn to host our study group, so for once while Brent was on the road, I was at my own apartment. In preparation for having company, I’d made snacks and spread my books, laptop, and study guides across my living room table and floor.
Ryan arrived first, handing me a bottle of red wine as a thank you. Harper showed up shortly after, her arms weighed down with a mess of notebooks and files.
“So, I think we should just start at the top,” I said once we’d settled. “I printed out some flash cards with a case example on the front and the winning argument on the back. There’s also a stack of general terms in each of the Bar test subject categories. Which should we do first?”
“Let’s start with terms,” Ryan said. “Then work our way up to the bigger stuff.”
Harper nodded in agreement, and I picked up the note cards.
Before we began, Ryan suggested we make it into a game. The stack of cards was shuffled and divided into three piles, each of us taking one. We would go around the circle, one of us asking the other two to provide the definition for the word on their card. The first one to correctly answer would receive a point. At the end of the game, the two of us with the fewest points would treat the winner to dinner and drinks.
“Y’all are going down,” Ryan said. “I can’t wait for my steak dinner.”
“Dream on, Dixie,” Harper said. I held back a chuckle at Harper’s subtle dig of Ryan’s South Carolina accent, and Ryan glared at her.
The first several rounds went smoothly. We worked our way through over half of the cards, all maintaining our composure. At the point when I was in the lead with twelve points, Ryan in second with ten, and Harper pulling up the rear with nine, all hell broke loose.
When I presented my next card, Ryan and Harper answered at the same time, though both incorrectly. When I told them they were wrong, they proceeded to yell at me and argue like the lawyers they were meant to be. This disagreement eventually devolved into Ryan throwing popcorn at me and booing loudly whenever I opened my mouth.
Finally, sick of being accosted, I pulled out my textbook, flipped to the term in question, and shoved the book in their faces.
“HA!” I yelled. “Told you.”
A blush rose onto Ryan’s cheeks as he read, and Harper whispered, “Sorry.”
“It’s fine,” I said, “but I think that’s enough for tonight. Brent plays soon, and I need to clean this place up since someone trashed it with popcorn.”
Chastised, Ryan rose to his feet and started picking stray popcorn from my living room carpet. “Sorry,” he mumbled as he dropped the pieces back into the bowl. “Hey, speaking of Brent, are you bringing him to Treasure of Detroit?”
I paused by the hall closet, where I’d headed to get the vacuum.
The Treasure of Detroit Ball was Wayne State’s version of a Barrister’s Ball. It was basically a law school prom. The third-year law students got all dressed up and descended upon the Colony Club to rub elbows with their classmates, as well as practicing lawyers and political elite from the area who had made a lasting impression on that year’s class. I was on the organizing committee along with ten of my classmates, and we’d chosen to keep this year’s event classic. There would be a sit-down dinner and a walking buffet of appetizers later in the evening. Local businesses and wealthy individuals were donating items to a silent auction, the proceeds of which would go to our class’s chosen charity—a local women’s shelter. We’d also booked a live band and were offering a cash bar.
“To be honest, I’ve been so busy I kind of forgot about it,” I said.
And things between me and my boyfriend were so tense at the moment that I wasn’t sure I was even allowed to ask. I hadn’t spoken to him since he’d left the previous day, and the disconnect made me anxious, had my entire body clenching like a fist.
“Forgot?” Harper said, incredulous. “Berkley, you’re dating the hottest man alive and youforgotabout an opportunity to dress him up and parade him in front of your classmates? At an event, mind you, that you helped plan.”
I shrugged. “I don’t even know if he’ll be home.”
