Page 23 of Trainer

A knock came at the door, but without even waiting for a response, Natasha came barging in.

“Leave me alone,” I groaned. But Natasha was a good friend, and she ignored me, sat down beside me, and did what she always did in situations like this—put a hand on my ass. I’m not sure why that was her thing, but it was.

“Do I have to kill him?” she asked, drawing a hint of a smile from me.

“Kill me,” I replied.

“What the hell happened? Is he married or something? Did you run into his wife?”

“No—well, actually I don’t know,” I replied. “Maybe. It honestly wouldn’t surprise me at this point.”

“So he lied to you,” Natasha said. “But I mean—you just met him, right? What are you so upset about?”

Ugh, I thought. How do I tell her that I lost my virginity to him…?

“Just move on, tell the world that Chase Benton hit on you and that’s that,” she said simply. “At least it’s a good story, right? Right?”

“It’s…not that simple, Natasha,” I replied.

There was a long pause—remember how I said Natasha had frustrating ESP abilities when it came to me? Yeah. That happened again. I knew she knew before she even said anything.

“Oh, no,” she finally groaned. “You didn’t, Cady.”

“Stop.”

“You didn’t lose your fucking virginity—”

“I said stop!” I moaned, twisting away from her.

Natasha jumped on me like we were wrestling, spun me around, and made me look at her. I couldn’t have felt more stupid.

“Did you, Cady?” she asked firmly. “Did you lose your virginity to him?”

I couldn’t even respond, but my tears were enough. She let out a long sigh and looked at me like Melinda had—like she pitied me.

“Go back to your date,” I told her. “I’m just going to cry myself to sleep.”

“Babe! Why would you do that? He didn’t like…roofie you or something, did he?”

“No!” I snapped. I realized that even though I was completely destroyed by what had happened to me, I was still defensive of someone else saying disparaging things about Chase.

“Of course he didn’t roofie me,” I went on. “I—it felt right, okay? I don’t know how else to explain it. I felt like we had a connection and…Oh God…”

“What is it?”

?

?Can you take me to get Plan B?” I asked. Natasha’s eyes went wide.

“You let him come in you!?”

“Fine, I’ll go myself,” I replied, feeling more miserable than ever. I wanted to climb in the shower and rinse myself out for an hour.

“No, I’ll take you, babe,” Natasha said, rubbing my arm. “I just—I can’t believe all this. It’s so not like you.”

“I know,” I nodded, wiping tears from my eyes. “And that’s why I feel like such shit.”

“You girls fucking in there or something?” Natasha’s date called from the living room. She rolled her eyes immediately.

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