It didn’t seem to faze her, though. The more I pulled away and treated her with impatience and distance, the more she pulled closer.
So instead, I stayed away. I went off to college, and I rarely came home. I hadn’t seen her in months before I walked into that classroom today and saw her sitting there, looking so grown up and beautiful, like a fucking angel. I couldn’t help it. I walked up to her, wanting to pull her up and take her with us, but when she raised her eyes, meeting mine, I knew I couldn’t.
I wouldn’t stop if I did. I wouldn’t be able to give her back.
Why her? Why, despite my mother, who always loved me, and my friends, who always had my back, was it Erika Fane who put the air in my lungs or made my blood run hot. She always got to me.
And then when she showed up at the cathedral today, I was done denying the need to be close and done pushing her away. To hell with it. I may or may not let her in when all was said and done, but let’s see where the night took us.
I wasn’t disappointed.
She had a lot of guts, and my friends liked her, even though I could tell Damon was still trying to give her the cold shoulder. She was one of us.
“Goddamn, I hope someone has grills going inside,” Will complained as I pulled into a parking space. “I’m still fucking hungry.”
I kept my smile to myself. Every time he’d tried to eat tonight, we’d gotten sidetracked, and now we were too jacked up and wanted to drink.
I shut off the engine and everyone climbed out, Damon and Kai pulling off their sweatshirts and tossing them onto their seats, while Will gathered the masks and secured them in the duffel in the back of the car.
Glancing over, I saw Rika stuff the jewelry under her seat, probably realizing it was safer in the car, and then slammed the door, walking toward the rear.
“Come here, Little Monster.” Will pulled her around the back of the car.
I watched them over my shoulder, seeing him raise his hand to her face, and it appeared as if he was putting something on it.
He dragged his fingers down her skin, and then I spotted what was in his hand. Shoe polish. We kept it in the duffel in case a mask broke on one of our escapades and we needed to improvise.
He finished and grinned at her. “War paint,” he explained. “You’re one of us now.”
She turned around, a small smile on her face. A smudgy black stripe traveled from the left side of her forehead diagonally down her face, across her nose, and ended on the right side of her jaw. I crossed my arms over my chest, ignoring the rush in my chest. She looked badass.
A few drops of rain landed on my face, and I heard excited laughter and yelps around us as people scurried through the parking lot, trying to get inside before the downpour started.
Rika tipped her head back, cool drops glistening on her cheeks and forehead as her lips spread in a smile.
“Let’s go!” Kai yelled.
I turned and walked for the warehouse, Kai and Damon at my sides while Will and Rika followed behind.
Entering the massive building was like stepping into a different world. The warehouse had been gutted years ago and the steel beams fifty feet above our heads were rubbed raw of their paint by weather and time. Barely any walls remained, and the dilapidated roof had several large holes, making it easy for the rain, getting heavier by the minute, to pour in.
We walked in slowly, taking in the chaos that resembled a small, post-apocalyptic, underground city.
However, despite the darkness, the raw feel of the unclean and cold metal, and the bonfire raging to the left as people danced to Devil’s Night by Motionless in White, the madness here was better than any frat house party I’d attended at college.
No one cared what they looked like. They were going to get dirty anyway. Everyone, including the girls, wore jeans and Chucks, and you didn’t really care about conversation, either, because it was too loud to talk. No airs, no drama, no masks. Just music, rage, and noise, and eventually, when the high hit you just right, you’d find a girl or she’d find you, and you’d disappear upstairs for a while.
People greeted us as we walked in, and without asking, four Solo cups of beer showed up, a young girl smiling as she handed them off to us.
“We need one more,” I told her and handed mine off to Rika.
But before she had a chance to take it, arms circled her waist and she was pulled off the ground.
She gasped and then broke into laughter as her friend, Noah, who I remembered hanging around her when we were in high school, bounced her up and down in his arms.
I tensed, wanting to take his fucking hands away, but then I remembered that, not only were they friends, but he was also the reason she hadn’t suffered more at the hands of Miles and Astrid at that party in the spring.
So far, he had my trust.