Page 93 of Jaked

"Yeah," I said, "like a hole in my head."

"You wanna mouth off?" he said. "Come on back. Do it in person."

I wanted to tell him that if I did come back, I wouldn't be coming alone. But of course, it would be a lie. I didn't even know where Jake was. And even if I did, I wouldn’t be dragging him any further into my problems. The way it sounded, he was fighting plenty of his own demons.

"Forget it," I said. "I'm not going anywhere."

"Fine," Rango said. "I'll come to you."

"Oh yeah? What about your girlfriend?"

"Aw lighten up," he said. "You were kidding. I was kidding. Let's get together, talk it out, alright?"

He was up to something. I just knew it. "Is this about that book?" I asked.

"Don't worry," he said. "We'll get to that."

"I heard it's not even yours."

"Well, you know what they say about possession," he said. "Nine-tenths of the law, babe."

"If that's your logic," I said, "then the book's more mine than yours. Right?" In truth, I didn't even want the thing. But I couldn’t resist goading him at least a little more after everything he'd done.

"We'll see about that," he said. "And before you get any funny ideas, I've changed all my passwords, so your little joke-fest is over."

"Like I didn't knowthatalready." It was kind of a bummer too, because I'd come with some great new ideas for his personal Web page.

"Shit," Rango muttered, "what'shedoing here?"

"Who?" I asked.

"I've gotta go." A split-second later, he ended the call without so much as a goodbye.

I stared at my phone, wondering what the hell had just happened. I was still wondering when I heard the telltale sound of a key card in the entryway.

Jake?

I looked toward the door just in time to see it fly open. I jumped to my feet. My heart sank. It wasn't Jake. It was Bianca in all her schoolmarm glory. And she wasn't alone.