Page 199 of The Wicked

Text me when you wake up.

9:26 P.M.

I frowned at the last message and looked around the room as if I’d spot a trace of her. There was nothing.

But she was here. A few minutes ago.

I clicked on the call icon above the screen without thinking.

Drumming my finger against my knee, I felt another squeeze in my chest when the first ring came through, and then the call was declined.

I frowned, my brain already taking a route down its familiaroverthinking lane. This was why I was not too fond of phone calls, receiving or initiating them. They never came with a positive outcome. Either something was wrong, or the person you were trying to reach didn’t respond, or, in my case now—declined the call.

I didn’t know if I should feel anger or worry.

The first time I willingly initiate a call, it’s rejected almost immediate—

The phone buzzed in my hand, Zahra’s name flashing on the screen. I watched it ring for a decent stretch of seconds, and then I picked it up.

“Hi?” Her voice came through uncertain, soft, far away.

“You declined my call.”

“I called back,”she said, voice low like she didn’t want anyone to overhear her.

“Why did you decline it?”

There was a slight shuffling sound at the end of the line.“My phone was on the center table, and Devil was there. I didn’t want him to see that you were calling.”

“I thought you were smart enough not to save my number with my actual name.”

“I didn’t. It was saved as Dad. How the fuck would I have explained that to him. I don’t have a dad, and it’s—I can’t tell him it’s you because then he’d ask what that is about, and then he’d wonder why I have your number and why I didn’t save it with Marino or Elio and I—”

“Zahra.”

“Yeah?”she breathed out, and I could sense a twinge of nervousness in that small gesture.

A calm settled within me. “Your voice… it’s different on the phone.”

I think I heard a small laugh.“Of course it is; you’re hearing it through signals from a satellite in space.”

“Fascinating.” I relaxed back on the bed. “I didn’t know that; enlighten me on satellites and space that I definitely know nothing about.”

“And he says I’m insufferable.”

“We are alike in so many ways. Therefore I concede that it is normal for both of us to be insufferable.”

“Smart-ass.”

“I have an IQ of 170, so yes. I am smart.”

“You weren’t supposed to respond to that. For a man with an IQ of 170, you lack basic conversational skills.”

“Being academically intelligent is not equal to being socially intelligent.”

“Fine, I give up.”

“As you should.”