Page 57 of Trapped With You

I shook it with frustration.

“Easy, tiger. You’re going to break it if you keep doing that.”

“What do you suggest we do, huh?” I snarled, stressed because we’d wasted enough time in the tunnels.

“‘As per the rules, we are not allowed to damage anything on school property’,” he parroted my own words, his smirk growing at my sour expression. “And I suggest we use the bobby pin strategically hanging from the elastic band tied around the doorknob.”

“Oh.” That’s the first thing I should have noticed. Snatching the bobby pin, I thrust my flashlight at him. “Hold this while I open the lock.”

Cade taught me how to pick a lock in record time one night when we were out raising teenage hell around the city. My ex-boyfriend taught me a lot of things actually—how to shoot a gun, how to drive a motorcycle, how to sixty-nine, how to love and be loved in return—and this was just another reminder of how utterly perfect we’d once been.

Cade shone light over my hands as I opened the bobby pin at a ninety-degree angle. Then I inserted the pin meticulously, managing to disengage the lock on the first try.

Twisting the knob, the door opened with a creaky sound.

Our flashlights chased across the walls of the dorm room. There were two single beds, a small dresser, and a window covered with old, tattered curtains. It lacked personality, considering how long the building had remained vacant.

“I’ll search one side of the room and you take the other. It’ll go faster,” I said.

Cade wordlessly agreed. He went to the right and I darted to the left. With the constant drone of the rainstorm as a backdrop, we searched through the drawers, the space under the beds, and the closet.

“There’s nothing,” Cade concluded after a few minutes of rummaging.

My shoulders slumped. “I don’t see anything remotely similar to a photo either.”

“We have exactly two hours left.”

“Shit.” I drummed my fingers against my thigh. “Okay, let’s split up. That way we’ll stay on track with the timer. I have another bobby pin here somewhere.” I opened the zip of my crossbody purse and fished in the tiny compartment where I kept my pins and lip gloss. “Aha, here! Use this to unlock the other dorm rooms. I’ll take the ones on the left side of the hall, and you take the ones on the right.”

Cade killed the distance between us in two strides. Insteadof grabbing the pin, he closed his fingers around my wrist like a manacle.

A shot of electricity pulsed from the touch.

Again.

His face dipped close to mine. “Is this your way of avoiding me—avoidingus?”

My expression fell. “There’s nothing to avoid, Cade. There’s just nothingleft. For the sake of tonight, let’s call it a truce. I don’t—” I paused to inhale sharply. “I don’t have it in me to rehash the past. Please, just drop it.”

It was the honest to God truth. Regardless of our previous teasing and flirtation, I truly didn’t have the energy to go over our history. There was too much of it.

Opening old wounds would not be wise.

“Before we go our separate ways, tell me something,” he rasped. “In all these months, did you never once miss me…even for a second?”

I should lie to him. It’s what he deserved. Yet in the dark room, the sliver of vulnerability in his tone was amplified and resonated with my softer side, the one that was completely weak for him.

It forced me to say the truth. “Just for a second.”

Hope flared in the air like a tangible thing and I instantly regretted it.

“Ella—”

“Please, Cade,” I cut him off, not offering him the chance to build up on that hope. I made my stance clear on our past: I didn’t want to talk about it. “If you find the next dare before me, just call out my name.”

I couldn’t see his eyes, but I felt them all the same, hugging every inch of my silhouette the way they’d done many times in the past. I used to love the way he watched me with quiet intensity, like he was marvelling at my existence.

It was euphoric to know there was someone out there who viewed you in the same light reserved for celestial beings.