until he won." I gave Steele my best innocent eyes, but I wasn't fooling him for even a second.
He shot me a bullshit look. "He could have talked his way around that. There must be a threat on the line if he loses, too."
My grin spread wider, and I repeated the consequence of Archer losing this fight, verbatim. Steele's brows shot up, and he cast an interested look at me as we passed through the front gates. He gave a quick wave to the evening security guard—Dave—then turned out into the street.
"Well shit, Hellcat," he muttered after a moment of silence. "Now I want Archer to lose."
I gave him a casual shrug. "No reason we can't do both."
He drew a deep breath, his nostrils flaring and his chest rising. "Shit yes," he breathed on his exhale. "One of the many things I love about you, Hellcat. You think outside the box of societal norm."
His compliment warmed me. For the next while we just drove in companionable silence while the stereo played an epic selection of In This Moment, Amatory Riot, Vanth Falling, Aviva, and Indecency.
"Killer playlist," I murmured to him as one of my favorite songs came on, and I cranked the volume.
About half an hour into our drive, my phone started ringing. I fished it out of my bag, then sighed heavily as I saw the caller ID.
"Scott again?" Steele asked, guessing correctly. "He really doesn't give up, does he?"
I grimaced, rejecting the call. I'd lost track of how many calls I'd rejected from him now. "Apparently not." My phone immediately lit up with another incoming call from Scott. "Maybe I should just answer and let him say whatever he needs to say."
Steele shrugged. "If you want. But put him on speaker phone so I'll know if he insults you again."
I licked my lips with a grin. "And then what?"
He shot me a deadly serious look. "And then I'll break one of his bones for every word of that insult."
I swiped my thumb across the screen of my phone. "Scott," I said, switching the call to speaker. "Didn't I make myself clear the other day at school? I don't want you calling."
"Maddie, thank god! I thought something had happened. Did they hurt you?" Scott's voice was panicked and a bit nasal, like maybe his nose was blocked. Or broken.
I frowned, shooting Steele a confused look. He just shrugged back at me, as confused as I was.
"What? Did who hurt me?"
"Those fucking bastards who think they control you," Scott spat, enraged. "Do you know where I am right now? Do you know what they did to me?"
I rolled my eyes at his theatrics. He did seem to lean pretty hard on the drama of any situation.
"I'm in the hospital, Maddie," he answered his own question, not waiting for me to respond. "They broke my wrist, my nose, four ribs, and gave me a concussion. I look like I've been run over by a car!"
I wrinkled my nose, rubbing at the bridge and trying to give Scott the shocked reaction he was hoping for.
"Well, it sounds like you learned not to call anyone a desperate slut again, huh?" Whoops, that wasn't supposed to come out my mouth. Oh well, too late now.
A strangled sound came down the phone, and I got the impression that wasn't quite the level of sympathy Scott had been fishing for.
I sighed. "Look, Scott—"
"They're changing you, Maddie. This cold, bitchy attitude isn't you, it's them." His voice was filled with venom and loathing, and it hurt my brain just listening to him. As if I didn't have enough drama in my life without Scott whining about what I'm sure was a minor ass-kicking.
"Okay, sure," I agreed, not really giving a shit about his opinion. We simply weren't good enough friends for his words to hit home with any weight. "Actually, Scott, I have something I want to ask you."
"What?" he snapped back, apparently irate at my lack of fucks given.
"Did you steal all my underwear and leave a creepy message in the bottom of my drawer last week?" I met Steele's eyes as I asked this and didn’t even tense up when he took way too long to return his gaze to the road. Maybe the guys were slowly curing my fear of car crashes. Slowly.
There was a pause on the line, long enough to make me suspicious as all hell. More so than I'd already been after hearing about the partial fingerprint.