In My Skin

CH 37 || A Terrible Friend

I met Cody at the parking lot, my eyes automatically scanning the surroundings. Yet, there was no sign of his dark-haired, know-it-all sidekick and my shoulders dropped a little.

Then again, Killian's presence might make this a little awkward. I settled into the passenger seat of his car, wringing my hands. How should I bring this up?

An awkward silence hung inside the car. Or maybe it was just me being awkward. However, when I glanced at Cody, he seemed to be equally lost in his thoughts as I was.

"Don't you have any questions?" he asked as he wheeled out of the parking lot.

I turned to face him, surprised. "About what?"

His lips stretched into a half-smile as he glanced at me. "Kel."

I felt a flush rise to my cheeks. Had I really been so obvious?

"Oh," I said, my voice sounding too high even to my own ears. "How—"

"Suz hinted very subtly at something along those lines."

Oh my God. Of course, she had. She'd probably expected me to chicken out.

"You're the only one who calls him Kel, right?" I asked to distract myself.

"My mom came up with it. So? I'm waiting."

I opened my mouth, swallowed, and tried again, but no words escaped my lips. Something didn't feel right about this. With a deep exhale I finally said, "I don't want to go behind his back."

"Don't worry, he told me to be honest if you had."

"He—you mean Killian?" I asked suddenly breathless.

"Yeah."

I mulled that over in my head. "When?"

"After our vacation."

That long ago? "But...why would he tell you that? Why not talk to me himself?"

Cody laughed. "Were you really going to ask him?"

Killian's closed-off expression swam before my eyes. "Yes... Maybe?"

Cody raised his brows at me.

Yeah, he didn't buy that one bit.

"Well, I did sort of ask," I mumbled and crossed my arms. "He seemed pretty tight-lipped about it."

We pulled up to my apartment. Cody parked the car and turned off the engine. "That's probably my fault," he hedged, his eyes darting away from mine.

I tried to make sense of that but came up blank. "I don't understand."

Cody let out a sigh and leaned back in his seat. "Kel doesn't want to talk about my stuff since he might think some of it is touchy for me," he explained.

I cocked my head. "Like what?"

"Well, that depends." His mouth curled as he faced me again. "Do you have questions or not?"

"Fine," I relented. "What's the deal with Alicia?"

Cody let out a long exhale and rubbed his forehead as if trying to shake off a bad memory.

"You don't have to tell me—"

"No, it's fine. If anyone would understand, it's probably you. You're not the only one who was stuck in a toxic relationship."

My eyes went wide.

He kept his gaze straight forward, looking through the windshield. "The funny thing was, I had no idea. I just thought that's how it's supposed to be and if I didn't do what she wanted, I was the asshole. Killian and I were roommates back then and at some point, my ex brought Alicia along. She had this idea of her best friend dating her boyfriend's best friend or something. It was fine at first. Alicia and Killian would join us and they even became friends. She was nice enough and Kel didn't mind, but I knew he did it mostly for me. He wasn't interested. But then..." Cody trailed off grimacing.