Another beep from an incoming text as I swallowed. I walked back to the living room, my chest tightening with each forced breath.

Can I come over?

Well, that didn’t make sense. If Robin had found out, Grant certainly wouldn’t be flaunting it in her face by coming over. Unless he was coming to warn me. Oh God, was Robin going to kick my ass? I had earned the reputation of a scrapper. I’d gotten in plenty of knock-down, drag-out fracases with other girls when I was a kid. Hell, I’d even been in a couple of damn good catfights in bars as an adult. Somehow I couldn’t picture a Goody-Two-shoes like Robin getting down and dirty like that. But if she thought for a moment I’d been boning her man, I knew her claws would come out. I’d rather have that than the mind games chicks tend to play. If only women could be more like men where they used fists to handle a dispute and it was over with, all forgiven with blood and knuckles.

I needed to know what was going on, so I typed a simple answer:

What’s going on?

I’ll tell you when I get there. On my way.

I paced through the next ten minutes while the drugs worked their magic until I heard a knock. I rushed to the door, preparing myself for the worst as I hurried him inside.

He was barely across the threshold when I blurted out, “Tell me what happened. I’m about to lose my fucking mind, Grant.”

He rested one hand on each of my shoulders, then leaned down to hook my gaze on him. “Hey, calm down. There’s no problem. I just wanted to see you.”

I flicked his hands off my shoulders and backed away, fuming. “What the hell was that all about then, idiota? With all that cryptic shit you were texting I was about to go over there and start apologizing to her, begging her to kick my ass!”

Grant pulled me into a hug, his body a warming balm. “Hey, it’s okay, Lil. Everything’s fine.”

“So Robin doesn’t know about the kiss?”

“No. Why would you think that she did? Did she say something to you?”

“No, Grant, but your text was vague. Who says they need ‘to talk’”—I air-quoted—“unless it’s bad?”

“I guess I do.” He chuckled, but I wasn’t laughing. I was still coming down off my panic attack. I slumped into the sofa. My legs felt sleepy and my arms heavy as the living room rippled like it was underwater.

“What do we need to talk about?” I demanded. “And next time don’t word it like that or I’ll cut your friggin’ balls off.”

“Ouch.” He cupped his balls; that made me grin. “Well, I wanted to talk about us.”