Free The Year We Hid Away by Sarina Bowen Page B

sound of a heavy body falling to the sidewalk. “Aaaarrgh, fuck!” the guy hollered. When I looked down, he was curled up in a ball, holding his nuts.
    And Bridger was standing over him. “What part of off me did you not hear?” he growled. He wound up for another kick, but the guy rolled away, flopping over onto his other side, still protecting the family jewels.
    “Bridge,” I gasped, tasting bile in my throat. I was still stunned to see him. If only the world would slow down for a few minutes so I could catch up with everything that had just happened.
    The sound of my voice seemed to change his focus. He wheeled away from Spunky and stood before me. Bridger took my hands in his, inspecting my wrists. He pulled me into a hug. “Did he hurt you? Jesus, I’ll kill him.”
    That’s when the tears began running down my face, and Bridger wiped them away with his thumbs. But I wasn’t really afraid, just overwrought. About everything. And Bridger had no idea. Angry, I pushed him away. “No. Don’t touch me.”
    He stepped back, shock on his face. “Christ, Scarlet. Tell me what’s wrong.”
    “You,” I squealed. “Why are you here? Why were you there , in that bar? With who? I’m just your Tuesday and Thursday girl…”
    I broke off, gasping now. Even as my sobs gathered steam, I knew I was making an ass of myself. But I was too drunk to reign it in. I stood there, right on Elm Street, having an ugly cry.
    “Where is it, Scarlet?”
    Bridger was trying to ask me a question, but I was too busy sobbing to hear him. I wiped my nose on my sleeve.
    He wrapped an arm around my back, and I let him. I allowed it, because crying while very drunk wasn’t as easy as you’d think. The ground beneath my feet had begun to sway in unpredictable ways. But Bridger held me tight, and it felt so freaking good. And that only made me cry harder. Damn. It. All .
    “Your phone , Scarlet. Did you lose it?”
    “At home,” I gulped. “Why?”
    “Because I’ve been calling you for hours ,” he sighed. “I got an unexpected free pass tonight. So I started calling you before seven, right up until the minute I saw you in that bar. Go look at your phone. You’ll see.”
    “Ohhhh,” I moaned, the word long and shuddery.
    Bridger pulled me to his side and started to lead me down the sidewalk. “How did you get into such a state? Do you always get wasted on Friday nights?”
    I shook my head violently. “Never. Which is why I feel so… urgh.”
    “Let’s get you home, then,” he said, steering me across the street. “You have your key card?”
    I nodded with my whole drunken body. The way a horse nods.
    “Okay,” he chuckled. “Come on.”
     
    We’d almost made it home when a war broke out in my stomach. As we walked across Freshman Court, the schnapps began fighting the popcorn, and I couldn’t tell who was winning. But I, for one, was losing. “Bridger, I think… ugh.” I swerved away from him, took two staggered steps, and managed to aim my vomit into the shrubbery. “Oh,” I wailed, as much from the humiliation as from the discomfort.
    Bridger gathered my hair together and held it for me. “You’ll be okay,” he said, with actual humor in his voice. “We’ve all been there.”
    “Not me,” I said. “I don’t do this.”
    Behind me, he let out another enormous sight. “Okay, you know what? We’re going to write off this entire night.”
    “Are we?” I stood up again, fishing through my pockets for a tissue. No such luck. The best I could come up with was a receipt for a cup of coffee I’d bought. So that’s what I used to wipe my mouth.
    Sexy.
    “Henceforth,” he said, “we shall refer to this as The Most Pointless Night Ever. It’s just one more example of my good luck. Getting this one night’s reprieve…”
    “And me not answering the phone,” I mumbled. “It’s all my fault.”
    “Not at all,” he sighed. “I should have known about tonight before, but I didn’t read the…