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“You met her tonight?” I ask.

His eyes flick to the side and back. Something in my stomach drops so far and so fast my knees go loose, and I have to lock them.

“Did you meet her tonight?”

“Kylie.”

“Wow.”

“Can we please not do this in front of everybody?”

One laugh comes out of me, cracked straight down the middle. “You’re embarrassed? You’re worried about people watching?”

“No. Jesus Christ. I’m trying to talk to you.”

“You were doing plenty with your mouth five seconds ago. You didn’t mind an audience then.”

His face goes hard. “Come on.”

“No,” I say, and when he says my name again, “No,” and I turn around and walk out.

I don’t need to look back to know he’s following. The porch is crowded, so I shove through, somebody’s drink sloshing over my wrist, and take the steps too fast. The night air hits the sweat at the back of my neck, and I drag it in like I’ve been underwater.

“Kylie, stop.”

I don’t. Corvin Hall is only a few blocks away, which was the whole reason we came to this party. Somebody on the fourth floor knew somebody who knew somebody who lived here, which in college apparently counts as a complete chain of custody.

Evan falls into step beside me. “Will you slow down?”

“No.”

“I said I fucked up.”

“And?”

“And I’m trying to explain.”

“So explain.”

When I turn my head, his brows are pulled low and his mouth is a flat line, and I can’t believe it. He’s angry. He found a way to get there first.

“Go ahead,” I say. “You wanted me to stop. I stopped.”

“I don’t know what you want me to say.”

That lands right under my ribs, because I do know. I want him to say something that puts it all back, that rewinds fifteen minutes and drops me in that living room with Maybe-Morgan, sweaty and laughing, thinking about calling him tomorrow. I want him to tell me I got it wrong. But his mouth was on hers, and his hand was on her, and she thought he was single because he told her so. I keep turning those three things over, looking for the angle where they become something else, and there isn’t one.

“You told her you were single.” My voice gives on the last word, and I hate that.

“I didn’t—”

“She said you did.”

“It’s complicated.”

“No. That sentence is actually really, really simple.”

“Kylie, I didn’t go there planning for this to happen.”