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"He tolda break froht now, that’s why he’s back in town"

"Doesn’t he live near you?"

"Two doors down"

"We could have gone there to check"

"I already checked His parents don’t even know he’s in the city" I’d called his house after school I’d had a feeling he wouldn’t be there, but his h to convince ht not be able to find hi alone with him I wanted to confront him in a public place

"Okay, so where is he?" Carly asked "Let’s do this"

She thought s were hurt and I wanted to lash out, and as my best friend, she was ready to back me up

Just like with my mother, I hadn’t breathed a word to her about as really going on I wasn’t sure as stopping me, exactly Carly, of all people, would probably believe there were angels and de the city

But still I didn’t speak up She liked to protect ht pick on ht do worse than throw out a few insults Cruel naers could kill

I did wish very hard that I could stop thinking about Bishop He was constantly on my mind now If he hadn’t shown up today, I had little doubt that Kraven would have killed ratitude to Bishop for saving ht before

"I need to talk to Stephen on my own," I said "You should stay here and wait for et it So I’et a chance to tell hih, I won’t say that you having a car isn’t a nice perk" I couldn’t help but grin at herI need to handlethat way"

She considered this "So what if he’s all schain’? You’re just going to ignore it?"

"That isn’t going to happen" Even if Stephen was one hundred percent innocent, his reaction to me after the kiss spoke volumes I s to deal with than falling for soht now, no matter how cute I’d always found him

It was funny how completely this had doused my crush on him Like a bucket of water thrown on a litattraction to Bishop--and the fact that I couldn’t get him off my mind--had shown me that my little crush on Stephen had been just that Little