Page 118 of The Draft

With his brows crossed, he was swiping his phone, looking annoyed. “I’ve been trying to call her, but she hasn’t answered.”

“It’s five a.m. She’s probably sleeping like the rest of campus. We’re the only idiots awake right now.”

“Yeah, but that doesn’t explain why she didn’t text me last night. She always checks her phone before she goes to bed.”

Unless she was being eaten out by me, apparently. I had no idea where her phone even was. I hadn’t seen it all night, so it must have still been in her sweatshirt.

I scratched the back of my neck, trying to think of another excuse for her. “Maybe she hasn’t gone to sleep yet. It’s Saturday morning. She probably went out and had a good night with her friends.”

Cade looked up in shock. Wrong thing to say. “You don’t think she’s out with those football guys, do you?”

“No. No, of course not. I bet she’s out with some other friends.”

“She doesn’t have any other friends.”

Shit. I didn’t think this through.

“Cade, do you hear yourself? Madison is fine. I bet she just fell asleep before she could text you back. That’s all.”

“Madison’s a light sleeper, though. Don’t you remember when she blackmailed me for sneaking out of my window to a party in high school? She would have heard any of my texts or calls.”

“Not if her phone is on silent.”

“You know what? I’m going to go over to her dorm. I think it opens at six.”

“Wait. How about I come with you?” I said as he started walking to the elevator. We were in too deep because if he went to Madison’s room and she wasn’t there, he would freak the hell out, so I needed to distract him and give her some time to get there before he did. “The security guard, Todd, and I go way back. He might let me in early.”

“How do you know his name?” Thankfully, he was too concerned about Madison to think about it for long enough to draw conclusions.

“He’s a big Crushers fan. That’s all.” Taking the two drinks, I walked past Cade, trying to act casual. “Look, I’m sure she’s fine and she’ll text back ina minute, but if you want to check, let me just put some clothes on and I’ll come with you.”

I gestured to the door as I walked backward to my room so I could watch Cade’s facial expression. He wasn’t going to let this go. Not that I blamed him. It was his little sister, and if he thought she was in danger, he’d do anything to protect her. “How about I try to call her before we go? Maybe you ticked her off, and she’s ignoring you,” I joked.

“No. If you call her, she might get suspicious about why you’re suddenly all over her. She’ll probably think that you’ve got a crush on her or something.” He chuckled, but I didn’t find it funny. I tried to keep my smile from dropping as I nodded.

“I’ll just call her.” He had the phone to his ear before I could stop him, and I turned, wincing as I waited to hear her ringtone, only sighing in relief when there was no noise.

Thank goodness.

“Still no answer,” he said, glaring at his phone like it was the phone’s fault Madison was ignoring him.

“My phone is just in there.” I used my elbow to point at my door because I was holding the coffee and orange juice. “Let me see if she answers, and I’ll let you know.”

There. Easy way out of this conversation. No need to go into any more detail and I could still hide the fact that Madison was here.

I stepped toward my room, feeling good that I’d come up with something, but just as I was about to open my door, Cade said, “That’s weird.”

Ignore it. Go into your room and fix this thing by getting Madison to text him. That was what I needed to do, but I wasn’t thinking straight, and for some reason, was having trouble leaving Cade outside my room.

“It says her phone is here.”

“Here?”

“Yeah, you know, the tracker app that we have. It says her phone is here.”

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

“Maybe she came over last night looking for you and dropped it in between the sofa cushions.” I walked over to the couch, already feeling my demise because I knew her phone wasn’t there.