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her anymore—especially after she’d physically thrown his girlfriend out on her ass when Nikki had found the girl snorting coke in their cramped kitchen.
    She must really look like shit if Shawn was feeling bad for her.
    “Nah, he can come on up, Shawn. But thanks.”
    He only shrugged and walked away. She swiveled in her chair to face her mirror. Yep. She looked like hell. Bloodshot eyes, face pale and strained, hair messily shoved into a ponytail. Her ripped, sleeveless sweatshirt had certainly seen better days, and her cut-off shorts weren’t much better.
    Not only that, they bagged slightly at the waist, evidence of her lack of appetite in the past week.
    She turned back to her keyboard as footsteps echoed on the steps, tapping away at the keys, putting half-formed ideas into words. She worked a few minutes more, even after Wade slowly entered the room.
    Still too angry to make the first move, she continued to work.
    Finally finished, Nikki skimmed the rough draft and then she saved the file on the slow word processor. She really, really wanted a computer. But college was proving damned expensive, even with her scholarships, so she’d just have to make do for a while longer. Besides, for the most part, when she really needed something faster, she could use the computer at Wade’s.
    Well, usually .
    Spinning around, she found Wade staring out the window, his posture slumped, head bent. Finally, his voice sounding rusty, he asked, “Did you make it home okay?” He was, of course, referring to the night a week earlier when he’d driven away from the store in a fury unlike anything she had ever seen in him.
    Cocking her head, she coolly said, “It looks that way. I don’t appear to be the worse for wear.” Well, not really. Nothing some sleep, a shower and a meal or two wouldn’t fix. And you…
    He sighed, looking even more miserable, if possible, and flung himself on her unmade bed. He had his arm over his eyes, and his hand was clenched so tightly his knuckles were bloodless.
    He looked utterly dejected, Nikki thought with mild amusement.
    If she didn’t know better, she would think he was feeling guilty for picking a fight over nothing. And he damn well ought to. However, Wade never felt guilty about anything. Feeling guilty meant you had done something wrong, made some sort of mistake. Things like that were below him.
    She couldn’t gloat for too long though. He looked too awful. “I caught a ride home with Connie,” she said.
    Wade’s lower lip was still puffy.
    Nikki still couldn’t believe she had hit him. But, damn it, the way he had acted…
    Wade’s hoarse voice broke the silence when he said quietly, “I’m sorry. I had no right to do that, no right to jump all over you. I don’t know what in the hell came over me.” 22
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    “Don’t you?” she asked, her voice remote.
    With a sigh, he lowered his arm and sat up in bed, swinging around to sit on the edge of it. Looking her right in the eye for the first time since entering the room, he grimaced. His skin was unnaturally pale, dark blue circles under his eyes.
    “I was jealous,” he said simply. “Maybe I worry about you thinking about… Shit, I dunno. Dating.
    You never really did that. We’ve been together the past two years, and up until you started hanging out with me you never messed with dating. You didn’t have a chance to play the field the way your friends did.
    You would have every right to wonder.”
    “I never have wondered,” Nikki said quietly. “The girls my age think I’m damn lucky to have found myself somebody. The guys my age aren’t worth the trouble. But that’s beside the point. You came in with guns blazing and attacked me simply for talking to a guy I work with.”
    “He’d like to do more. I know what a guy looks like when he’s interested. And he’s definitely interested.”
    Sighing, he scrubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands. “But that’s not the