I swallow to keep my voice steady. “I don’t think. I know.”
“Do you know how many women he’s had in this room? In that bed?” His hand lifts to point toward it for effect. I force my chin up, trying to be strong. I don’t want to know. It doesn’t matter. He’s with me now. “I hope you at least used condoms.”
Condoms.
I completely forget. It was just too intense.
The color draining from my face says it all.
Connor dips his head, shaking it with disappointment. “Jesus, Livie. I thought you were smarter than that.”
Ashton hasn’t said a word. Not a word to defend himself, or us. He stands quietly, watching this entire disaster with sad, resigned eyes.
The three of us stand facing each other in a misshapen triangle, the air between us choking thick and toxic, the lies swirling visibly on the outside while the truth of what Ashton and I have disappears into nothingness.
That’s how Dana finds us. “What’s going on?”
Honest fear contorts Ashton’s face for just a moment before vanishing, leaving his complexion three shades paler. “What are you doing here?”
“I thought I’d surprise you,” she says, stepping into the room so carefully that you’d think the floor was riddled with land mines.
Connor crosses his arms over his chest. “Why don’t you tell her, Livie? Go on . . . tell her what you just told me.” Connor stares at me. Ashton stares at me. And when pretty, sweet Dana steps into the mix, her eyes wide with confusion and fear, she stares at me too, as she reaches up to clutch Ashton’s arm.
A sparkle catches my eye.
The solitaire diamond on Dana’s left hand. On her ring finger.
The gasp catches in my throat.
When did he propose?
Ashton knows I’ve seen it, because he closes his eyes and begins absently fumbling with the leather belt strap around his wrist.
It’s back on his wrist.
Ashton has put that shackle back on his wrist. Which means he’s given up the freedom that I gave him last night.
By the look of dismay on Connor’s face, he’s also seen the ring and now truly realizes the extent of this betrayal. “Tell her, Livie. Tell her what’s going on between you and her future husband, if you think you know him so well.”
I don’t need to say anything. Dana’s face pales. I watch as her eyes take me in from head to toe, then turn to look at the bed, then back to me. Almost recoiling from Ashton’s arm, she stumbles back three steps. “Ash?” Her voice trembles as she turns to look at him.
He bows his head, mumbling almost indecipherably, “I made a mistake. Just let me explain.”
Bursting into tears, she turns and runs out of the room. Ashton doesn’t hesitate for a second. He runs after her as her screams carry through the house.
Turning his back on me. On us. On whatever the hell we were. A mistake.
Connor’s words are quiet but piercing, soft but deadly, honest but so far from the truth. “You helped shatter two hearts today. You must be proud. Goodbye, Livie.” The bedroom door slams behind him.
And I know that there’s no reason for me to be here anymore. Not in this house, not in this school. Not in this life that is not my life.
I have to let go of everything.
And so I walk away.
I walk away from the voices, the shouts, the disappointment.
I walk away from my deceptions, my mistakes, my regrets.
I walk away from all that I am supposed to be and all that I cannot be.
For all of it is a lie.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Letting Go
I find them sitting at the kitchen table. Kacey is curled up on Trent’s lap with her fingers coiled in his hair, laughing as Dan pokes Storm’s swollen belly repeatedly, trying to make the baby respond. She’s due in two months now and she’s as beautiful as ever.
“Livie?” My sister’s watery blue eyes stare at me with a mix of surprise and worry. “I thought you weren’t coming home over your break.”
I swallow. “Neither did I, but . . . things changed.”
“I can see that.” She stares pointedly at my outfit. I never did go back to the dorm to change. I simply jumped in a cab to Newark and went on standby for the first available flight out to Miami. It took ten hours, but here I am.
Home.
Where I never should have left to begin with.
No one says a word, but I feel their eyes on my back as I walk over to the pantry. I pull out the bottle of tequila that Storm keeps on the top shelf. For emergencies, she says. “You were right, Kacey.” I grab two shot glasses. “You were right all along.”
“I missed the sound of seagulls,” I murmur.
“Wow, you really are f**ked up.”
With a snort, I fling my hand in Kacey’s direction and end up slapping her in the cheek. Last night, with the bottle of tequila and two shot glasses in hand, I had silently walked out the patio door to the deck. Kacey followed me, pulling up a lounge chair next to mine. Without a word, she started pouring shots.
And I started pouring my guts out.
I told my sister everything.
I admitted to every detail of my last two months, right down to the most intimate and embarrassing. Once the truth started flowing, it cascaded out of me in an unstoppable torrent. I’m sure the booze helped, but being around my sister helped more. Kacey just listened. She held my hand and squeezed it tight. She didn’t pass judgment, she didn’t scream, she didn’t cast disappointed sighs and glances or make me feel embarrassed. She did scold me for not using a condom, but then quickly admitted that she shouldn’t be throwing stones.
She cried with me.
At some point Trent came out to stretch a duvet over us. He didn’t say a word, leaving us to our drunken, sobbing stupor. And as the first hints of sun came over the horizon, completely drained of every last emotion, every secret, every lie, I passed out.
“Can I see that picture again?” Kacey asks softly.
I hand her the four-by-six from my purse, so thankful that I had it on me when I left. “I can’t believe how young they are here,” she murmurs, tracing the lines of the image as I had. I smile to myself. Three years ago, Kacey couldn’t even glance in the general direction of our parents’ picture.
Waving it at me before she hands it back, she murmurs, “Proof that he cares a great deal about you, Livie. Even if he is a train wreck.”
I close my eyes and heave a sigh. “I don’t know what to do, Kacey. I can’t go back. I mean . . . he’s engaged. Or he was.” Is he still? I’d received a where-the-hell-are-you text from Reagan earlier. After explaining that I was back in Miami, we shared a few messages, but she had no information for me. Or she didn’t want to tell me, other than to say that she hid out in Grant’s room all day because there was a lot of screaming and yelling.
That made me start worrying about Ashton more. What if he’s not with Dana? What will his father do to him? Will he use whatever he has over his head?
“And he’s definitely a train wreck,” Kacey repeats. “He needs to clear the tracks before he can move on with anyone, and that includes you.”
Just the thought of it stirs an ache in my chest. She’s right. Whatever Ashton and I had, I have to let it go. As much as I want to keep trying, to stay close to him while he battles whatever demons he needs to battle, I can’t keep doing it. Not like this.
Not with Connor and Dana and . . . ugh. The ring. My stomach tightens. This thing between us—love or not—has turned me into a selfish, manipulating idiot who takes what she wants even though it may hurt others. Who kept convincing herself that everything she did was okay because she knew that the man she wanted cared about her.