The door was shut, but he didn’t bother to knock. The only person allowed in her majesty’s room during a party was the queen herself.
He walked in, his draw dropping.
A girl was pinned against the wall, in a rather interesting position, by one of the varsity football players. His shocked mind attempted to process what he was seeing and to accept it.
His barging into the room like an idiot didn’t interrupt their…uh, mating—for a lack of a better term.
In any other situation, D would’ve laughed, made some stupid comment like “Dude, my bad”, and exited the room stage right. This wasn’t the first time he’d walked in on people having that kind of naughty fun at a party.
The problem with this situation was that Veronica was the girl blissfully oblivious and lost in the moment up against the wall.
Yes, that would be the same Veronica he was currently dating.
The irony of the moment didn’t escape him. He consciously chose to ignore it.
He took another large gulp off his beer, setting it down on her desk beside the door. He cleared his throat, focusing on a point way above the couple. He was pissed—not that he really had a leg to stand on in that department—but he wasn’t going to let them know that because he had a nagging feeling that was exactly what Veronica wanted.
A very public, drama filled outburst where she could call him out on his bullshit. Yeah, so not happening.
And, let’s be honest here. Causing that kind of scene over this was a lot like the pot calling the kettle black.
There really was only one way to handle this.
“Please… By all means, don’t let me interrupt your fun. I’ll just be downstairs when you’re done.”
They jumped apart like someone had just blown an air horn in the room at the calm statement. Veronica discreetly pulled her skirt down and the guy adjusted his fly before they both turned around to face him.
D now recognized the guy mounting his girlfriend like a prized mare as Justin Rhoades, Del’s boyfriend’s older brother.
He could also tell both of them were drunker than skunks.
Well, at least buzzed in Veronica’s case. She realized she was busted and he could see it was killing what buzz she’d been riding that wave of pleasure with.
She was slowly sobering up, an almost violet blush creeping up her neck to encompass her normally pale face.
“Hi, babe,” she squeaked—yes, squeaked like a dog’s chew toy—as she patted down her chin-length red hair, her baby blues wide with surprise. “That wasn’t what you, uh, thought it was.”
D leaned a shoulder against the wall just inside the door, his arms folded over his chest and arched an eyebrow. Now, he had absolutely no room to be judgmental after sleeping with Shanna back in June, but he also wasn’t going to stand there and take her lying straight to his face.
At least he hadn’t been caught red handed. Technically, he hadn’t been caught at all, but suspicions and accusations were being tossed around like a Frisbee here and there.
Denials weren’t exactly being made.
No one had any idea who the supposed girl was, though.
“I’m not stupid. I’ve been laid enough times to recognize the act. Just because you and I haven’t gotten that far doesn’t mean I haven’t traveled down that particular road a time or two before.” His gaze traveled to the drunken football player attempting to stumble out of the room without getting his face bashed in. D chuckled, taking pity on the poor guy. “Rhoades, if you leave right now without opening that idiotic trap of yours, I promise not to further mess up your ugly mug.”
Justin rushed past him and, in his haste to escape the mounting tension in the room virtually unscathed, almost slid down the stairs on the very face he hoped to keep unmarked.
D reached over and closed the door.
Veronica glared at him like he’d done something wrong, pulling her barely there shirt over her head. She threw it in the general direction of the clothes hamper. Stepping out of her skirt, she left it on the floor as she stalked over to her dresser in a black strapless bra and black lacy thong.
“If you needed that particular itch scratched, all you needed to do was say something. I would’ve been more than willing to oblige.”
Okay, so now he was just being an ass. He couldn’t help it.
Justin had gotten farther in one drunken encounter that he had in eleven months of dating her.
Not that he had really tried, especially after that fiasco with Shanna a couple of months ago, but still.
That bruised his ego a bit.
He watched as she yanked open a drawer, pulling out a pair of red pajama bottoms and a plain white tee.
He swore he could see steam coming out of her ears as she hastily pulled them on.
“Fuck you, D.”
“Apparently, that’s not in my job description as your boyfriend,” he shot back easily. He hitched a thumb over his shoulder. “If you’d like, I can call your fuck buddy back. You don’t look satisfied. I mean, after all, I did interrupt your, ah, quality time together.”
She climbed onto her bed, sitting Indian style on the lilac comforter as she faced him. “At least I didn’t try to hide it.”
Oh, wow.
She went there.
At this point, D didn’t even attempt to deny it. The cat was out of the bag, might was well let it run around and play. She wanted to play the game this way, fine, they’d play. He didn’t play nice, though.
“At least I had the decency,” he said quietly through clenched teeth, “to not broadcast the fact that I was sleeping—I should say slept, as in once—with someone other than my girlfriend to the entire school.” He consciously relaxed his jaw.
The silent tension in the air could be cut with a knife.
He lounged against the wall beside the door, one foot propped up behind him. He looked her straight in the eyes, his voice resigned, but kind, when he spoke again. “Instead of me assuming what this little lapse in judgment is about, why don’t you tell me yourself why you let the star quarterback mount you like a prized stud claiming a mare? Last time I checked, you deemed him lower than pond scum and you very publically announced—this is a direct quote here—‘he has reached a level of douchbagery that has yet to be discovered on Earth and he will plug his stick into any available port’.”
She studied her hands, a blush making itself at home on her cheeks. “Okay, fine. I was acting out like a sullen toddler to get a rise out of you. I wanted to see if you still gave a damn about me. I’ve been placed on the back burner for months,” she answered quietly.
D had to bite his tongue to keep the apology from escaping. He felt like the biggest dick on the planet because she was right. There was more going on between him and Shanna than just a drunken one night stand. Veronica couldn’t prove that or prove that it was Shanna, but he also had absolutely no doubt she suspected. And she was hurt and pissed off about it. Rightly so.
He got that.
He honestly did.
Lashing out in an equally hurtful way wasn’t going to resolve their relationship drama, though. It was just going to add to the drama.
He huffed out a sigh. “Did I pass your little test?”
She picked her brush up off the night stand. “Not exactly the reaction I was hoping for, but yeah. You passed.” She ran the brush through her tangled hair. “Though, you didn’t look the least bit surprised.”
D passed a hand over his hair with another sigh, this one pained. “I was. To be honest, though, I had a sneaking suspicion you were going to retaliate in some way after I called to say I was going to be late because of Corelsand. I just didn’t expect you to pull a stunt like that.”
“Why? Because I’m the good girl?”
“Honestly? Well, yeah.”
Veronica replaced the brush on the nightstand, keeping her gaze lowered. “Why don’t we just call this like it is?” she asked softly. “You go figure things out with whomever you’ve been drooling
over like an overexcited puppy for the last few months and I get to enjoy being a single girl again. We go our separate ways. No hard feelings. We both screwed up, so it’s all good.”
He shrugged. “If that’s what you want.” He wasn’t going to plead or grovel.
This was where tonight had been heading anyway.
She had cheated on him—yes, he was a hypocrite of the highest order, hear him roar—and he had never stayed with a female who had cheated.
And, putting the cheating crap aside, it wasn’t fair to keep stringing her along while he figured things out with Shanna.
Okay, there was also the fact that he wasn’t in love with Veronica. He loved her, yes. He wasn’t in love with her.
There. He had admitted it.
He was comfortable with her.
“You know, for the record, it was never about sex. There was no planning involved. It involved alcohol, poor judgment, and was beyond stupid,” he suddenly said. “I was wrong for not telling you about it when it happened and for leading you on all these months. I pulled away instead of being a man and owning up to my mistake and my feelings. I’m so very sorry that I’ve hurt you like I have.”
She nodded, tears sliding silently down her cheeks as she still refused to look at him. The admission was too little, too late, but she appreciated the apology more than he would ever know.
“Let’s forget the bullshit and try and be friends. It won’t be right away, but maybe we could get back to that point soon,” she whispered.
D pushed away from the wall and pulled open the door. “If that’s what you want.” The crack in his voice betrayed the hurt he was trying to keep hidden.
Without another word, he walked out her room, not looking back.
CHAPTER 13
August 2015
Suffield, OH
He snuck up the stairs, pulling his vibrating phone out of his pocket as he shut the basement door behind him. Swiping his finger across the screen, he answered the call. “Thanks for getting back to me so fast.”
“This better be good, Tiern. Things here are going to hell in a hand basket and I don’t have time for your bitching and moaning,” the female voice on the other end snapped.
D chuckled, leaning back against the wall. “Whoa there, Nox. Put your inner bitch back on her leash and tell her to heel. Things here aren’t all sunshine and unicorns either. Look, shit’s about to hit the fan and it’s only a matter of time before the secret is out.”
There was silence on the other end of the line.
Then a sharp intake of breath, followed by, “How bad is it?”
D scrubbed his free hand through his hair, tufts sticking up around his head like mini spikes. He sighed heavily. “She’s trying to avoid it. She’s telling the truth, without disclosing the whole truth. I’m attempting to do the same, mainly because I don’t know if she knows I know, you know?”
There was a chuckle on the other end of the line. “Yeah, I know. You know it has to come out, right? They need to know what they are up against, D.”
“Yes, Megan. I know, but if it comes out, we’re not just exposing ourselves. We’re exposing everyone and if we open that particular can of worms, everything is going to come out into the open.”
“That’s a risk we have to take.”
He sighed. “As long as you know what’s coming, I guess we have no choice but to let the whole truth come out.”
Washington, D.C
Guilt.
It’s the one emotion that sneaks up on a person like a ninja. It slowly eats away at a person, starting in the pit of their stomach as a sinking feeling every time the reason they feel it comes around. It festers more and more every time someone acknowledges its existence, until it finally tears the person open.
There are many ways a person can deal with this annoying invader. Megan Nox’s action of choice was to drown all those pesky little feelings and thoughts feeding into her guilt in alcohol. It wasn’t the most productive way to ignore those feelings, and it was probably going to end up biting her in the ass by night’s end, but it was so worth the risk.
Honestly, it was.
Especially after that call from D.
She scanned the crowded bar as she traced the rim of the glass of whiskey in front of her. With a heavy sigh, she picked up the glass and downed it in one swallow. As the liquid burned its way down her throat, she set the glass back down and signaled for another.
She spun around on the stool, watching the crowded room as she leaned her elbows back on the edge of the wooden bar. The dance floor in the middle of the room was packed with bodies moving to the loud beat pounding from the multiple speakers strung out along the ceiling.
Her eyes landed on the far back table. There was a man tucked into the corner watching the room while he nursed a bottle of beer. He had shaggy dark brown hair hidden under a plain black baseball cap. His light brown skin was dark enough to show he spent a lot of time in the sun and his eyes were hidden behind sunglasses. He was dressed in a black tee and loose fitting black jeans. He was cute, in a mysterious kind of way.
She sighed, running a hand through her curly black hair. She blamed the whiskey already coursing through her veins for the temporary lapse in judgment. The kind of guy who sat alone in the back of a crowded bar, dressed in all black, and wore sunglasses in an already darkened room, at night, was trouble with a capital “t”.
That was someone she needed to avoid like a bad rash. He was someone with something to hide.
Someone who was way too much like her for comfort.
Megan groaned, spinning back around as the bartender set a new glass of amber liquid down in front of her. She stared blankly up at one of the three large flat screens above the bar. Right now, she could be at home curled up on the couch with a good book and her boyfriend. Instead of here at this godforsaken bar.
She should be at home taking advantage of the fact that he was actually home.
Nope. Not her. Instead, she was in a crowded bar, in a completely different state, trying to figure out how the hell things had gotten this far out of control.
She started at the sudden vibration in her pocket. Down boys and girls. There was nothing kinky going on here, much to her dismay. It was just her phone alerting her that the real world still wanted her attention. Pulling the electronic leash out her pocket, she looked at the screen.
With a low groan, she downed the new drink and stood up. Dropping some bills onto the bar, she turned and made her way through the crowd towards the door.
Once outside, she took a few gulps of the cool night air and swiped her finger across the screen. “Hi, babe. What’s up?” she asked, walking further away from the building and into the side alley.
“Nothing. Just missed you,” the deep voice of her boyfriend of two years, Derrick, answered softly in her ear. “How’s the City of Angels treating you?”
Megan looked around, her gaze settling on the huge white house in the distance. She pulled her blue cotton long sleeved button down shirt tighter around her body as lightening flashed in the night sky and the wind picked up around her. She shifted, digging the toe of her combat boots into the loose gravel.
Yeah, she so wasn’t in California. More like D.C., but what was a coast amongst lovers?
Okay, fine. She had fully intended to go to Los Angeles on the business trip he thought she was on. The night before the trip, she had gotten a call from her past and the rest, as they say, was history.
So why did Derrick still think she was on the west coast instead of the east coast?
It was safer that way. If she could keep her past from colliding with her present, this little white lie could be overlooked and forgotten, never to see the light of day.
And, in all honesty, it was beyond complicated. A lot more alcohol would be required for any further explanation to be rendered. Quite possibly all the liquor in the metro D.C. area.
“Good,” she lied smoothly. The vaguer she kept her answers, the harder it would be
to be caught in the lies she was telling.
She stiffened as she heard footsteps at the mouth of the alleyway. Fading deeper into the shadows, she plastered herself against the side of the building and watched as three figures dressed in all black walked slowly into the alley.
Crap.
“Hey, babe, can I call you back?”
“Sure,” Derrick answered slowly. “I’ll be up for a while. Love you.”
“Love you, too,” she whispered absently as she hit the end button and slipped the device back into her jeans pocket.
She watched as the three figures fanned out as they walked deeper into the narrow space between the buildings. They were searching for something. That much was obvious. What would three commandos be looking for in an alley beside a bar?
Wow, that sounded like the beginning of a bad joke…
“Come out, come out, wherever you are!” one of the figures called out, placing his hands around his mouth like a bullhorn. “We know you’re here somewhere, Yves. We watched you come into the alley.”
Damn.
Well, that answered that question. They were looking for her.
Figured.
“C’mon, Yves! With the sky about to open up like a river after the dam’s been broken, I’m not in the mood to play hide and seek in a dark alley that smells like a dirty gym locker,” the figure closest to the mouth of the alley whined. “Make this easy on yourself. Hell, make this easy on all of us. Just this once.”
“Got her guys,” the third figure said. “Five meters down, left side, against the building watching us.”
That was a very accurately detailed description of where she was in conjunction to them…
Shit.
Megan looked down at the red dot on her shirt. It rested right over her heart.
Narrowing her eyes, she looked up towards the roof on the building across from her location. With a drawn out groan and a muttered curse, she stepped out of the shadows, both hands raised in surrender. Looking up at the most likely spot for their sniper, she raised the middle finger on both hands.
Surviving Today Page 10