Love Between Enemies

by Molly E. Lee

  Explain, if he’d let me.

  Would you?

  No. I wouldn’t. If someone hurt me this bad—well, I’d plot something even worse to return the gesture—because apparently, I was a horrible human being. This morning, with the heat from my parents, the rumor mill, and the utter mortification he’d subjected me to, my plan had seemed flawless. Now, after spending some real time with Gordon, the plan was nothing but a childish attempt to cause some real pain…and I couldn’t understand how I’d gotten to this point.

  A scholarship.

  A terrible speech.

  And an internship.

  Who knew these were the tools I’d use to ruin myself? And quite possibly Gordon along with me.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Gordon

  I parked in my normal spot in the shop’s lot, my heart in my throat and my stomach in waves. I’d hoped my dad’s text had been some kind of sick joke to get me to rush over. He wasn’t that kind of guy, but the alternative…

  I got out of my car, my muscles filled with lead as I walked the distance to the front of the shop. My father stood there, his arms crossed tightly over his chest. The glass door was open, and kids from my class and some underclassmen were slowly pouring out of the shop. The smell of beer and fried food wafted as they passed.

  “Sorry man,” a junior said under his breath as he eyed my dad. “Thanks for the afterparty, though.” He clapped me on the shoulder. He meant well, but his attempt at a quiet apology made my dad flinch.

  What in the absolute hell?

  I stopped in front of my dad, my stomach hitting the pavement as I peered inside the shop. The last person shuffled out, following the trail of people heading to their cars in groups. Empty beer bottles, glass bottles, cans, and cups littered the tables, counters, and part of the floor inside. The red and blue baskets we used to serve customers food were all over the place, some filled with chips from our stockroom, others empty and tossed aside or crushed. One trash can was knocked over in the back, the contents spilled and strewn about like confetti.

  I rubbed my palms over my face, stepping farther inside. The place was in a state of disarray, evidence of an epic party that should never have happened.

  How did it happen?

  “I never thought you’d disrespect this place, kid.” Dad’s voice was low and strained from behind me.

  I whirled around, the denial on the tip of my tongue. His raised hand stopped me.

  “I don’t know if you did this because of what I told you this morning, because you thought you’d send her off in style or maybe because you stopped caring…but it’s…it’s unacceptable. You’ve never done something like this,” he said, rubbing the back of his neck. “I don’t know what to do with you. You’re eighteen, but damn, son, this…” He indicated the disaster around us. “This isn’t being a man.” He shook his head. “What bothers me most?”

  My shoulders dropped as I pressed my lips together.

  “If you wanted a party that bad, I would’ve let you throw it at the house. You didn’t have to go behind my back.”

  I flinched, the pain slicing down my chest like a physical blow. “Dad—”

  “Don’t.” He pointed at the mess. “I don’t want to hear whatever excuse you may have. Just clean this place up.” He eyed the register that was thankfully untouched. “Be grateful no one messed with that or the safe. Or,” he huffed. “God forbid the cops would’ve shown up instead of me. Do you realize the trouble I’d be in if all those minors were caught drinking on our business property?”

  I clenched my eyes shut, the weight and confusion hitting me with a massive headache. “Dad, I didn’t—”

  “Don’t. No one else has the code, or the keys. I don’t want excuses.” He glared at me, the look enough to silence me again. He jabbed his finger at the mess. “Clean it. I can’t be around you right now, son. Just…fix this.” He turned his back on me and walked out the door.

  Never, not once in my life had he not given me the chance to be heard. To explain. Though, in this situation, I didn’t know where to start.

  I eyed the area. Literally don’t know where to start.

  The place was a wreck. It would take me all night to get it back to normal, quite possibly right up until I was due to meet Mr. Handler. Shit. If he even glimpsed it in this sort of state…if anyone did… A cold dread fell over me like an icy waterfall.

  I fished out my cell, drawing up my Snapchat app. I’d known what would be there, but was dumb enough to hope it wasn’t. My name—tagged in too many pictures to count. #undergradsunite #afterparty #thanksforthespaceGordon.

  “Hey, man,” Jay said as he came through the doorway. “Saw your dad leave. I tried to catch him, but he drove off pretty quickly.” He shoved his hands in his pockets.

  A bolt of lightning hit me, and I sighed. That’s how they’d gotten in without setting off the alarm.

  Jay.

  “I’m sorry we got caught before you could make it to your own afterparty.”

  “What?” I snapped. “You’re going to try and act like I allowed all this to happen?”

  He flinched.

  “How could you?” I asked, throwing my arm out to indicate the shop. “Jay? Why would you do this to us? Were you that desperate to have a party for the underclassmen? That pissed Lennon didn’t invite anyone but seniors to his place?”

  “No!” He gaped at me. “I didn’t do this.”

  I glared at him.

  “I mean,” he said, sighing. “I brought stuff. And punched in the code—”

  “And stole my keys?” I cut him off, patting the back of my pocket, feeling the keys there. “Did you make a copy or something?” I racked my brain, thinking back to breakfast this morning. I couldn’t remember a time when he’d gotten close enough to me to lift them long enough to make a copy, and then get them back. He must be an expert at it for me to not even notice.

  A crease formed between his eyebrows as he gazed at me like I was speaking a different language. “You gave your keys to Zoey, who gave them to Julie, so we could get everything set up early.” He shrugged. “That’s how I knew this was your idea. You wouldn’t have given your keys to Zoey if you weren’t ready to party here.”

  The ground shifted beneath my feet.

  Zoey had run into Julie as I raced out Lennon’s door. Then she’d thrown my keys to me, assuring me I’d dropped them.

  My stomach rolled. “Come again?” I asked, needing clarification.

  “Yeah,” he said. “Julie told me Zoey told her this was your big idea. Go out on grad night with an epic afterparty. Something for the underclassmen to get started until you could bring people back here after Lennon’s show.”

  I shook my head, grinding my teeth. “On what planet does that come close to sounding like me?”

  Jay opened his mouth, then snapped it shut.

  The gears turned behind my eyes, but the chaos of the shop and Jay’s story made the answer come too slowly.

  “I’m going to help you clean this shit up. Then Julie has some explaining to do,” he said. “I got played.”

  “We both did,” I said, my eyes going wide at the sight of Zoey standing in the entryway. Guilt was written all over her face.

  And the entire night became so painfully clear.

  She hadn’t forgiven me. She hadn’t been interested in me. We hadn’t connected. She’d known about the meeting with her dad. Known about my desperation for the internship and how these pictures would quash my chances.

  The kiss…she’d played me. And I was the sucker at her fingertips.

  I sighed and slowly walked toward the wooden bench that hugged the massive front window of the shop. The metal gate was down, thank God. That’s probably why the cops hadn’t shown up during the massive party I apparently threw.

  “I’m going to get started on the kitchen,” Jay said, glaring at Zoey before he disappeared behind the swinging door to the back.

  I sank onto the bench in front of her and s
troked the wood with my free hand.

  “I used to sit here every single day after school,” I said, my eyes fogging over. “When I was only old enough to get in Dad’s way. I’d sit here and study and watch the people walk up and down the street.” I clenched my eyes shut. “We’re in jeopardy of closing,” I said, the admission slightly freeing the massive weight on my chest. “Circumstances. I’ll spare you the details, but I found out this morning. Found out my father’s finances are now in jeopardy. There was no backup plan for Stanford like I thought. The scholarship, or the internship. That’s the only shot I had. When I thought you’d taken the scholarship from me just because you could…I snapped.” I swallowed the rock lodged in my throat.

  A tiny gasp escaped Zoey’s lips and I glared up at her.

  “What was the point of this?” I gestured to the disaster. “You found out about the meeting I have with your father in…” I glanced at the time on my cell. “Six and a half hours and decided to make his investment look like a bad one? Or simply make me seem like an asshole who doesn’t care?”

  She shook her head, her green eyes glistening.

  “Tell me,” I snapped, and she jumped at my words. I took a deep breath. “I think I at least deserve to know the full plan, because this…this couldn’t be it. I mean, kudos for hitting me somewhere I loved…but it can’t be all you had planned.”

  She blinked hard, her spine straightening. “I was going to bring you back here. Throw you into the party and get a picture. Just a picture. One I could use to show that you don’t care about rules or boundaries—”

  “Ah,” I cut her off. “You were going to tag me in the picture. So the people at the internship would see and not want to choose me.” Damn. She was brilliant. Cold, but brilliant. “Too bad for you my dad saw it before you could get me here.” I raked my fingers through my hair.

  “I tried to stop it.” She took a few steps toward me but halted when I slit my eyes at her.

  “You stole my keys. Kept me at the party on purpose.” The facts of the night tumbled out of my lips and the center of my chest tightened. “It was all an act.”

  “No, it wasn’t.” She sank down before me. “I’m sorry. I was so angry this morning when I hatched the plan. I thought your dad was just finally ready to sell. I didn’t know it was on the verge of closing…it’s always so packed. I didn’t know…I didn’t know you and I would—”

  “You and I?” I cut her off again. I stood up, needing to get away from her. She was too close, her pleading green eyes too real and raw for me to handle. This day, this night had been the worst and best of my life, and now it was back to shit again. “I’m an idiot,” I said, only stopping when I was across the room from her. “I thought there was something there…something deeper. I thought I’d seen the real you for the first time.” I palmed my neck.

  “You did. Gordon,” she said, “you have to believe me.” She tossed her hair off her face. “I’ll help you. I can help you fix this.” She started gathering cups in her arms. “I can tell my dad everything. We can fix this before the meeting…”

  “Stop,” I said. “Don’t you get it? You’ve gotten exactly what you wanted.”

  “No,” she said, dumping the trash in the upright can by the door. “Nothing has changed. I messed up, sure, but so did you. If I can see past the speech, you have to be able to see past this. I’ll clean this whole place myself and we can go back to—”

  “Zoey,” I chided. “There are at least a dozen pictures online with my name tagged in them. It doesn’t matter that I wasn’t here. The shop is easily recognizable.” I huffed. “You win.”

  She bit down on her lip, her brow furrowed. If I wasn’t practically shaking from the anger flooding my blood, I’d want to walk over and hold her until she smiled again. But that was a joke, a ruse, an act.

  “Gordon. Please. You know that was me when the lights went out.”

  “Funny,” I said. “That you had to be in total darkness to finally be real with me.” I rubbed my hands over my face, staring at the floor because I couldn’t bear to see the tears in her eyes. “Just go.”

  “No, I can fix this.” She was so determined, but I was so done.

  “You need to go,” I said, finally looking up at her. “I know I made an ass of myself today, so maybe I deserved this…but my apology was sincere and my stupid speech didn’t rob you of anything. Not like this. Now I have no scholarship, no internship. No Stanford. And a few hours ago, I was prepared to be fine with that because I’d found something else to look forward to, to be joyful about.” The meeting with her dad would be screwed, too, if I didn’t get this all cleaned before he got here.

  “What?” Her voice cracked.

  I pressed my lips together, planting her with a look that couldn’t be misunderstood.

  “And now you’ve taken that, too.”

  “I’m here,” she said. “What do you want me to do, beg?” She opened her arms like she was fully prepared to do it. “I didn’t understand the way I felt about you until…”

  “Until you had to fake it?”

  She flinched.

  “Just go,” I said again.

  The building tears in her eyes finally rolled down her cheeks.

  I thought she never cried, and after what she’d done to me tonight, I was shocked she had it in her.

  Maybe she really feels bad.

  Maybe there was no way of being sure. How could I ever trust her again?

  “I’m sorry,” she said and spun on her heels, her blonde hair flying behind her as she bolted out the door.

  A fresh wave of hurt opened up in my chest as the reality of losing everything crashed down on top of me.

  “Damn,” Jay said, pushing through the door from the kitchen where he’d left to give us privacy. “I couldn’t not overhear.” He picked up an armful of cups, walked them to the overturned trashcan, and stood it upright. “What happened between you two tonight?”

  I raked my palms over my face, arching my head toward the ceiling. “It’s a long story.”

  He grabbed the broom from behind the bar and started sweeping trash into a big pile on the floor. “Looks like we’ve got a long night ahead of us,” he said. “Why don’t you start at the beginning?”

  I scooped up a half-empty bottle of vodka off the floor and shrugged. “All right.”

  It took me an hour from start to finish to tell Jay the happenings of one of the worst and most interesting days of my life. Though we worked the entire time I talked, we still weren’t anywhere near close to being done.

  I tossed him a bottle of water as we took a quick break from cleaning, and I leaned against the bar.

  “Shit,” he said after taking a drink. “That is cold.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  “But she did apologize. That has to count for something.”

  I glared at him. “You going to let Julie off the hook that easy, too?”

  He laughed. “Probably. She’s got me wrapped.”

  I shook my head. “I can see that.”

  “Don’t fault me, dude. I’m pissed af. I’m dreading the screaming match this convo will turn into.” He tore at the label on his bottle. “But we’ll work it out. Love does that to you.”

  “You love her?” I asked, shocked.

  “Yeah.” He widened his eyes like it was the most obvious thing in the world. “But I am super pissed she let me believe this was your master plan, not Zoey’s.”

  “Not even close,” I said. “I thought I was making up for the dick move I’d pulled at the ceremony, but it turns out she was getting back at me the entire time.” I downed the rest of my water. “I made an idiot of myself enough times in one night for a whole lifetime.”

  Jay clapped me on the back. “Don’t worry, man,” he said. “You’ve got more stored up.” He smirked at my incredulous gaze, and it was impossible not to laugh with him.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Zoey

  I sank into my car and allowed the tear
s I’d barely held back to rush out of me so hard I cringed. I shouldn’t be in hysterics. I should be doing a victory dance. My ultimate revenge plan had been a success. One problem.

  I didn’t plan on falling for him.

  I thought I could fix it. Thought he’d give me a chance, but I was too good at plotting. I’d come up with something that would ensure he didn’t get the internship, and on top of that, more than likely ruin his meeting with my father. How could I expect him to trust me after the act I’d pulled? I couldn’t help wishing he believed me, though. That it wasn’t all an act. That our kiss had been real and incredible.

  An alarm blared on my cell, and I jolted against my steering wheel at the jarring sound. I scooped it up, noting the label on the alarm.

  Midnight.

  Time to text Fynn. I hoped Braylen had already come clean with him, but if she hadn’t, at least I knew this was the right thing to do. Fynn deserved to know that Braylen was in love with him, and she deserved to leave for college without regrets.

  I typed out a fast text to Fynn, then dropped my phone in my bag. After a few minutes of staring at the light glowing through the closed glass door of the shop, I finally drove out of the parking lot. And I kept going, driving around town as I let my mind wander, trying like hell to figure out a way to fix what I’d ruined. There had to be a way, and I wouldn’t stop until I’d found it.

  An hour later, I parked in a gas station lot and texted Braylen. I needed an outsider’s prospective. She, at least, would tell me the truth. Tell me if I didn’t have a chance at earning back his trust.

  A smile cracked my lips when I read her return text. Fynn was at her house. Well, there was something good from this wretched night. I told her that we’d talk tomorrow. There was no way I was busting up that love fest. It was eighteen years coming, and I would not get in the way.

  I swiped underneath my eyes, sucking in a sharp breath. I had nowhere else to go but home.

  Home.

  A lightbulb clicked on in my brain, the answer waiting buried in the one place I’d avoided looking. I hurried home, a rush of hope filling my chest. A cold sense of dread sat right next to it because it was something I’d sworn to myself a long time ago I’d never do.