“I said some unforgivable things to you.”
“I needed to hear them.”
“No one deserves to hear those things.”
Liv took several steps closer to her. “But you were right. I’ve spent so much of my life ashamed of my own weakness that I’ve turned it against people, expected them to live up to a standard I couldn’t meet myself.”
“And I lashed out at you to cover my own shame.”
Indignation on Alexis’s behalf puffed Liv’s chest out. “But you didn’t do anything wrong! Royce is a piece of shit who forced you into this position!”
Alexis laughed softly. “I wish I had it in me to fight the way you do.”
“Alexis, that’s not—”
“You know what, though?” Alexis said, cutting her off. “It’s oddly freeing to have someone know. I’m so fucking tired of living with this.”
Liv’s eyes widened. “You said the F-word.”
“I know. It seemed the appropriate time to do it.”
“I would agree.”
Alexis looked at the ceiling and sucked in a deep breath. She let it out as she lowered her gaze. “I need a drink.”
“Girl, same.”
Liv followed Alexis into the kitchen, keeping her eyes peeled for Beefcake and Howler. They’d been unsupervised long enough to have acquired weapons. Alexis walked to the far end of the kitchen and withdrew a can of Coke from the fridge. Liv laughed out loud when it was followed by a bottle of whiskey.
“Maybe just the whiskey,” she suggested.
Alexis nodded. “Definitely.”
Two shots later, they sat on the floor of the kitchen, their backs pressed to the cold stainless-steel counter.
“My mom was sick,” Alexis said.
“I know.”
“He was offering me all this money, and all I had to do was keep my mouth shut, and suddenly it was like I had a way out. Not just from the harassment or the hell of that job but a way out for my mom. He was offering me enough money to pay off her medical expenses, to give her a real funeral, and—”
She looked around, hands gesturing just wildly enough to reflect the booze in her system.
“To open your own café,” Liv finished.
“To live my dream.”
“There is no reason to be ashamed of any of that.”
“I know that logically. And probably, if I were in your shoes, I’d be telling me the same thing. But it’s different when it actually happens to you.”
“How long did it go on?”
“It started almost as soon as I got there.”
Liv lost her breath. “That was over a year.”
“Yep. A year of complete humiliation.” Alexis’s voice hardened. “A year of learning how to avoid him, how to pretend it didn’t matter. A year of believing I had to put up with it to protect my career and everything I’d worked so hard for.”
“Did he—I mean, how far did he take it?” Liv didn’t know how else to ask the question and felt guilty for even asking it.
“You mean did I sleep with him?”
“It doesn’t matter. I shouldn’t have asked.”
“Yes.”
She said it so softly that Liv wasn’t even sure what she meant at first. But the look on Alexis’s face gave it away.
“You asked why I’m ashamed. That’s why. I gave in to him. What does that make me?”
Alexis didn’t wait for Liv to answer. She stumbled to her feet, a gag evident in her throat. Liv watched helplessly as Alexis raced to the garbage can and retched.
Liv walked to her friend and hugged her from behind. “It’s okay. It’s going to be okay.”
Alexis braced her hands on the edges of the trash can, panting and sweating. Liv gripped her shoulders and forced her to turn around.
“What does that make you?” she asked, cupping her friend’s cheeks the same way Rosie and done to her earlier. “It makes you a survivor.”
Tears dripped down Alexis’s cheeks. “I slept with him. Willingly, Liv.”
“It wasn’t consensual. Not in a real way. And even if it were, who gives a fuck? He had power over you. He knew you were vulnerable because of your mom. He took advantage of that. Of you. And you did the only thing you thought you could to protect yourself and your mom.” Liv remembered the book with a small smile. “Fear is a powerful motivator, but so is love.”
Alexis’s face crumbled, and she gave in to her sobs. She bent and pressed her forehead to Liv’s shoulder, and Liv held her like that. Rocked her. Rubbed her hands up and down her friend’s back until sobs became hiccups and hiccups became shaky breaths. Until it was over.
Alexis pulled back with a groan and turned around, her hands swiping at her cheeks. “God, I hate crying.”
“I know. I’ve done enough of it in the past twenty-four hours to last a lifetime.”
“Why?” Alexis sniffed, turning around again.
Oh. Right. She didn’t know about Mack. Liv shrugged and brought her up to date.
Alexis’s mouth dropped open. “Wow. There’s been a lot going on in your life.”
“Pretty much.”
“And . . . it’s over with him?”
A lumped formed in Liv’s throat. “I said some unforgivable things to him.”
Alexis tilted her head then, and Liv knew something profound and very Alexis-like was about to be stated. “Maybe he needed to hear them.”
Liv groaned and rolled her eyes. “I had that coming, didn’t I?”
“Yep.”
God, what if she’d ruined everything? “He didn’t need to hear them, though. He needed me to be understanding, to hold him. And I didn’t.”
Alexis put a hand on her arm. “Deep breaths.”
Liv returned to the counter, poured another shot, and fired it back. Alexis joined her and did the same.
“You know what I really want to do?” Alexis asked as she set her glass down.
“Get sloppy drunk and bitch about men?”
“No. Well, yes. But I’m talking about after that.”
“What do you want to do?”
Alexis poured two more shots and handed one to Liv. “Destroy Royce Preston.”
Liv clinked their glasses. Because this was one thing she could get right. “Girl, same.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
For the first time in his life, Mack wished he were unemployed.
Because after leaving Liv, he’d stumbled home, grabbed an unopened bottle of Jameson, and carried it to bed with no intention of going anywhere near his clubs or a single living person for as long as it took to forget the taste of her, the feel of her, the memory of her.
For three days, he hadn’t showered. Barely ate. Ignored every phone call and text. Threw some shit. Broke some shit. But mostly he slept and drank, and when he drank too much, he thought really, really hard about calling and leaving her slurred voice mails, but thank God he didn’t because sometimes he even cried.
Because his heart was hemorrhaging in his goddamned chest.
On day four, his bedroom door crashed open. “Oh my God, what the fuck is that smell?”
He rolled over. His friends stood in the doorway with matching expressions of disgust on their faces.
“What do you want?” he growled.
“We’re here to save you,” Gavin said, “but I think we’re going to need gas masks.”
“Fuck off.”
Gavin held his hand over his nose and mouth. “Seriously, Mack. It smells like a camel exhibit in here. Have you been, like, pissing all over yourself or something?”
Mack grabbed a pillow and threw it. It landed ten feet from them. “Go away.”
With a dramatic gag, Gavin stepped over the pillow and a pile of dirty clothes and went into the bathroom. Mack heard the spray of the shower
a moment later.
“Hose yourself off, asshole,” Gavin said when he walked back out. “Now. And then come downstairs. It’s time for a fucking intervention.”
The door slammed shut as they left.
Mack stared at the ceiling. Fuck them. He didn’t need an intervention. He needed to be left alone to wallow in his misery. He dragged a hand down his scruffy jaw, caught a whiff of his own stench, and realized they were right about at least one thing. He could use a shower.
His stiff muscles protested as he sat up and swung his legs off the bed. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d gone this long without at least running. The hot water pounded at knots in his shoulders he’d been too depressed to even notice.
There was a poetic justice to it, of course. The founder of the Bromance Book Club, the man who believed the manuals had all the answers, who thought he knew everything there was to know about love, brought down by a woman.
Except, that wasn’t true, was it? He’d brought himself down. He’d violated one of the most important rules: never, ever lie. There’d been a thousand chances to tell Liv the truth, but he hadn’t. Even after she’d confided in him about her painful past, he’d convinced himself he just needed more time to find the right words. He’d ignored everything he’d ever learned from the books, forgotten every hard-fought lesson the heroes had had to learn, and now it was too late.
Mack scrubbed his hands over his face and leaned into the hot water. The scalding downpour became a punishment, a reprimand, a stinging cleanse. It would take a thousand blistering showers to wash away the tattooed imprint of her on his body, and even that wouldn’t be enough to scrub his brain or his heart of the memories of what it had been like to finally, fully, fiercely fall in love. The manuals never offered advice on how to survive an unhappy ever after. He was officially on his own.
Fifteen minutes later he finally emerged from his bedroom and headed downstairs. The Russian met him in the hallway leading to the kitchen. “You need a hug, yes?”
“Not really—mrph.” The Russian pulled him into an awkward, muscle-bound embrace. His face was smooshed against the Russian’s shoulder, and it actually felt kind of good, so he stayed there for a moment and closed his eyes. Hugs were underrated.
“You smell much better,” the Russian said, pulling back.
At least he had that going for him.
When Mack walked into the kitchen, he found the guys in various stages of cleaning. Malcolm wore rubber gloves that barely fit over his massive fingers and was scrubbing the sink, which was miraculously clear of the dirty dishes that had slowly piled up.
“This place was a mess, man,” Del said without looking up from where he was scraping at something sticky on the counter. “I’ve never seen it like that before.”
“I’ve had a bad few days.”
“No shit,” Gavin said. “There was a piece of pizza on the floor that was about to gain independent thought and stage a coup.”
“Christ, it’s only been four days.”
They all stopped and stared.
“What?” he barked.
“It’s been five days,” Gavin said.
His lungs vacated oxygen. Five days? He’d lost an entire day? How the fuck had that happened? Shit. Had Liv tried to call him? When was the last time he’d even checked?
“Where’s my phone?” he breathed.
Gavin shrugged. Mack turned and ran back upstairs. He ripped blankets off the bed, threw pillows over his shoulder. Nothing. Where was it? He dropped to the floor and looked under the bed. There. He grabbed it and turned it over. Tried to turn it on. Swore a blue streak when he realized it was dead. He grabbed his charger and ran back downstairs.
Malcolm was pulling something out of the microwave when he returned to the kitchen. The smell of whatever it was sparked a vicious growl in Mack’s empty stomach, but he barely glanced at it as he plugged in his phone. His thumbs tapped a nervous beat on the counter as he waited for the white screen of life to appear.
“Come sit down and eat,” Malcolm said, walking behind him with a plate.
Mack ignored him as he hit the power button again, but he got the same empty-battery image.
“I’m not going to tell you again,” Malcolm said.
Mack’s stomach growled again, so he gave in. He sat in a chair along the island, and Malcolm set the plate and a bottle of water in front of him.
Mack leaned forward and stared at his plate. “What is this?”
“Chicken pot pie.”
“You found that in my freezer?”
“No, I brought it.”
Mack lifted an eyebrow. “Why?”
“You’re seriously going to complain about the food I brought? You’ve been living on bourbon and Cheez-Its for a week.”
“Whiskey. Not bourbon.”
“Same fucking thing.”
“It’s not, actually,” Gavin said. “All bourbon is whiskey, but not all whiskey is bourbon.”
“Christ,” Malcolm muttered, tugging on his beard. He pointed at Mack’s plate. “My mom used to make me those when I was sick. I thought you could use some comfort food.”
Mack tested a couple of bites. His taste buds rejoiced, but his stomach rebelled at the presence of real food. The pot pie turned to rock as soon as it hit his gut. He guzzled the water instead.
Across from him, the guys stood in a straight line, watching expectantly. “I’m alive,” he muttered. “You can go now.”
Del snorted as if to say, yeah, right. “You think we’d leave you alone right now?”
“I want to be alone.”
“No, you don’t,” Gavin said.
“Yes, I do.”
“Tough,” Malcolm said. “Friends don’t leave friends alone.”
The Russian pointed at the pot pie. “Is there cheese in that?”
Mack shoved the plate across the counter at him. The Russian picked it up and started eating the pot pie with his hand like a sandwich.
Gavin gaped at him. “Dude, how can you be hungry? We stopped at a fucking drive-through on the way here.”
“That was breakfast,” the Russian mumbled with his mouth full. “This is lunch.”
Malcolm pulled out the chair next to Mack’s and sat down. “Tell us what happened.”
“You know what happened.”
“We only know what happened before you left the chamber gala, not after,” Del said.
“And you expect me to believe that he”—Mack nodded at Gavin—“hasn’t filled you in on the rest?”
“Thea told me about your father.” He paused before adding, “I haven’t seen Liv. She’s kind of hiding out like you and avoiding everyone.”
Mack clenched his hands into fists to ward off the sudden urge to drop his forehead to the counter and cry. If Liv’s quiet anger had been painful, Gavin’s quiet sympathy was torture. Part of him wished Gavin would hurt him. Hit him. Scream at him.
“Come on, man,” Del said quietly. “You know how this works. If you don’t tell us what happened, we can’t help you fix it.”
“There’s nothing to fix. It’s over.”
“Spoken like a true romance hero when all seems lost,” Malcolm said.
Mack groaned. “I don’t want to talk about stupid book shit anymore.”
Then guys exchanged a collective eye roll. “Mack,” Malcolm sighed. “You know full well what this is. It’s the low point of your story. You can’t give up.”
“Are you listening to me? This isn’t a story. It’s my real fucking life, and it sucks. She said it’s over, and that’s all there is.”
“Which is basically what every romance heroine says when the hero fucks up,” Del pointed out. “But that’s not the end. Come on, man. You know all this.”
“All I know is that Liv was right all along.” His chest caved in just f
rom saying her name out loud. “I’ve read too many romance novels, and all it got me is a broken fucking heart.”
“Those romance novels have saved all our marriages, man,” Del said. “You did that for us. You kept us going, kept us reading and hanging on even when we felt exactly like you do now. You really think you can scare us off just because you’re finally experiencing the black moment?”
“The black moment?” Mack pointed to the back door. “Out. All of you.”
They ignored him. “What exactly did she say?” Malcolm prodded.
“Christ,” Mack muttered, scrubbing his hands down his face. “What does it matter? It’s over.”
“What. Happened.” Del growled, his frustration evident not only in his voice but in the tense thinness of his lips.
Mack exploded. “Just what I knew would happen! I told her everything! I poured my heart out to her, but the minute she learned the truth about me and my past, she didn’t want me anymore.” Exhaustion and resignation turned his muscles to mush. His shoulders slumped, and his hands fell uselessly into his lap. “I told her everything, and it wasn’t enough.”
Malcolm crossed his arms and adopted an intimidating stance. “So that’s it? You’re not even going to fight for her?”
“There’s nothing to fight for. She made it clear that she wants nothing to do with me.”
“Bullshit,” Del barked. “There has to be more to it than that. Liv wouldn’t send you packing over this.”
Gavin let out a heavy sigh and sank into one of the chairs at the island. “I don’t know, Del. Liv just might. She has a vindictive streak a mile wide.”
Mack narrowed his eyes. What kind of bullshit was that?
Gavin leaned on his elbows. “Look, I love my sister-in-law, but she drives me crazy. Sometimes I don’t even understand how she and Thea could possibly be related. Thea is kind and nurturing, and Liv is sarcastic and cranky.”
Mack’s hands curled into fists as his blood pressure spiked.
“I mean, I admire you for trying to get past all her bullshit, Mack. Because that girl . . .” Gavin shook his head and let out a hoo-boy. “She makes it awfully hard to love her.”
Mack had heard enough and shot to his feet. “Gavin, out of respect for our friendship, I am going to give you exactly one second to take that back before I break your fucking face.”
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