My phone buzzes in my hand.
A text from Liana.
Liana: Thanks for tonight! Sorry I had to rush off. Volunteering waits for no one! See you soon!
She ends it with a heart emoji. A cheerful little heart.
She sends me a heart emoji after having sex with me in the front seat of a sports car and then abandoning me.
I type back: We need to talk about what just happened.
Three dots appear immediately. Then disappear. Then appear again. She's thinking about how to respond.
Liana: What do you mean? We already talked at the poker game. Everything's fine! Sleep well!
Everything's fine.
She thinks everything's fine. Like this is normal behavior. I drop the phone on the seat beside me, unable to formulate a response.
I'm in serious trouble.
Deep, deep trouble.
Chapter 13: Liana
I make it home at two in the morning, slipping through the front door as quietly as possible.
The house is completely quiet, wrapped in that particular silence that only comes in the deepest hours of night. Dark hallways stretch before me, every light extinguished. Everyone's asleep, tucked safely in their beds, unaware of my late return.
The last thing I need right now is questions I can't answer.
I slip off my heels in the marble entryway, wincing at every small sound, then carry them carefully as I climb the grand staircase to the second floor. My legs feel shaky and unsteady beneath me, whether from the heels or from what just happened, I'm not entirely sure.
My dress is wrinkled beyond any hope of repair, the fabric creased and disheveled. I can still feel him on my skin, in my body.
Everywhere.
I reach my bedroom and close the door behind me with a soft click, then lean heavily against the solid wood, letting it support my weight.
What did I just do?
That's the wrong question. I know exactly what I did. The question that's actually haunting me is why it felt so impossibly good when it's supposed to be part of my plan to make him miserable, to drive him away, to save myself from this arrangement.
I shower in my private bathroom, standing under the hot spray for what feels like hours. I scrub away the physical evidence of what happened in that car, washing my skin until it'spink and raw. I try desperately to scrub away the memory of his hands on my body, his mouth on mine, the way he looked at me when he slid deep inside me.
Stop. Just stop thinking about it.
I wrap myself in a soft towel and sit on the edge of my bed, my mind a chaotic mess of thoughts and feelings I don't want to examine.
My phone buzzes on the nightstand, the sound sharp in the quiet room.
Santino: We need to talk about what just happened.
I stare at the message, reading it over and over. He wants to talk. To analyze what happened between us. To make this mean something significant, to turn it into more than what it was.
I can't let it mean something. I can't afford for this to become real.
Me: What do you mean? We already talked at the poker game. Everything's fine! Sleep well!
