“She’ll try.She’s the same vindictive, selfish person she was when I knew her years ago.”
“What did she do, Jaeger?I asked Tyler, but he didn’t say much.Just called her a bitch.”
“That’s apt,” he says wryly.“When I first met Kate in my sophomore year of high school, I thought she was this sweet, quiet person, who worked part-time at an ice cream shop with a girl I’d just started dating.The girl was social and outgoing, until a rumor spread she was sleeping with one of the teachers.
“The rumors were graphic, the timing and circumstances difficult to refute.They fired the teacher, and I stopped seeing the girl.She tried to defend herself.She told me the rumor was a lie, that she’d never slept with him.She claimed she’d never been with anyone.I didn’t believe her.She was pretty.She’d dated a couple of guys I knew by reputation.I just assumed… Anyway, I was stupid and self-involved with my training.I thought if she could lie about being a virgin, what was stopping her from lying about the teacher?”
He lets out a heavy sigh.“The school administration believed the rumors too.It was a done deal.Six months later, the girl switched high schools and I never saw her again.I didn’t think about her after that.I’d already started dating Kate.”
I think I see where this is going, and it makes me sick for Jaeger and the girl he dated.“Kate had something to do with the rumor?”I ask.
“I didn’t know it at first.She told me she quit her job at the ice cream shop because her parents didn’t want her taking time away from her studies.I discovered a few months later through a mutual friend that she’d been fired for stealing.I confronted her about it, and she said she was embarrassed and that’s why she didn’t say anything.That not telling me was just a little white lie.That if I loved her I wouldn’t make her feel worse.The stealing was one of several lies or omissions I caught her in throughout our relationship.”
He looks me in the eye.“I can’t explain why I stayed with her, Cali, except to say that I was so focused on training.Being with Kate was easy, but after we broke up, every doubt I ever had about her surfaced.”
His gaze wanders absently to the trees across the yard.“During my knee recovery, I had a lot of time on my hands.I looked up that girl I’d been dating when Kate and I met.She told me Kate used her to get the job at the ice cream shop, then pumped her for information.About her.About me.The girl swore she never hooked up with the teacher.That it was all a lie and that the only person who knew her whereabouts that day was Kate.”
Jesus.Kate is evil.“It wasn’t your fault, Jaeger,” I say.“You were young.You didn’t know.”
“I was naïve and selfish, only thinking about my goals.I’m not that person anymore.When I think about what she did to you—” He shakes his head and lets out a hard breath.“She won’t get away with it.Even if I can’t find the evidence to connect it to her, I’ll make sure she pays somehow.”
I knew he and Kate had a history.I never imagined this.No wonder Jaeger doesn’t like Kate.Though he’s never outright disparaged her.He’s not the kind of guy to bash someone he’s dated, even if she deserves it.
“I remained single for a long time after Kate.Once I stopped drinking and hooking up and actually dated women again, I remembered that good people exist.Kate is not the norm.But even that got old after a while.I stopped having casual flings about a year ago.”
The first time we were together he said he hadn’t been with anyone in a year.It all makes sense now.
“Then I ran into you, and I knew what I’d been missing.”The corners of his mouth curve up before a serious look returns.“I won’t let her come between us, Cali.”
I circle my arms around his waist and rest my head under his chin.“What now?If she won’t leave, what do we do?”
“How do you feel about kicking out an unwanted guest?”
ChapterThirty-Four
“So, how should we play this?”I ask.
Wild schemes fill my head.The first, hauling Kate by the hair, catfight style, and dragging her out of the house kicking and screaming, comes to mind.Or we could set up booby traps inside the house to piss her off and make her leave.Then there’s the good, old-fashioned “burning all her clothes in the outside fire pit and changing the locks” trick.Jaeger would need a high-tech alarm system in case she tried to climb back in through a window.She’s a wily one; I don’t put anything past her.Of course, none of my ideas are as vindictive and cruel as what she did to me, but then, I’m not a crazy bitch.
Jaeger pulls up to his house and I’m bouncing in my seat.This is some serious showdown at the O.K.Corral shit.“Well?What do you think?”I say.“We need a plan before we go in.”
His gaze flicks to Kate’s car.“I have a plan.Follow my lead.”
Ohhh, a man in charge.So totally hot.
“Check!”I scramble out of his truck and try to match his long strides to the front door.It’s like keeping up with walking tree trunks.
Jaeger sweeps into the house, his eyes slowly taking in the room.Crumpled fast food bags lie scattered over tables and the floor.Clothing and trash dangle from the chandelier.Dishes are stacked to toppling in the sink, the counters covered in a rainbow of sticky-looking dried-up spills and leftover food.The place smells like a combination of expensive hair spray and rotting meat.
Jaeger’s beautiful home is a disaster.What has Kate been doing?
Music blasts from the back bedroom.Jaeger’s office.The one he locked.
He storms back and I follow.
Kate’s sitting at his desk, like last time, her feet kicked up at the corner, fingers pounding the keyboard of his computer.
“I thought you took that to Mason’s,” I whisper.
