“What did I tell you? The guy is a beast,” Janel said loudly, rubbing a hand over her face.
“Does your boyfriend know?” Bailey asked.
Alyssa nodded and dropped her gaze.
“Logan walked in on us, but, of course, he believed Neil over me.” She looked up at me again and inched closer. “Selene, Logan kicked me out of the house because he’s too tight with his brother to accept what actually happened.” She rested her hands on my shoulders and gave them a gentle squeeze. I stared blankly at her. My brain apparently wasn’t going to cooperate with me. It was too busy short-circuiting. My lips fell slightly open, though I said nothing.
“Neil knows he did wrong,” she continued, “but he’ll never admit it because he’s too afraid he might lose Logan. The truth is, he couldn’t control himself. I really believe that Neil has an actual psychological problem with sex and women,” she trailed off sadly.
Other doubts crept into my mind:Has Neil really been lusting after Alyssa right behind his brother’s back?
I felt a sick, instinctive jealousy toward my friend, but I forced myself to pause and reflect. Neil was the one who had kissed her. He was the onewho had betrayed Logan’s trust and done such a disrespectful thing. Despite knowing how erratic that walking disaster could be, I never would have expected him to do something like that, something so vile and reprehensible to one of the most important people in his life.
Not so much because Alyssa was my friend but because she was his brother’s girlfriend.
His brother’s girlfriend, for God’s sake!
“Bet this is making you rethink some things, huh?” Janel said softly, looking at me. She looked sorry for me but also satisfied that her dislike of Neil had been borne out.
All at once, a wave of nausea washed over me. I pressed a hand to my stomach and winced slightly.
My mind drifted back to a few days before. I went through everything we’d shared: his hands on my body, his lips that traversed every part of me, his quiet, masculine moans, my fingers gliding down his powerful back, my legs clenching around his hips, and…
And the nausea came back, making me suck in breath.
Maybe he was thinking of someone else during that moment. Maybe Alyssa or Jennifer or Alexia and Jennifer together, or Britney from the pool house, or Professor Cooper, or…
No. Enough!
I tried to force myself to stop this self-harm, but apparently my body didn’t get the memo.
I ran for the bathroom with a hand clamped over my mouth and knelt in front of the toilet.
An intense burning sensation spread from my stomach all the way up to my throat, and I vomited out all the suffering, all the disappointment, and all the pain I was experiencing. I spat out the time I’d spent with Neil, his golden eyes, his clean smell, and his intense voice. I spat out dashed hopes until only my feelings for him remained, clinging stubbornly to my heart.
I’d never be able to stop loving him; that love wasn’t going to evaporate or go away. But that love would only ever mock me and make me acutely aware of the colossal mistake I’d made, bonding myself to a man like him.
I had started to believe that I deserved to suffer, that I had gotten myselfinto this mess, and now I was reaping what I’d sown. I’d been reaping it, actually, ever since Jennifer beat me up months ago. Except, I had been convinced back then that I could handle a complicated person like Neil, that I could cope with his mood swings and heal wounds even as deep as the ones he had. Unfortunately, that was not the case.
In an act of desperation, my mind had conjured up another world, making me dream of something that was impossible to realize and long for things that I could never have. And that’s exactly what Neil was.
He was unobtainable. A wistful memory was probably the most I would ever have of him. Even he had made that clear the last time we were together: I deserved a different ending, an ending that didn’t include him by my side.
I coughed miserably and had the strange sensation of acid burning in my throat. I got back to my feet, trying to clear my head once again. I washed my face and brushed my teeth, holding tight to the rim of the sink like my legs weren’t strong enough to bear up under all the wretched things I was feeling. I looked into the mirror and examined my reflection, standing there motionless. My eyes moved over the evidence of Neil’s passion speckling the curve of my throat. I touched them lightly with an index finger and felt my breath catch in my chest. Neil’s lips had been on my skin right there.
I still felt like I belonged to him. That this boy had taken ownership of my soul, and he could do as he liked with it.
I was his, and, despite everything he said to the contrary, there had been several moments when I felt like the same was true for him.
So why had he done such a thing? Why had he kissed Alyssa? Why had he stabbed both Logan and me in the back?
I resisted the urge to cry and tried to recover some composure. Then I walked out of the bathroom and headed for the living room, where my friends were still trying to comfort Alyssa.
I approached them on shaky legs and narrowed my eyes as I observed her for what felt like an endless moment. Alyssa was beautiful, extremely beautiful, but she wasn’t blond. She wasn’t the type of woman who typically would drive Neil wild and make him act on impulse.
I knew his behavioral patterns well: He had a fixation on blonds. Or, rather, on having sex with blonds, as he himself had once specified.
What if Alyssa was lying to me?
