Page 7 of Make You Mine

“W-what?”

“The pink in your hair. From when I first met you.”

“Right.” I used to have some pink highlights in my hair when I was sixteen, but I dyed them brown to match the rest of my hair in college, and I never looked back. “Sorry.”

“Nah. You still look great. It was just a thought.”

“Okay. So, you wanted to talk about the past, right?” I’m the one leaning forward now, tugging at the collar of his jersey and pressing my mouth to his ear. “Are we finally going to discuss the sex tape that you leaked?”

He cackles. “That I leaked?” he repeats.

“Yep, that’s what I said.” I lean back in my seat now, looking away from him and to the front, catching a hockey player racing to shoot the puck to the opponent’s net.

“I didn’t leak it, Madelyn.” His voice is serious. “I told you that.”

“You lied to me and told me you didn’t do it,” I correct him. “But you’re the only one who could have done it, Kayden. I know you’re the one who recorded it. And you never insisted you didn’t after I called you out.”

I sneak a peek at him in hopes of catching his reaction.

Because seven years ago, Kayden had me on my knees, with his cock in my mouth. And I don’t know why—maybe he wanted to have proof of the way he managed to corrupt me into doing what I did—but he took a video of us and leaked it to our whole college class in the middle of a presentation I had to give.

“No matter what I say, you’re not going to believe I didn’t do it. That’s why I stopped trying to convince you otherwise, Madelyn. Not because I did it. You never wanted to listen.”

“Okay, Mr. Innocent.” I roll my eyes. I don’t believe him one bit.

Turning me into a joke in front of the whole class and ruining our freshman year at college sounds like the perfect way for Kayden to have exited my life. It suits the way he used to prey on me, bullying me throughout the years. He’s been that way ever since that fateful day our parents met. Hot and cold. Unpredictable. Hurting me one day, and nice the next. I have no idea what’s going on through that head of his.

“You’re going to regret blaming me, Maddy,” he says.

The words send a chill down my spine.

“Are you threatening me right now?”

“No. I’m just telling you.” He leans back in his seat, his voice turning nonchalant. “Because it wasn’t me.”

“Whatever you say. Are we done?”

“No. That’s not what I’m here for.”

I let out a sarcastic laugh. “Of course it isn’t. Then what is it you want to talk about, Mr. Innocent?”

He turns his face to me, a lopsided grin coating his lips. “Our living situation now that I’m back.”

“What do you mean? There’s no living situation,” I deadpan. “I’m living in my apartment, and you’re living…wherever it is you’re living.”

He sighs. “That’s the thing.”

A lump forms in my throat. I don’t like the sound of that.

“You know better than I do that I’d rather sleep on the streets than set foot in my father’s house. Not that he’d welcome me there.”

“Right.”

When he left seven years ago, it was because his father signed him up to the military after he got us both suspended from college and fucked up our academic careers. He didn’t want Kayden living with us. Though at the moment, I can’t say he’d mind. With Lucas’s declining health, he doesn’t have a say in the house anymore. All the responsibilities fell to Mom and me, but mostly Mom. I’ve played the good daughter role as much as I could, but I haven’t lived with them for years.

Does Kayden even know his father’s sick?

“Tough luck,” I spit out, testing out the waters.