AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“She spent the night with Bennett,” I say it through gritted teeth, every single part of me fucking hating it, but also, not, I don’t want her to ever be alone ever again.
“What?”
“He forced his way in, then he never left,” I swallow and it feels like razor blades on the back of my tongue.
“That fucker.”
My thoughts exactly.
“You think this is because he wanted her for himself?” Rex is almost breathless at my side as we take the stairs up to the Math department.
“You smoke too much,” I inform him, but he ignores me, keeps talking.
“I know he explained how they met, but, shit, man, we had her first. If it wasn’t for him, we wouldn’t even know about the connection. That would have been better wouldn’t it? We wouldn’t even have to be sorry right now because she would have just been ours! Safe and loved and we could have helped her. All of us together, we could have helped her and we wouldn’t have had to share her. Don’t you think, King?”
All of Rex’s questions swirl inside my head, anger nipping at my heels like a dog in chase, and I’m just about ready to explode. Anger at Bennett, at Flynn, at Lynx, myself.
How did I not see it?
Her using.
Why didn’t her words click in my thick fucking skull when we talked, our whispered confessions in the night. She was telling me then, wasn’t she? A plea that I couldn’t figure out. Silent desperation for help.
‘“Yeah, I get like, anxiety and stuff now,” she frowns hard like she’s somewhere else. “It took me a long time to try and move past it,” she rasps, her voice low and cracked. “Don’t think I ever will.”’
I didn’t understand, baby girl.
Just like I didn't with Lynx.
“Hendrix,” I bite his name off as it tears up my throat like a growl, my feet stilling. “Please, stop talking, I can’t- I can’t focus and your voice is like a screwdriver being pushed in through my ear.”
“Wow,” he says with a scoff, a laugh, half-hearted as he tries to shrug it off.
I’m walking again, seeing the door to Poppy’s class up ahead, breathing a sigh of relief that it's not let out yet. And then I’m planting myself in front of it, glaring through the small circular window, up into the lecture hall, my eyes scanning over the sea of faces, only searching for one.
I didn’t think she would attend today, but Flynn said something about credits, and her dad, and then I tuned out, grabbing my keys and getting in my truck. Driving straight here. Finding Rex already in the parking lot as I haphazardly pulled in.
I spot her, far in the back, her head dipped, shoulders drawn in, slumped down as low as she can with her tall frame in her seat, nobody sitting around her, three or more seats between her and the nearest student. Nobody looks at her, their gazes all fixed on the professor, or their phones hidden in their laps like they think they’re being really sneaky about it.
I keep staring and I think I like the way she looks when she’s lost inside her own head, alone, no distractions around her interrupting her thoughts. And then her eyes lift, those pretty silver-lilacs, and they’re on mine, like she knew I was here. A short crease digging between her brows, staring back at me, and, momentarily, I don’t breathe. Can’t quite catch my breath at the sight of the blues and reds and purples, the plume of them down the side of her face.
We did that to her.
Rex is talking at my back, talking and talking and I’m staring at someone I wanted to protect, wearing bruises crafted by my brothers, by me, and my heart thuds so hard inside my chest, I think I might go into cardiac arrest. And then I’m spinning around, my clenched fist aimed at Rex’s jaw.
But he's ready.
Rex leans back, ducking, his hands coming up to block himself from me, my fist colliding with his forearms as he staggers back out of my way.
Arms dropping to my sides, my chest is heaving. I’m breathing so hard and Rex is now too, his chest rising and falling fast. All I can hear inside my head is the roar of my own blood, the thud of my heart. Anger is a dense, red cloud that I can’t clear. Rex’s hands up in front of him, palms face out, towards me, his brow low. He could beat me in a fight on skill. But I think, maybe, because of my anger, I could win on rage alone.
I don’t wanna fight with my brothers.
We promised we’d never let anyone come between us.
Not something we really had to worry about,weare the ones who came between us.
We ruined everything ourselves.
