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Grabbing the jeans, I took a step up the stairs and found his discarded polo shirt next, and a low groan rumbled in my chest.
Wait, wasn’t Shane out with his boys tonight? I paused halfway up the stairs and tried to recall our last conversation through the fog of alcohol in my mind, but I could only catch snippets.
Maybe this mess was mine? I had left a pile of laundry on the upstairs cabinet, and it was entirely plausible it had fallen over.
This theory became more solid as I found a bra draped over the upper banister, and a pulse of guilt rushed through my stomach at how quickly I had blamed him. It was becoming far too easy these days to fall into that habit, but I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t considered that maybe we had outgrown each other.
He was older than me, but we had been a couple, or some semblance of, since High School, although only official for two years. Long gone were the days when we’d sneak off to my family cabin in the woods and enjoy quality time together.
Maybe that was what we were missing.
A powerful yawn swept through me, and I started to rub my left eye, stopping abruptly when I remembered the beautiful makeup I had carefully applied a few hours earlier. Oops.
As my eye burned from smudged makeup, I pushed open the bedroom door expecting to see Shane spread out in the middle of the bed, fast asleep as usual.
I was wrong.
Desperate, soft moaning reached my ears, and I froze up. Every muscle in my body turned to stone, and I watched in horror as a dark shape moved about the bed in front of me. Shane’s breathy grunt rang in my ears, followed by a gasp and whimper from a woman, and my stomach clenched painfully.
My heart sank.
With a shaky hand, I reached for the light and the two culprits basked in the warm orange glow from the frilly nightshade above. They didn’t even notice. Shane was going to town on a woman I could barely see, fucking her right in the middle of our bed without a care in the world. The sharp stink of alcohol and sweat filled the air and despite my own earlier drinking, it turned my stomach.
Not as much as watching my boyfriend cheat on me right before my eyes.
Suddenly, the woman tossed her head back and platinum blonde hair spilled across my pillow. Then, over Shane’s shoulder, she finally noticed me standing by the door and her eyes widened.
“Babe!”
Babe? Really?
“Mhmm,” Shane groaned, his voice thick with lust. The woman slapped him on the back and started to squirm around with one hand reaching for the covers.
“There’s a woman!”
Shane froze and then, very slowly, he turned to face me with movements that resembled a feral cat squaring up for a fight. When his pale blue eyes locked onto me, my heart punched up into my throat and tears stung painfully at my eyes.
“Scarlett.”
“Shane..? What… what the hell?”
I wanted to be angry. I wanted to be furious, to erupt into flames like those fiery women on the exciting TV shows I used to watch and give Shane a piece of my mind but I’m not like that.
I’ve never been the strong woman carved from marble. My mother always said I was too soft and giving, and that people like me needed to toughen up to survive. That was a hard thing to hear from a woman who had become paper thin, wasting away as cancer ravaged her body.
That wasn’t me, though. I was the gentle one and yet, at that moment, I desperately wished I was anyone but Scarlett Parker.
“Scarlett,” Shane said again. He didn’t even try to cover himself up, although his date seemed to get the message and was trying to hide under my birdsong duvet.
I loved those sheets. I’d have to throw them away now.
“You weren’t supposed to be back so early.”
I laughed, short and dry, and lifted tear-filled eyes to my boyfriend— ex-boyfriend. “I told you I’d be back by eight.”
“Shit.” Shane glanced over his shoulder at the clock on my nightstand and then shrugged. “My bad.”
“Your bad?” Numbness swept through my body like a wave, dulling the feelings of sickness and wrapping a cold hand around my pounding heart.
