Page 88 of Use Me Up

“Ellis? Because I don’t think—”

“No, not Ellis. Ellis is not my boyfriend.”

“Ellis said you were his girlfriend.”

“Well, he just said that. He and I never talked about any kind of commitment to each other. He obviously is incapable of committing to anyone except Calliope.” My voice is bitter.

“Let’s leave Ellis out of it for a minute,” says Gatlin.

“Okay, we can try,” I say, but I don’t feel very confident that we can make that stick.

“It’s not as if I don’t find women sexually attractive,” says Gatlin. “And you’re…” His expression changes, and the smile that takes over his face makes my stomach turn over. “There’s something about you, Hannah.”

“There is not,” I say quietly. “There isn’t. I’m plain. I’m vanilla. I’m nothing. No one ever notices me.”

“I notice you,” he says.

I believe him. I don’t know why. But there’s something about the way he’s looking at me that’s not like the way Ellis looks at me, and it’s not like the way I’ve ever been looked at before. It’s about something else besides desire, but there’s desire in that look of his. I like it. I could get used to being looked at like that. I go to him again.

We’re kissing again, and the kisses have this achingly sweet quality, and he’s so careful when he holds me, and I feel dizzy.

Gently, he pries me off him and moves me away. “Hannah,” he breathes. “Not yet. We need to talk to Ellis.”

“Okay,” I murmur. “Okay, fine.”

“You should come over tomorrow,” he says. “To Ellis’s place. We’ll talk it out then.”

ellis

My heat breaks sometime before midnight.

It’s probably mostly because of the suppressants, but it’s also because of my alphas. Even though the heat is ebbing out, I don’t want them to leave me. I ask them if they’ll curl up with me in my bed upstairs. The nest is sort of oppressive at this point, full of too much scent, too much warmth, but I want them close.

They agree.

They always did what I wanted, though. I could lead these guys around by their dicks, and they’d just laugh affectionately at me and call me their pretty boy and shake their heads, shake them and shake them.

They like me, but I get the impression they think they’re better than me, and I guess I think they’re better than me, too. They have everything together, after all. Still, it’s nice having them here.

I guess they’ll leave in the morning.

Fuck.

I feel a black feeling of despair at that. The bond has been strengthened by all three of us being in the same house, and it’ll hurt to break it again, to weaken it. I don’t know if I have that in me.

Maybe I should go home with them.

I think it’s obvious that Callie and I can’t be near each other, and it’s also obvious that all I’ll ever do is hurt Hannah, and she doesn’t deserve it.

Hannah and I both think of ourselves as lesser and pathetic and not worthy, but Hannah is wrong about herself. I happen to be correct. Everyone agrees with my opinion of myself, including my alphas.

Hannah is the only person on earth who ever saw me as anything differently.

And what did I do?

I used her up.

She’ll hate me now, too.