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“You lied to me!” I scream. “Again!”
“Liv, please, listen to me. I love you,” he implores.
“The day you answered Olivia’s phone, I told you I would figure out the truth. I knew you couldn’t be trusted,” Chase’s jaw ticks, his hands clenching into white-knuckled fists. “I won’t let you hurt Olivia again.”
I turn my attention to Brandi. “How long?” I manage to whisper.
“How long what?”
“How long have you been together? Was it before I caught you?” I look at Evan, tears streaming down my face.
She shrugs her shoulders in defeat. “Yes, way before. Maybe a year or so.” I gasp, placing my hand over my mouth.
I take a few steps back, toward the path that led me here. “Before you proposed, I asked if you had seen her, and you adamantly said no. You lied to me. Straight to my face. You said it was a one-time thing. That it was a mistake, ‘a very big mistake’,” I quote. With every sentence, my voice becomes increasingly louder, and I become angrier. Brandi spins, pinning her gaze on Evan.
“A mistake?” she snarls.
“Why? Why go through all this trouble? How can you say you love me when you can’t be faithful for even a second?”
“Liv,” he stutters. He has nothing to say. No argument to win. It’s time for him to accept defeat.
A wave of emotions wash over me. Mostly rage. Over and over, he’s ripped out my heart, and what’s worse, I let him. Well, no more. I need to get a handle on this situation before I explode.
“This is over! “ I shout. “I can’t believe you lied to me again! I am so done with you and your bullshit. I don’t even want to breathe the same air as you,” I hiss.
“Liv, wait!” Evan pleads, reaching out for me.
Without looking back, I run down the beach toward the hotel, away from everyone.
“Olivia, wait!” Chase calls from behind me, but I don’t wait. I don’t want to talk to him either. “Olivia, please. We need to talk.”
I stop and turn to him. “Why?” I ask through tears. “What can you possibly say?”
“I’m sorry.”
“That’s it? I’m sorry? Sorry for what, that my life is in shambles? Sorry for doing the exact same thing Evan did to me? Sorry you got caught? What exactly are you sorry for?”
“That you are this miserable. I hate seeing you in pain.”
“You’re part of the reason I’m in so much pain. You,” I say, waving my arm behind me, “are just as bad as he is!”
“Olivia, what you saw and what you think you saw are two completely different things,” Chase whispers, running his hands through his hair.
“I know what I saw.?
?
“No,” he says, his tone soft. “Tell me what you saw.”
“I saw a beautiful woman coming out of your apartment half-dressed.”
“Yes, that is correct. But there’s more, things you couldn’t possibly know.”
“What else is there? She was coming out of your apartment, buttoning her shirt.”
He takes a deep breath and exhales through his nose. “That was my ex, Natalie,” he says, resigned. He motions for me to sit on one of the benches along the path, but I fold my arms over my chest and raise my brow. Knowing this is the best he’s going to get, he sits and looks up at me. “Remember when I left Fire Island in a rush?”
I nod my head.
