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I glanced around the kitchen, realizing all my cousins knew exactly how lame I was too.
It made me feel gross, embarrassed, ashamed. Stupid.
Because, seriously, how could I not know? All the clues had been there. He was an outgoing, arrogant kind of guy that got off on being adored. He thought he was better than others. He thought others owed him prestige. And he’d always been super friendly to other girls. Attractive girls. But I’d just shrugged it off, forgiving him for not being perfect, not even realizing he was outright flirting with other women right in front of me. I mean, how had I not realized that? How had I trusted so blindly and never questioned anything?
I’d let him charm and distract me with pretty, false words, pretty, false smiles, and pretty, false attention. I’d been so desperate to find what my parents possessed—a partnership/best friend/lover combination—that I hadn’t really even stopped to look at Topher objectively to see if he even fit the bill. Which he hadn’t. Not at all.
God, what everyone must think of me. I probably looked as pathetic as I was. It was so mortifying.
“You know what you need to do, Haven?” Bentley slurred from my left as she slung an arm around my shoulders and drunkenly bumped into me. “You need a revenge rebound to make that asshole suffer. That’s what you need.”
“Yes,” Teagan hollered, lifting her shot glass full of orange juice and then belting back a swallow. “Preach it, sister. You need to hit him right in the pride, HayHay. Make him bleed jealousy.”
“Yeah,” Lucy cheered. “We should totally find you someone sexy to shove in his face and say, ha, look at me now, bitch. Someone amazing, and sexy, and witty, and sexy, and…” Across the table from me, Lucy frowned in confusion. “Have I said sexy yet?”
“Repeatedly,” I answered with a snort and turned my head aside, laughing, when Bella tried to shove tequila up my nostril in order to feed me another drink.
Giggling, she apologized and aimed for my mouth next, only to end up dribbling some down my chin.
“Here. I’ll do it.” I took the drink from her, pinched my nose—since I’d read about someone doing that in a story once and thought it was cool, so I had tried it, loved it, and now that’s how I always took a shot—and downed it, thinking it better to swallow the stuff than wear it.
“Seriously, isn’t there an idea where I don’t have to hook up with some sleazy stranger?” I asked aloud. “Something just as vindictive and painful to his pride, like…ooh, keying his car with the word cheater. Yeah, let’s do that.”
Topher did so love his car. And I would so love to hurt it as much as I’d love to hurt him.
“Boo,” Bentley called, making a face.
Teagan nodded her agreement. “Yeah, too cliché.”
“Too much jail time,” Lucy pitched in, turning both thumbs down.
But Bella merely shrugged. “Or we could do that too.”
I scowled at their instant rejection. “But isn’t shoving a rebound in his face also cliché?”
“No way,” Bentley insisted. “Rebound hookups are timeless.”
The other three nodded. “Classic.”
Bella stood up, making her chair topple over backward behind her. Jabbing her finger into the air to make her point, she proclaimed, “If Topher Fucking-Small-Dick Nicholl really thinks he can just cheat on my sweet baby cousin and break her heart, then he’s going to pay. That’s all there is to it.”
“And he’s going to pay big,” Teagan agreed, bumbling her pregnant, sober way to her feet as well so she could stand next to Bella as a united front. “We are going to annihilate his ass.”
Lucy wrinkled her face at them before she glanced over at Bentley sitting next to her. “Do we have to stand up to agree with them?”
When Bentley hiccupped and shook her head widely back and forth, Lucy grinned and shot a fist into the air while remaining seated. “Yes, yes, yes! Ammil…annee…slaughter him.”
“Bring him to his knees,” Bentley tossed in. “By setting you up with the hottest, smartest, most awesome guy that ever existed.”
“Hey, what the hell are you five yelling about?” Gracen asked as he entered the kitchen. “You’re freaking Braiden out.” Falling to a stop, he gaped at us. “Holy shit. You’re drunk. All of you.”
“Not me,” Teagan said, holding up the orange juice and rubbing her pregnant belly.
When Wick appeared in the opening of the kitchen next to him with a curious wide-eyed Braiden at his side, Lucy pointed and screeched, “Him. Yes! Wick would be the perfect candidate for your plan, HayHay.”
I nearly swallowed my tongue, hoping to God Wick had no idea what they were talking about. “Whoa, hey. Don’t go dragging my poor innocent roommate into this. And it’s your stupid plan, not mine.”
“Hey, the plan isn’t stupid,” Teagan groused.
