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“If you want me to keep your secret, then I want what I’m owed.”
“What does… What does that mean?”
“It means,” his mouth curls up in a cold smirk. “That I want my payment.”
“What?”
“I know you think I’m some kind of a good guy. That I helped you or saved you or whatever the fuck you’re thinking, out of the goodness of my heart, but,” he says, still tenderly cradling my cheeks and staring down at me, “I don’t have much of a heart, remember? I’m heartless. So I want something in return. I want the thing that you haven’t given to anyone else. Not even him. The guy you love. Your ex-fucking-boyfriend. Because you’re saving it for me.”
I know what he’s saying.
Iknow.
But I still can’t make sense of it. I still can’t make sense of what he’s doing.
“You give me that tight little cherry that you’re so dearly holding on to, and I’ll keep your secret. I’ll let youkeepwhat you think I gave you, your ex-boyfriend.”
CHAPTERTWENTY-SEVEN
The Bandit
Ididn’t mean to read her diary. That’s the first thing.
I, for one, know how private it is. How intimate.
All I wanted to do was touch it.
Touch the one thing that has connected us since the beginning.
Or ratherhadconnected us, since I don’t allow myself to write anymore.
And then touching led to opening. That led to flipping through the yellow pages. But even then I had no intention of reading any of her words.
Until I accidentally flipped open an old entry and stumbled upon ‘watermelon.’
I don’t know why that fascinated me so much, that word. That word written in the same sentence as ‘kiss.’
Look, I have wondered about that kiss. About why she would do it when she hated me. And the only logical explanation is that she was distraught after what had happened that night. After the whole proposal disaster. And since she had a crush on me way back when, she took solace in my arms.
Another thing: Yes, I know about her crush. When we had first met. Why else would I have had to push her toward Lucas? I knew she had a thing for me — misguidedly — so I crushed it.
That she still thinks about that kiss though was a revelation. But then as I said to Lucas the other night, it doesn’t mean anything. A two-minute kiss doesn’t negate her love for Lucas.
But anyway, when I did read that word in her diary, there was no stopping me. I read that line and then another, and another and the next thing I knew I’d read the whole paragraph.
But then my self-disgust became too much for me to go on and so I shut it and put it back in its place.
Despite all that though, despite my horrendous invasion of privacy, I had no intention of ever bringing it up.
Everusingit against her.
But I had to.
That’s the second thing. That Ihadto.
I didn’t want to blackmail her but she left me no choice.
I did have a feeling that she’d pull something like this. That she might object to Lucas’s so-called ultimatum. It’s the good girl in her. Wanting to save everyone, fix everything. So I figured I’d block her number and help out my dead best friend one last time. I figured if I ignored her for a few days, she’d give up and be with who she’s supposed to be with.
