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“Do you really believe that?” Birdie challenges. “I don’t get that vibe from her.”
“Of course, you don’t,” I growl. “Because this is what she does. She fucks with people. She bends the truth to suit her whims so she doesn’t have to deal with reality. This is who she’s always been. She’s sick in the head, Birdie, and she wants you to fall for the sweet, innocent act just so she can turn around and stab you in the back. Don’t make the mistake of trusting her.”
Birdie’s brow furrows in confusion as I swallow the bitter taste of regret. I know she doesn’t understand. There’s no way she could. But this idea she’s pitching that it’s all some misunderstanding is irrelevant. Facts are facts. Bianca burned Adam and me, and she never looked back.
“Look, I don’t know what happened that night,” I tell Birdie. “But I know if she gave a single fuck about anyone other than herself, she would have come forward. She wouldn’t be lying to cover her ass right now.”
“She says she doesn’t remember,” Birdie supplies cautiously.
“Amnesia?” I scoff. “That’s convenient, don’t you think? If she had forgotten her whole life, then she had no reason to run the minute she saw me. I’m not buying it, and you shouldn’t either. She’s playing you, Birdie. She can sense you have a softness for her, and she will use and abuse it at every opportunity.”
“It just… doesn’t feel like a lie.” Birdie frowns. “All I’m saying is I think you should consider that it’s more complicated than it seems. We don’t know a lot about that night, including what may have happened to her.”
I lean back in my chair and cross my arms. I won’t allow myself to feel sorry for her. Her father tried to tell me who she really was, and I was blind to it. Every time I gave her an inch, she’d reel me back in. That’s exactly what she’s trying to do now, and Birdie’s taking the bait. But I sure as fuck won’t.
“Nothing about this is complicated,” I say. “It’s always been simple with her. You can’t believe a word she tells you.”
Birdie sighs, and Ace clears his throat. “It’s time to go.”
Birdie nods and joins her husband, but not before she leaves me with one last request.
“Just think about it, Kodiak. Please.”
I slap the peanut butter sandwich onto a paper plate with some chips and carry it to the game room. Maybe it’s a dick move, but she isn’t here for comforts. When she can open her mouth without lies spilling free, then I’ll consider feeding her something else. Those are my best-laid plans, at least, until I enter the room and stop short.
Bianca is asleep on the couch, wearing a yellow dress that barely skims her upper thighs. Every time she draws a breath, the fabric rides up, giving me a glimpse of what I already know is beneath. I mutter a curse at Birdie, thinking I should have known she’d play this card.
After all the hell Bianca’s rained down, it should be easy to tear my eyes away from her, but it’s not. It never has been. From the moment she came into my life, she had me. She’s the worst thing that ever happened to me, but I’d be lying if I didn’t say she was the best, too. When she’s asleep, she’s almost peaceful, and it occurs to me that the last time I saw her like this was when she came to me at my darkest hour.
Her silky black hair cascades over her shoulders, and my fingers itch with the urge to touch it again. I can’t even count how many times I’ve dreamed about it. When I was alone, trying to resist my fucked-up cravings, I’d remember how it felt when her hair slipped through my fingers. At times, I wondered if the memory was better than reality because that’s what I wanted to believe. But inevitably, that would just trigger more memories. Like how she always smelled of peaches after I tasted them from her lips. She managed to leave that scent behind every time she crossed my path. It was the worst kind of hell knowing she would never be mine while I harbored intimate knowledge of how it felt to be inside her. Or her secret smiles and the freedom she had when she was with me. For a moment in time, I captured her and held her in my arms before she flew away. Before she belonged to him. Before my whole world went up in smoke with a single revelation.
It didn’t stop me from desecrating her every night in my mind like the sick fuck I was. Things with Bianca have never been anything but messy. Indulging in her was my addiction, and my betrayal just the same. I can’t ever go back to that place. I’m not about to relapse on her when I’ve been stone-cold sober for five years.
