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“Why not? You’re so good at it.” I do a good job of mimicking his signature smirk as I look at him. But I’m met with a frown and stormy eyes.
He takes another step closer. A vein is pulsing wildly in his neck. I zero in on it, fascinated that tonight I’m getting to him. I’m making him as mad as he makes me.
It’s oddly thrilling, and yet, something else too. I shake off the hint of empathy trying to poke at me. He’s not really mad. This is how we are together. Only it’s usually him winding me up and me taking it.
He should play fair and let me have a go for a change.
“I guess growing up being protected gives you the freedom to be whatever you want.” My eyes flick up and down his broad body in his tuxedo. It’s radiating heat as he stands rigid mere inches from me. “And you chose to be…you,” I deliver the last word clipped and precise in a sickly-sweet tone.
“And who exactly am I seeing as you know so fucking well?”
The venom in his tone surprises me, but I conceal my shock as my hands tighten around the wooden edge of the sideboard. It digs into my back as Logan moves closer still, forcing me to push backward unless I want our chests to touch.
“Well?” he presses, a glinting challenge in his eyes.
I stare into intense green eyes. He’s never asked me why I hate him before. Never given me that opportunity. If I’ve ever plucked up the courage in the past to say something, he’s stolen it from me with his jokes and teasing. I gave up trying to talk to Logan years ago. But now he’s laying himself bare and asking what I think. It could be a trap that he will turn back onto me somehow. But regardless, my skin pricks with adrenaline at the chance to finally tell him.
I intend to savor every second.
I let my eyes convey everything I’ve ever felt in his presence as I open my veins and let the words bleed out.
“You’re the guy who got away with it and watched as his friend took all the punishment. The guy who followed his sister home from school when all she wanted was her brother. The reason she walked alone every day. The guy who made sure she didn’t have a date to prom because everyone thought she had crabs. The guy who laughed about it. Laughed at her.”
I jab a finger into his chest, but he doesn’t even flinch. He just holds my eyes with a cold stare.
“You’re the guy who, for whatever reason, decided he hated her first, before she hated you,” I spit finally, dragging in a deep breath that makes my lungs burn like they’re on fire.
It's the first time I’ve ever said those words out loud to him.
And I want it to hurt.
I want it to rip him up deep inside. To feel like someone has crawled inside him and is destroying him from the inside out. The way he made me feel all those years ago.
And now that it’s out, I feel… better? At least, I should. But the only sensation I’m aware of is the bottoming out of my gut as Logan stares at me without a trace of regret on his face.
Why isn’t he reacting? Doing something? Anything?
He just continues to stand painfully close to me, his green eyes scorching in their intensity as he stares into mine, his mouth set in a grim line.
His lack of reaction makes my heart pound painfully in my chest. He made my life hell for six whole months while Drew was gone. And he hasn’t stopped since. We’ve just grown up, and I’ve gained distance from him. Reprieve.
The least he can do is say something.
I rake my gaze over him in disgust. The mood in the room is toxic. I lost exactly where our banter changed to something dark and ugly. But now the truth is laid bare, in all its messed-up glory.
“Maybe it was all a game to you,” I choke, my voice catching. “But it was my fuckinglifeyou were playing with. Mine and Drew’s. He didn’t have Daddy’s money to protect him.”
Logan grimaces, but his eyes maintain the intensity that’s penetrating my skin and ravaging through me like acid.
When he finally speaks, his voice is low and jagged.
“No. Drew didn’t have anyone protecting him. But if you think my dad bought my way out, then you’re wrong. You don’t know shit, Mads.”
I snort.
“And you’re a bigger spoiled Daddy’s princess than I thought.”
My arms shake with rage by my sides. “I hate you.”
