Chapter 2 #3
If they want to turn me into a laughingstock, then fine. Leo is going to be mine, one way or another. This—this is just a hiccup. A mishap or an accident. This isn’t fatal. He’ll make it up to me—I know he will. He’s a good man.
I go into Settings and systematically unblock everyone who came at me that night. Fuck them. If they want to boost the engagement on my posts, they can go for it. Hopefully the media will pick it up, and they’ll get into shit for being creeps.
If not, they can keep commenting and pay my fucking rent.
Steeling myself, I click into the group chat I’ve been avoiding for days—the same group chat that Leo is in but has conveniently stayed utterly silent in and left me for dead.
I scroll to the very start and take a screenshot of every photo and message they sent, all the members of this stupid group chat, including those who tried to leave.
Then I print it all out and lay it on my floor.
I grab the list of his team members and the profiles of the people I thought might be Leo’s friends based on prior sleuthing I’ve done, cross-referencing to see who engaged in this bullshit and who steered clear. An hour ticks by as I do my deep dive into everyone’s life.
The guys who frequently make an appearance in Leo’s stories are nowhere to be seen in this chat. Not even his best friend, Mitchell, partook—in fact, he immediately removed himself the second he was added.
It also strikes me as odd that the time of the screenshots of my personal account shows they were taken at five o’clock.
They started messaging me at midnight. Which means that Leo and his friends—no, just his friends—sat on this information for hours.
They plotted and schemed and planned how they were going to bring me down and make me feel like I’m less than them for what I do.
All it took was alcohol and a celebration party.
The truth stings like a bitch.
But then his message . . . All of it makes my head spin.
Sorry? He doesn’t just get to be fucking sorry. But he will be if it turns out he was part of it. He’s going to regret ever thinking he could get rid of me like that. If Leo wants me to be the villain in this story, then I will be.
He’ll finally see me as something more than a desperate nobody who wants his attention. Everything I need to know is plastered all over his social media.
It doesn’t take long to find out who the girl in the photo was. I’ve already looked through his verified followers list more than once.
It takes even less time to figure out where Leo lives. He used to save his stories onto his page. He stopped about a year ago. And as I said, I take my own screenshots.
When I first saw the picture of the Sold sticker that was slapped on the For Sale sign in front of a brand-new house, I fought the urge to check dates and addresses against the realtor’s prior listings. Back then, I had an unacknowledged message and hopeless dreams.
Shit happened. Now, there’s nothing holding me back.
I go through my image library until I find the screenshot where his sister is standing beside the sign, holding up a giant bottle of champagne and pointing at Leo at the very edge of the frame. There’s the realtor’s name and company, plus pictures of the listing on that sign.
Which means those pictures will still be online.
All it takes is a quick Google search of the real estate company’s name, city, and realtor. Eventually I find it in their “sold” listings. There on the screen is an address.
Leo’s address.
My car keys are in my hand in a heartbeat. Tires rolling along gravel in the next. The half-hour drive passes by in a blur.
Streetlights move by in my periphery, and my mind spins with possibilities. I’m not sure what I’ll do once I’m there. I need an in. Any kind of in.
The muscles along my shoulders are burning with wound-up tension by the time I park a couple houses down from his place. It’s in the expensive part of the city where someone could fit four of my two-bedroom apartment onto a single plot of land.
I grip the steering wheel, glaring at the two-story property. Four wooden pillars hold up the roof of the porch, matching the door of the lower garage. None of the lights are on in the house, other than the garden lamps illuminating the gray slating and white-trimmed windows.
The plans I found online suggest his bedroom would be the one with the balcony, facing the backyard, with two more bedrooms and an office upstairs, and another spare bedroom below.
It’s nine at night, and I know for a fact he doesn’t have a game on. I never thought to question whether he lives with anyone. His sister lives in a swanky apartment in the city center, and I doubt his multimillionaire father would be living in his son’s house.
What if some of his teammates are living with him? Or if he has a girl over? My stomach sours.
I stay in the comfort of my car, staring at the building like it might give me some insight on how the hell I’m going to approach this.
An hour passes before a convertible pulls up the driveway. I quickly lower myself into my seat just enough to still see who it is.
My lungs stall when I finally see Leo in the flesh.
The photos don’t do him justice. Not at all.
He’s even more breathtaking in real life.
His shoulders seem broader beneath his button-up shirt, jawline sharper.
There’s an air of authority around him that can’t be captured on camera.
It’s as if I’ve been sucked into his orbit where nothing matters but him.
I stop breathing altogether when a woman steps out of the driver’s side. My fingers shake, mind bombarding me with images of the brunette girl in the photo. But then I see her wavy black hair, bright-red tights, and vintage heels; everything starts to click into place.
Sabrina Duval. Upcoming stylist. Online personality. Leo’s younger sister.
Someone who has nothing to do with the attacks against me.
It looks like I’ve found my in.