Chapter 38 F.A.A.F.O #2
“Look here, you punk ass, limp-dicked, middle-shelf mistake of a man,” I say, stepping forward half a pace, “if you don’t get the fuck out of my face with your revisionist bullshit, I will embarrass you in ways your whole family and your therapist will feel.
Don't downgrade me because you can't face yourself.”
Spencer blinks.
Good. Let it land.
“You don’t get to rewrite history because your ego can’t survive the fact that I outgrew you,” I continue, voice steady. “You were a phase. A clearance-rack chapter I don’t reread.”
His jaw tightens. Pride bruised.
He points the tumbler at me again, wobbling just enough to make my body tense.
“You got a little attention tonight and now you think you’re hot shit,” he slurs. “Don’t let this fake-ass wannabe papi go to your head.”
My breath catches, but I don’t move.
Spencer’s eyes drag over me again, greedy and disgusting, like he’s trying to take something without touching it.
“You’ll never be more than his black girl fantasy.”
The words hit my chest like a slap.
My heel catches on the marble. My body jolts, just for a second.
August steadies me instantly, not with force, with presence. His hand tightens at my waist like a vow.
His voice drops even lower.
“What was that?”
Spencer smirks. “You heard me.”
August’s jacket shifts as if he’s about to move, and I lift my hand, press it to his chest.
“August,” I whisper. Not a plea. A warning. “Don’t. Not here.”
His eyes flick to me, dark and sharp. He’s holding himself back because he knows I have more to lose.
He stays still.
Spencer laughs, loud enough that it bounces off the walls.
“What?” he says, spreading his arms. “Y’all came out the bathroom looking like a deleted scene from Pornhub and now you wanna play royal couple?”
My face burns, not with shame, with rage.
But Spencer isn’t done. He never is.
He steps in front of us, blocking the hallway like a roadblock with a trust fund.
“C’mon, Harlee,” he says, voice dropping into that fake-soft tone he uses when he wants access. “Talk to me. For old time’s sake.”
“We’re leaving,” I say. “Move.”
He doesn’t.
August shifts just a fraction, shoulders squaring, the professional mask thinning to something colder. More predatory.
Spencer’s gaze flicks over August, then back to me, and he leans in like he’s whispering a secret.
“Enjoy it while it’s new,” he says, eyes gleaming. “She’ll moan for anybody with a jawline and attention.”
My hands curl into fists.
August’s jaw ticks.
I take a breath through my nose. Controlled. Measured.
“Spencer,” I say, slow. “Go home.”
He laughs again, wet and ugly. “Or what?”
Spencer sways slightly, glass sloshing in his hand, eyes dragging over me like he’s trying to reclaim something with his stare alone.
“You really think you’re better than me now?” he slurs. “All dressed up, lettin’ this dude play hero?”
I keep my voice calm on purpose. Measured. Adult.
“Spencer, you’re drunk,” I say. “This isn’t the time or the place. Go home.”
He laughs, loud and brittle. “You always say that when you don’t wanna deal with the truth.”
August shifts beside me. Not forward. Just closer. A quiet signal.
“That’s enough,” August says evenly. “We’re leaving.”
Spencer’s grin sharpens. “Oh, look at that. Lame Bunny finally speaks.”
I don’t rise to it. I won’t give him the satisfaction.
“We’re done here,” I say again. “Move.”
August’s hand settles at the small of my back, firm but gentle, guiding me away from the conversation like it’s already over. Like Spencer no longer matters.
And that’s what sets him off.
“Wow,” Spencer says, louder now, voice bouncing down the hallway. “So that’s it? You let him tell you what to do now?”
We start walking.
I don’t look back.
“You always did love attention, Harlee,” he calls after me. “You’ll be back when he gets bored. You always come back.”
My jaw tightens, but I keep moving. August keeps pace beside me, steady, unshaken.
“Enjoy my sloppy seconds, chump!” Spencer yells. “She’s nothing but an emotional, nagging bitch anyway!”
That word lands square in my chest.
I flinch despite myself.
August stops.
Just stops.
He turns halfway, eyes dark, voice calm in a way that’s terrifying.
“Watch your mouth.”
Spencer laughs, triumphant now. “What? You gonna cry about it? You think smashing her in a bathroom makes her yours?”
My stomach drops.
He’s still behind us. Still talking. Still spitting poison.
We start to move again.
And that’s when it happens. Spencer's intrusive thoughts finally get the better of him.
Spencer lunges forward and grabs my arm.
Hard.
My body jumps before my pride can even catch up. My breath hiccups, stuttering like it forgot its rhythm. Pain ignites where his fingers dig in, and a sound I loathe slips from my lips.
A tiny, involuntary wince.
My heels scrape against the marble. He yanks me back toward him, sudden and sharp—like I’m a marionette in a storm.
“Harlee—” he starts, but I can’t focus on him.
Something in August snaps.
He pulls me from Spencer’s grip with a fluidity that’s almost beautiful—like he’s rescuing a rare artifact from a careless hand. No roughness, just a smooth precision. Then he advances.
One step.
Two.
I catch the flicker of doubt in Spencer’s smile, just a crack, but it’s there.
And then August’s fist connects.
A clean crack that sends my stomach tumbling.
Spencer stumbles, the tumbler slipping from his grasp, shattering against the tile in a spectacular explosion of glass and ice.
Shards scatter like fallen stars. Someone gasps behind us; I can’t tell who.
But August isn’t done.
He cracks Spencer shit again, and now he’s down on the marble, blood blooming across his nose like someone spilled red wine on a white tablecloth. The satisfaction that flickers through me is a dark little secret, and I hate myself for it. Good.
Footsteps thunder in, and I can hear the rush of Spencer’s friends, moving like they’ve rehearsed this dance before. They grab August by the shoulders, around his arms, not fighting him but containing the aftermath like it’s some wild animal that’s just been unleashed.
August stands over Spencer, chest rising and falling slow, like he didn’t just rearrange a man’s face in front of us.
He rolls his shoulders once, adjusts his cufflinks with a casualness that feels out of place, like he’s preparing for a dinner party instead of standing over a bleeding man.
The hallway swells with people now, their murmurs filling the air with tension. I can feel every heartbeat, every pulse of anxiety buzzing in my ears.
Voices ripple. People gather at a cautious distance. Phones lift behind clutches and sleeves like everyone suddenly remembered they’re journalists when mess happens.
Blood and bubbles. Exactly.
“What in God’s name is going on here?”
The voice slices through the chaos like a gavel hitting stone.
I turn.
A woman in her fifties glides forward in a fitted gown and diamonds that catch the light like teeth. Her silk press is sharp enough to cut somebody. Her face is horror and rage wrapped in expensive composure.
Behind her comes a tall man in a tux with the kind of calm that feels dangerous. His eyes land on Spencer like he’s already calculating charges.
Spencer’s parents.
Judge Buchanan and District Attorney Buchanan.
Of course.
“Spencer!” his mother cries, rushing forward, hands fluttering as if she can pat his face back into place. “Oh my God, what happened?"
Spencer wipes his nose with the back of his hand, smearing blood across his cheek like war paint. Even on the floor, he’s smug. Entitlement doesn’t bleed out. It just stains.
“I’m fine,” he says thickly. “Just a little roughhousing.”
“Roughhousing?” his mother repeats, voice climbing. “You’re bleeding!”
The DA’s gaze flicks from Spencer to August, then to me. Sharp. Assessing.
He doesn’t ask if I’m okay.
He clocks me like evidence.
August steps back to my side, posture straightening into something polished, controlled, corporate. His knuckles are split. Red. Painted in Spencer’s blood.
“Yeah,” August says, voice smooth as a boardroom table. “No harm. No foul.”
The DA’s eyes narrow. “You think this is no harm?”
Kelley appears near the edge of the crowd, face tight, eyes already doing PR math. Monroe’s there too, silent and watchful, like he’s absorbing the scene for later.
Kelley mutters, barely audible, “Well, you’re fucked.”
His mother is still hovering over Spencer, whispering like she’s soothing a toddler. “Pookie, your beautiful face…”
Pookie?
Jesus Christ.
The whispering grows. The camera angles multiply.
This isn’t gossip anymore. This is footage.
August exhales through his nose, then does the most terrifying thing of all.
He turns and walks away.
Just… walks. Cuts through the lobby like he owns the building and consequences don’t apply to him the way they apply to regular people.
But this isn’t regular.
And the Buchanan’s are not regular.
From the crowd, a voice cuts through the murmurs, loud and unmistakable.
“Biiitch, what is Spencer doing here?”
Wynter. At my elbow like she teleported.
Her eyes are wide, lashes dramatic, dress screaming main character. She clocks Spencer’s busted face. Clocks the blood. Clocks the glass. Then she looks at me.
And her expression sharpens into something serious, protective, and furious.
I open my mouth. Nothing comes out.
“I… I have no idea,” I manage, and it doesn’t sound like me.
Wynter grips my arm, careful around the spot Spencer yanked, her voice dropping low.
“Lee,” she says, all play gone, “we need to go. Now.”
She’s right.
But I look at Spencer on the marble, still smirking through blood. I look at his mother fussing. I look at his father’s eyes, already writing a story where his son is the victim and I’m the scandal.
I look at the phones.
I look at August disappearing into the crowd like he can outrun this.
And my chest tightens with the kind of panic that has nothing to do with emotions and everything to do with reality.
This isn’t messy ex drama anymore.
This is legal. Political. Very not discreet.
Whatever version of “keep things discreet” we thought we had?
That shit dead.
Nothing about this will ever be the same again.