Chapter 29 #2
Both he and his truck were gone. The last I’d seen, he had been with Megan, and now he was missing.
He might have just been driving her home, but that, in itself, pissed me off.
The girl had slashed my tires, been a total bitch, and gotten into a fight with my friend.
In what world did he think it was okay to give the psycho he’d dated, or screwed—whatever he’d done—a ride home?
She deserved to be dumped on the street like the feral bitch she was.
I sat in the middle of Wolf’s bed, trying my hardest not to think the worst. Trying to forget the smug smile Megan had on her face when his arm had wrapped around her.
For an hour, I sat watching Maverick and Goose move around their cage—the cage Wolf had bought them. For me.
Even with that reminder, I tore at my thumbnail, trying to convince myself that Wolf didn’t want her, that she was crazy.
But he’d told her I was his blackmailed little sister.
While that was the truth, the very fact that he’d spoken to her bothered me.
Nora, Megan… Did he just have a collection of exes he kept around?
As the minutes ticked by, my imagination ran wild, picturing them together, the stereotypical football player with his blond, busty cheerleader.
By the time the muffled noise of the front door closing came from downstairs, I’d convinced myself that Wolf was just playing me and I was the ugliest person to walk the earth. Footfalls came up the steps before the bedroom door creaked open.
Squishy shot in, zooming straight to the bed and hopping onto it, but my attention was aimed at Wolf.
I wanted to control myself, pretend like I didn’t care, but the moment his gaze met mine, the toxic jealousy that had been bleeding through my veins for the past hour leaked out. “Did you have a nice time with Megan?”
Mumbling “shit” under his breath, he rounded the bed and plugged his phone into the charger. “I was not with Megan.”
“You didn’t come back for an hour ! I tried to call you five times.”
“I kicked her out, told her never to talk to me again. The cops showed up, thanks to your and Cassie’s bullshit, then got a call—right before my phone died—that Dog had escaped Miss Seaton’s.”
My attention drifted to Squishy, who sat beside me like a proud emperor. A moment of relief washed through me, but it was short-lived. “Truth or not, there’s clearly something between you and Megan.”
His nostrils flared on a deep huff. “There isn’t jack shit between us.”
“There’s enough for her to try to rip out my fucking hair! And slash my damn tires.” I should have stopped there, but with each passing second, my blood pressure rose, and the insanity took hold. It was like watching a wreck I couldn’t stop. “Did you date her?”
“Oh my fucking God.” Dropping his head back, he swiped his hands through his hair, biceps flexing. “I fucked her. Once. When I was shitfaced drunk. Happy?”
I couldn’t stop the image of him and her, naked, kissing, fucking, from popping to the forefront of my mind.
“Girls don’t go absolutely bat shit over a fuck, Wolf.” My mind was a whirlwind of uncertainty, of that bitter jealousy I so badly wished I could snuff out. “But let me guess, you’re still friends with her, right?”
His gaze hardened. “Jesus Christ! It was one time, when you,” he pointed at me, “didn’t want anything to do with me!”
“I didn’t want anything to do with you because you moved on from me faster than I could say we’re fucking done!”
His phone vibrated on the nightstand. My gaze snapped over to it, my blood boiling when I saw Nora’s name flashing on the screen.
“Speak of the devil.” Laughing, I snatched the device from the charger, then chucked it at him, as hard as I could, barely missing his head.
“Nora wants to talk to you. So much for telling her not to call you anymore.” I felt stupid for believing him, stupid for believing in us.
My emotions mixed and whirled, anger, hurt, humiliation, all culminating into something I could barely manage.
“Guess I don’t matter that much after all.
” I shoved off the bed, storming past him to the dresser.
“I told her not to call me. That I was with you. What do you want me to do, block her number?”
I grabbed my backpack from the floor. If he’d told her not to call, that we were together, and she still felt the right to…
All that did was send all those old feelings of inadequacy rising to the surface.
“I’m not your keeper, Wolf,” I said, fighting tears as I raked my body spray and hairbrush into my bag.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m going home. If that means you need to use that video—” I snatched one of my T-shirts from the floor. “Then so be it.”
“I deleted the fucking video. Over a week ago.”
That doused a drop of water on my emotions, only to stir in confusion.
If he’d deleted the video, then that meant something, didn’t it?
That he cared? Or that I could have gone home this entire time, but he let me stay and be Rogue’s servant.
His phone rang from the floor where it had landed when I’d thrown it at him.
When I looked down and saw Nora’s name on the screen again, I snapped.
I picked it up and answered. If he didn’t want to tell her, I sure as hell would. “Stop calling Nora. You look desperate.”
“I—”
I hung up, then slapped his phone against his massive chest. “See! How hard that is?”
His brow furrowed, his angry gaze peeling back layers I didn’t want him to see. “Feel better?”
“No.” Squishy followed me into the bathroom.
“Why can’t you just be a dick for once?” I grabbed my shampoo and deodorant, cramming both into my bag before going back into the bedroom, refusing to look at Wolf.
“You had no problem being a massive dick when you blackmailed me.” I dropped my bag onto the bed and went to zip it, but before I could, Wolf’s hand halted the movement.
“Would you stop?” He snatched the backpack from my grip and dropped it to the floor. “I don’t want Megan. I don’t want Nora. I only want you. Why can’t you just trust that?”
Because I was too messed up when it came to him. Too all in already. Too aware of how much he could hurt me. I looked at the floor, angry at myself, at him.
“Jade…” Wolf took my chin, forcing me to look at him.
“I fucking love you. I don’t want anyone else.
If you think, for one damned second, that any other girl could ever measure up to you…
” His brow creased. “The way I feel about you. That’s a once-in-a-lifetime thing, and if you think I would fuck that up… ”
Tears spilled down my cheeks. Everything about this hurt, his words, the possibility of losing us again…
“I’d put a bullet in my own head before I let you go again.”
Deep down, I knew he loved me. It was the fear of whether that love was enough that terrified me, that sent me down a rationally irrational spiral.
“Jade, please. I need you.”
And I needed him. Without him, the world felt gray and cold. Colorless. Just as I opened my mouth to speak, a shrill squeak sounded—like a dog toy, except I knew it wasn’t.
My heart skipped a beat before going into overdrive when my gaze landed on Squishy, his face buried in my backpack that Wolf had dropped beside the bed.
Wolf turned just as Squishy dragged the penguin from my backpack and, with a condemning squeak, dropped it to the floor.
Time slowed down when one paw landed on its stomach and his sharp teeth wrapped around its head.
One hard tug, and he ripped it off. Blue pills exploded from the toy, and Squishy stepped back. His dirty deed done.
My face burned as I sank to the floor, sweeping pills into my hand. The dog sniffed a few stray pills. “Squishy, no.” I shoved him away, and he huffed before hopping onto the bed.
“Jade,” Wolf’s voice came from over my shoulder.
My entire body tensed, my brain trying to come up with an explanation for the stupid penguin I’d forgotten all about.
“Why did you have that in your bag?” The tinge of hurt in his voice had guilt and shame taking root in my chest.
“It’s not—” I could have lied, but I didn’t want to. I couldn’t. I knew how bad it looked, though. How bad it was . I pushed to my feet, ignoring his gaze as I poured the handful of pills onto the nightstand.
“Jade?”
Taking a breath, I turned and looked at him. “I wasn’t going to use it.”
His brows furrowed. “Use it?” Evidently, it wasn’t as obvious as I’d thought.
I drew in a long breath. “You were blackmailing us…had a loaded gun to our heads. And then I figured out what you use the penguins for.” The confession poured from my lips in a rushed string.
“We needed our own gun.” The betrayal ripped across his face.
“But I couldn’t bring myself to do that to you! ” I said in a rush.
He snatched the backpack from the floor, zipped it, and shoved it toward me. “Get out.”
My heart seized in my chest, as though it might stop beating altogether if he meant that. “What?”
“You heard me.”
It didn’t stop, but I almost felt it crack. He’d just told me he needed me, and now he wanted me to leave. I’d gone from seeing our whole future play out before my eyes to helplessly watching it slip through my fingers.
Tears poured down my face, the reality of losing him again tearing me apart. “What would you have done if someone were blackmailing you?”
“It’s not someone. It’s me.” His expression shuddered, jaw ticcing.
I knew him well enough to know nothing I could say would change anything right then.
“And I had that video deleted after you told me about your parents’ situation. Because the guilt of it was too much. Because I loved you. You, on the other hand, kept that fucking penguin.”
“I forgot I even had it,” I whispered, taking the backpack in what felt like an act of finality.
“I wish I could believe that.” His gaze held mine for a torturous beat. “Just go, Jade. Please, just get the fuck out of here. Out of my life…”