Total pages in book: 145
Estimated words: 138775 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 694(@200wpm)___ 555(@250wpm)___ 463(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 138775 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 694(@200wpm)___ 555(@250wpm)___ 463(@300wpm)
I jumped on his words. “But how could you prove it?”
“I told her just to call me directly on my phone to check.” He shrugged. “Who knows, maybe I could end up in jail.”
“No, not that. Just in general. How can you prove that an audio recording is fake?”
His eyebrows raised as he stared at me. “They have a recording of you?”
“No, they don’t.” I sighed. “But they think they do—and so does Tori.”
Sympathy filled his face—sympathy I didn’t want. Because I didn’t want to be fucking dealing with this. Maybe it would just be easier to let it go and fail the damn class. As long as she wouldn’t. Surely, they wouldn’t hold her to that fucked up rule if they thought I cheated?
“Have you talked to her about it?”
“I didn’t get the chance to.”
“Then do it when she gets home. She’s on your side.”
“She was. But the recording—it was bad.”
“Shit,” he muttered. “That’s fucked up. You know who else you should talk to.”
I frowned for a moment and then it came to me. “Coach. Yeah, he’d probably believe me. Or he’d check my batting average and pretend to believe me.”
“Not him,” Jayden said, then corrected himself. “Or not only him. You need to talk to Lucas.”
“Yeah, sure. That conversation will go well.”
“I’m serious. He’ll know how to find out if the recording is a fake.”
“It is a fake. But why the fuck would he help me?”
“I don’t know. He might—he might not. But you know he’d do it for her.”
Shit. I didn’t want to ask him for anything on my behalf or Tori’s. “She’s never going to believe me.”
“Why do you say that? She knows you, better than you think.”
“Yeah, she also thought she knew that guy she was living with, that prick who stole her necklace and planted a camera in her room.”
That shut Jayden up, since he knew I was right. Finally, he sighed. “Just talk to her when she gets home. I’ll keep Lucas out of your way.”
I didn’t answer, even though it was decent of him to offer. But maybe the best thing for all of us was if I just got in my truck and started driving. And never stopped.
And that’s basically what I did after easily winning the third game. Just drove around aimlessly before tori could get back and look at me with hurt in her eyes.
I finally ended up in a bar in some town in the middle of nowhere. They had pool tables there, too, and I won enough to pay for my drinks and make a small profit.
The house was dark and silent when I got back. Tori was probably nestled next to Jayden or Lucas—or both, as I’d seen one time. Probably after crying herself to sleep and telling them what a horrible person I was.
At least one of them, maybe both, would believe her on that account.
I smelled like cigarettes and stale beer, so I took a shower, pulling on a pair of board shorts after toweling off.
Flipping on the lights in my room, I stopped dead, my instincts telling me that something was different faster than my mind did.
Tori was in my bed.
She was on the far side, curled up under the covers. She blinked and shielded her eyes against the light—but I could see they were red.
What the fuck was she doing here? She did know this was my bedroom, right? She hadn’t slept here since before I moved in.
I turned the light back off and stood there for a long moment.
None of this made any sense—unless she’d talked to Jayden maybe?
Eventually, I stopped trying to figure it out. I climbed into the bed next to her. When she turned toward me, I took her in my arms and pulled her close.
I stroked her hair and held her while she cried. I didn’t ask her if she really thought I said those things about her.
Suspecting she thought the worst of me was bad enough. Knowing it would break me.
39
LUCAS
I didn’t see Jayden’s car when I pulled up to the little coffee shop a mile from the house. Figuring I must’ve beat him there, I headed inside. Only to stop dead when I saw Kyle sitting at a table by the window.
Shit.
There was no chance this was a coincidence. I was going to bury Jayden in a shallow grave under his beloved hammock when I got home.
“What.” I sat down across from Kyle. Might as well get this over with.
“Coffee?” he stated, not quite an offer.
I squinted at his cup. “Yes, it is. Want to tell me what this is about?”
He sighed, leaning back in his chair, looking out the window. “It’s about Tori. And a little about me.”
Great. Because I just loved hearing about the two of them being involved in any way. “Why am I here?”