Total pages in book: 94
Estimated words: 97994 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 490(@200wpm)___ 392(@250wpm)___ 327(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 97994 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 490(@200wpm)___ 392(@250wpm)___ 327(@300wpm)
TWENTY-NINE
JULIETTE
“That prick! I’m going to gut him—who does he think he is?”
“My brother.” I sniff, voice wrecked. My nose is raw from all the blowing I’ve done, tissues piling up on the coffee table like sad little white flags. “You can’t gut him. You won’t get past the doorman.”
Blaire paces my living room like a general preparing for war. “Watch me.”
If I wasn’t so devastated, I would laugh.
Instead, another wave of tears wells up and spills over before I can stop it.
I feel so stupid.
Stupid.
“How long?” I whisper, staring at nothing in particular. “How long has everyone known but me?”
Blaire stops pacing mid-step. “Please. Do not give those morons this much credit. From the way it sounds, your brother and Aaron have been brooding around the arena like cavemen and keeping this shit to themselves. I don’t think men gossip the way we do.”
Not true.
But I don’t point this out to Blaire; I know when to bite my tongue.
Honestly, I haven’t seen her this angry since her ex-boyfriend, Carter, changed the Netflix password on her, pre-breakup, and she was cut off from free streaming. She drafted a nasty, biting two paragraph text before dumping him.
This is worse.
She is nuclear.
She plants her hands on her hips and glares out the sliding glass door like Aaron’s face might materialize on the balcony. Or my brother’s.
“I am an idiot.”
Declan was right; I am naïve.
“You are not an idiot, Juliette Lillian Kennedy.” She says it so firmly I want so badly to believe her. “You were operating under the assumption that the men in your life weren’t complete lying fuck bags.”
Fuck bags?
That’s a new one.
I swipe at my cheeks again. My skin feels tight from all the crying I’ve done…
“Hey—sweetie, no—listen to me.” She comes over and goes down on her knees in front of me, taking my hands in hers. “Your brother didn’t tell you he slept with another man’s girlfriend. That’s on him. Aaron didn’t tell you he walked in on it and was petty about it. That’s on him. None of this is your fault.”
Logically, I know this.
“Look at me.” She squeezes my fingers. “You think that man was faking everything? Sounds exhausting.”
“I don’t know,” I admit, and that’s what hurts the most. “That’s the problem.”
I feel like I know nothing about anything.
“I trusted both of them,” I whisper.
Blaire nods. “I know you did.” Her mouth curves into a sneer. “Honest to god, I want to bury that man.”
She is not referring to Aaron.
I know her well enough to know she means Declan, her arch-nemesis since we were teenagers.
“Although, in his defense—and you know I loathe defending him…” Blaire sucks in a deep breath like it physically pains her. “He probably thought he was protecting you by not telling you.”
I tilt my head. “He was protecting himself so I wouldn’t know he can’t keep his wiener in his pants.”
“That too.” She nods solemnly. “And was it necessary for you to say wiener at a time like this? Couldn’t you say the word dick?”
“No.” I let out a lukewarm laugh. “Wiener feels more humiliating.”
I lean back into the couch cushions, staring at the ceiling. “I keep thinking about all the times he confronted me about the relationship, making it seem like Aaron was evil. All along, he was worried I’d find out he’d diddled Aaron’s girlfriend.”
“That’s one way to put it.”
I sniffle, reaching for another tissue. Blow loudly, another wave of tears streaming down my face.
“That’s it. I can’t take it anymore.” Blaire stands, stalking to the kitchen and snatching her keys off the counter.
I blink at her from the couch, mascara smudged down my cheeks, all the way to my chin.
“Where are you going?”
“To handle your brother.” She’s already at the door. “You stay here.”
As if I would leave? I look horrible.
Feel worse.
“Blaire—”
The door slams.
And then it’s just me.
Alone with my thoughts.
Which is, frankly, the worst possible company.
I pace.
I sit. I cry for the tenth time. I pick up my phone and attempt to thumb through my socials as if it’ll keep my mind off this mess.
It doesn’t.
Every passing minute stretches. I imagine Blaire marching into the arena. Or his condo. Or dragging him through a parking lot by the collar of his shirt, Neanderthal style.
Part of me is horrified.
Most of me is eternally grateful.
Two hours later, when the door finally unlocks, I’ve convinced myself she’s either been arrested or has murdered him and needs me to hide the body.
Instead, she walks in carrying two paper bags and the energy of someone who has assaulted a man with her verbal barbs and relished every single second of it.
She is charged.
Buzzing.
Exhilarated.
There’s a sparkle in her eye, and it replaces the murderous look she had before she left.
She kicks the door shut with her heel and drops the bags on the coffee table. “And before you ask, yes. I found him.”