Total pages in book: 99
Estimated words: 93224 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 466(@200wpm)___ 373(@250wpm)___ 311(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 93224 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 466(@200wpm)___ 373(@250wpm)___ 311(@300wpm)
I look at the faces in the room, all those bright, greedy eyes, hungry for gossip, for drama, for the spectacle of it. I look at my daughter, so sure of herself, so proud to be the one who broke the news.
And then I say, in a voice I barely recognize, “You’re all sick little bitches. Immature fucks, every one of you.”
A silence falls, this time total.
I grab the toolbox off the floor, the metal handle biting into my palm, and I stalk out without looking at any of them. Not at Stella. Not at Andie, who is shaking so hard she might shatter.
The door slams behind me, hard enough that the walls rattle. I take the stairs two at a time, then three. My hands are shaking, and my jaw feels like it’s going to split in two. I make it outside, into the cold blue air, before the first wave of nausea hits.
I lean against my truck, breathing hard, trying to force it all down: she used me. All along, there was a bet in place. The first girl to lose her virginity would win a monetary prize, and Andie used me to get her hands on the money.
What the hell was I thinking? Of course, she used me. That’s why she was taking photos the entire time, and I knew that. I even let her snap my face, goddamn the little bitch.
The humiliation, the betrayal, the sick twist of wanting to go back up there, to take Andie in my arms, to forgive her for everything, make me nauseous.
But I can’t.
Not now.
Not ever.
The last thing I remember, before the world tilts on its axis, is Andie’s face on the screen: beautiful, wild, hungry for me, and gone forever.
The toolbox hits the truck bed with a bang. I slam the door, turn the key, and drive away, praying that I never have to see any of them again.
But I know it won’t work.
Nothing ever does.
17
THE UGLY TRUTH COMES OUT
Andie
The key is so cold it burns.
I stand in the narrow vestibule of Thomas’s building, the key he gave me clenched in my palm, my breath fogging in the uncertain gap between indoors and out. The river wind shoves at the glass doors behind me, the kind of wind that seeps through walls and bones. The rest of the world is a blur because I can’t see. I can’t hear. I can’t think of anything, but the mess my life has become. For a long moment I stay just like this, staring up at the bank of elevators, not moving, not even sure if I can move.
My phone is in my other hand, thumb hovering over the screen. I haven’t let go of it for hours. It’s as if there’s still some magic in the device—a last hope that the words on it, the call history, could change or blink or vibrate with a message from him. But the display is nothing but a row of unanswered texts, blue bubbles hanging like baited hooks in a dark current. I kept texting Thomas last night, begging him to listen, but to no avail. He never wrote back.
I use the key to activate the elevator, and wait. When the doors open, the cab is empty. The mirror inside throws my face back at me: pale, hair limp under my hat, eyes so rimmed and swollen it looks like I’ve lost a fight. I step in, hit “PH,” and lean into the corner, phone clenched in both hands like a prayer.
On the way up, I press redial one last time. The elevator is silent but for the wheeze and hum of the gears, but then Thomas’s voice fills the small space: his recorded voicemail, low and polished, a little flat, the “You’ve reached Thomas Moreland. Please leave a message” barely concealing the Minnesota vowels.
I listen all the way through, let it beep, and then I hang up before I can say anything. I watch my own fingers shake as I do it.
At the top, the doors open to the penthouse, and for a moment, everything feels okay. But then, I notice that the lights are off. Everything is dark and silent, and the sound of my heart is louder than the faint shhh of the elevator doors as they close behind me.
I grip the key, heart pounding.
I step forward, and see that there’s a single low lamp on off to the right, its light pooling in a perfect circle on the living room rug. Heavy curtains are drawn tight against the skyline; behind them, the city glimmers in a muted grid, smeared and streaked with winter haze. There’s a Scotch bottle open on the bar and a matching cut-glass tumbler in Thomas’s hand, the color of it catching the lamp and turning everything gold and brown.