Break Away (20 page)

“Back to trolling for bar trash, I see.”

“That’s what single guys do,” he said with a pleased smile. “Would you prefer if I didn’t?”

I could see the challenge in his eyes. He
wanted
me to admit to being jealous… to having feelings for him. But why? What the hell was he trying to prove? Whatever sick game he was playing, I wasn’t going to let him win. No way would I give him the satisfaction of admitting to anything when he was being such a total jerk about it.

“By all means, troll away,” I smiled back stubbornly. He wanted to play childish games? Fine. I could play, too.

We glared at each other across the bar, both of us refusing to give in. When Brandy came back, Dex stood up and grabbed her hand. “Come on baby, let’s dance.”

As he pulled her to the dance floor, she tossed me a huge, delighted grin over her shoulder that made me want to hurl. It wasn’t long before they were grinding and gyrating against each other, her back pressed against his chest in the same way mine had been last night when it was the two of us dancing together. When the slut bent over, putting her hands on her knees and grinding her ass into Dex’s crotch, my stomach twisted into knots. I felt like I was going to be sick. I kept trying to remind myself that he was only aiming to get a rise out of me, and I shouldn’t let it bother me, but it did.

With each song, their disgusting performance on the dance floor got worse, until they were basically just dry humping each other in a crowd of people. Their sweaty bodies were fused so tightly together that it was difficult to tell where one whore ended and the other began. I tried not to look at them, but it was a train wreck happening right in front of me that I couldn’t help but watch.

When they finally decided to come up for air, Dex sauntered over to me while Brandy stopped to talk to her friend.

“Hey, Liv, could you be a doll and get me a water?”

“I think what you really need is a shower,” I hissed. “You’re covered in skank sweat.”

“Aren’t you awfully snappy tonight,” he grinned, resting his elbows on the bar. “I wonder why that is…”

“No, I’m just repulsed. Could you give me a heads up before you go out there for round two so I can go to the back and gouge my eyes out? Thanks.”

“You jealous, Liv? Cause you know I’m all yours if you want me. Just say the word, and she’s gone.” Leaning over the bar, he reached out and brushed his fingers along my cheek.

I recoiled from his touch, furious. “How could you think that I’d want you? You make me sick. Go back to your stupid slut and leave me the hell alone.”

His smile fell, pain sweeping across his face. But I didn’t feel bad this time. Did he really think that
this
was the way to win me over? That he could act like an asshole and I would swoon at his feet?

Dex was never going to change. This is who he was. I was delusional to think that any kind of relationship with him was anywhere in the realm of possibilities.

Without a word, he spun around and marched over to Brandy. Pulling her body against him, he dropped his mouth to hers and began kissing her intensely.

I felt like I’d been punched in the gut. Tears pricked at my eyes, and I wasn’t sure if I was going to cry or throw up. I rushed outside through the back door before the first sob broke free.

This was a new kind of pain for me. I’d never felt this before, not even when I walked in on my fiancé screwing another woman… and we’d been together for four years! Dex and I were barely together for one night, so why did this hurt so much more?

This was different, though. It hurt more because Dex knew me—really
knew
me. I’d cracked my walls and given him glimpses of who I was, and that terrified me. It was one thing to be rejected by someone who barely knew the real me, but to be hurt by someone that I trusted enough to expose myself to… that was something else entirely.

I stood outside in the fresh air, taking deep breaths and trying to regain my composure. Every time I thought about his arms wrapped around her and his lips on hers—the same arms that had been wrapped around me, the same lips that had been on mine—fresh tears flowed down my cheeks.

I’d been hesitant with Dex because he knew me too well, and somehow he managed to crush me anyway. That was what happened when I let people in. That’s how it always was. My dad, Steven and now Dex. All they ever did was hurt me and leave me.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Olivia freeze. Her face paled and her eyes filled with pain before she turned and ran out the back.

My heart dropped.

Immediately I knew that I’d gone too far and really fucked things up. I hadn’t even meant to do it, but when I heard her say all that shit about not wanting me and how much I disgusted her, I was so pissed off and so fucking hurt that I just lost it. I hadn’t been thinking. All I’d wanted to do in that moment was hurt her the way she hurt me.

But the look on her face… shit. It broke my fucking heart to see that. The pain in her eyes, the anger, the sadness… I never meant to do that. It gutted me. That look hurt more than getting ripped apart by shrapnel.

I tore my mouth from the whore I was kissing and pulled away.

“Where you going, baby?”

“Get the fuck off me, I have to go.” I pushed her into the arms of a random guy nearby. “Here you go. I bet he’ll fuck you.”

Ignoring her shocked expression, I stormed out of the bar. I wanted to find Olivia, but I knew I was the last person she would want to see. I didn’t want to make it worse than it already was, so I began walking to nowhere in particular, trying to clear my head.

All I could see was the look on Olivia’s face.

I sat on the hood of Olivia’s car, waiting for her to come out at the end of her shift. I don’t know long I was out there—a couple hours maybe—but I refused to go home without talking to her first. Everything had spiraled out of control, and I was powerless to stop it. I felt weak. In the Marines, we were trained to alter our circumstances and regain control when a situation got out of hand. When you lost the upper hand in war, you became vulnerable and exposed. I felt that way now, only this was a different kind of war. One that I was unfamiliar with. There were no definitive boundaries or a chain of command to follow. I’d worked long and hard to become a successful Marine, but I was inexperienced when it came to life outside of combat. My training couldn’t help me with this.

Olivia finally came outside, her eyes narrowing angrily when she glanced up and saw me there.

“I’m so sorry, Liv.”

“What the hell are you doing out here?” she said, stopping several feet away from me. “You sure made quick work of that girl in there. Did you decide to do her out here in the parking lot instead of taking her all the way back to your place?” Her hands rested on her hips defensively, and she wore an angry scowl, but there was vulnerability in her eyes that couldn’t be hidden by her tough exterior. I hated that I was the one who put it there.

“I promise you, I didn’t sleep with her. I left without her.”

She scoffed, “Well, that’s a first.”

“Can we please talk?” I said, stepping toward her slowly.

“There’s nothing to talk about, Dex. You were out there dry humping and making out with some random slut right in from of me, less than twenty-four hours after we… whatever, it doesn’t matter.” She tried to move past me to her car, but I blocked her path.

“I know that I fucked up. I know that. But I was only doing it to make you jealous. I was upset about what you said, and I was stupid. I wanted to hear that you have feelings for me and that it wasn’t a mistake. I wanted to be more than that.”

She was quiet for a moment, staring at the ground between us. I thought I had finally gotten through to her. When her eyes met mine, though, they were firm.

“Even if I had feelings for you then, I sure as hell don’t anymore. Nothing will ever happen between us because guys like you never change.” She stepped forward into the space between us until she was only inches away from me. “Now, if you care about me at all, then you’ll leave me alone and get out of my way so I can go home and pretend that the last two days never happened.”

Defeated, I stepped aside and let her climb into her car. I watched helplessly as she drove off, never slowing down or glancing back.

***

I stayed as busy as possible over the next week, picking up extra shifts at the restaurant and spending a lot of my free time at the aquarium. I had little time to myself, which was exactly how I wanted it. When I wasn’t working, I thought too much about all the things I had sworn to put behind me.

I’d barely seen Amy, except in passing, because I was rarely home. She’d called me a few times and I felt bad for ignoring her, but she was Dex’s sister after all. I wasn’t sure what, if anything, she knew about what happened between Dex and me. If he’d filled her in, then she would most certainly try to talk to me about it, and that was the last thing I wanted to do. I didn’t want to think about it, and I most definitely didn’t want to talk about it.

So I did the mature thing and avoided her instead.

Dex had done as I’d asked and was leaving me alone. He hadn’t been to the restaurant while I was working and I hadn’t seen him visiting Amy’s house, either. He’d managed to drop out of my life entirely. It was exactly what I wanted… so I didn’t know why it bothered me so much. It wasn’t as though I expected him to chase after me—Dex didn’t chase after women—and clearly I was no exception.

I woke up to pounding on my front door, and groggily looked at my phone to check the time. It was after eleven in the morning, but since it was my day off and I had nothing better to do, I’d decided to let myself sleep in.

The knocking continued, and I dragged myself out of bed to get the door. I opened it to find Amy and Sadie standing there in their beach gear.

“Oh, gosh, I’m so sorry to wake you,” Amy said, noting my disheveled appearance. “I haven’t seen you all week, and when I saw your car sitting in the driveway, I didn’t want to miss my chance.”

I was a terrible friend. “No worries, I was getting up anyway,” I lied. “I’m sorry I haven’t been over to see you guys. I’ve been working like crazy this week.”

“I figured it was something like that,” she said. “We were just getting ready to go to the beach. Do you want to come?”