“So you’re not angry with me,” Alex says for the thirteenth time.
I’m back at his house, and it’s 6:42 a.m. I was supposed to meet him at school for an early morning study session, but since Jacqueline just happens to be in Vegas with her girlfriends, I surprised him at home, like I couldn’t wait to see him.
“No. I’m not. I understand your reasons.”
We’re on the couch, and my head is in his lap. His hand strokes my hair slowly, softly, touching each strand like they are fine little woven bits of silk. I feel . . . special. Important.
“Your parents seemed nice,” he offers, and I laugh. It’s funny, in a weird, strange way, like this whole thing is screwed-up funny, and I don’t even know what’s going to happen next anymore.
And I used to have everything so smoothed out that I knew exactly what my next move was at any given time.
He leans down to kiss the top of my head. “You know I love you, Riley, don’t you?” he asks.
I squirm around so my face is up, and he pushes my hair out of my eyes. “I need you to do something for me,” I tell him.
“Okay.”
“Be mine. One hundred percent mine. For real. I can’t keep doing this otherwise.”
His hand freezes on my forehead. “I will, Riley. I swear to God I will. I just can’t right now. Not yet.”
Alex kissing Jacqueline flashes across my mind’s eye. “What’s the holdup, then?” I try to pitch my voice to sound casual, but it doesn’t. I don’t. I sound jealous and catty and my voice has a harsh catch in it.
He lets out his breath. “It’s just that Jaqueline’s life is really hard right now, and I don’t want to pile on, you know? As soon as she sorts everything out just a little bit more, I’ll be able to talk with her, and we’ll separate. Really separate, I mean. I won’t let her come back this time.”
I feel like someone has just put a vise grip on my heart. “Um, excuse me?”
He starts stroking again, but instead of his hand feeling good on my face, it’s annoying me. I push it away and sit up next to him on the couch so I can look at him. “Why is now not a good time, exactly?”
He looks uncomfortable. “Well, her Fine Wines group, they’re just being really mean to her right now. She’s so beautiful, you know, women are always just mean to her, and she doesn’t handle it all that well. She needs my help. She’s delicate. I’m sure you get it. You’re beautiful, too.”
“Please don’t compare me to her,” I say coldly.
“But you understand, right?” He grabs my hands and holds them tightly in his.
I study his face. The wide jawline, the stubble, the deep green eyes, and I realize, on some level, I hate him a little bit. I hate the man who made me all the promises in the world and just won’t keep them.
And I love him.
But I do hate him.
He leans in, slowly, closing his eyes, and I let him kiss me anyway. The kiss is slow and good, just like all of his kisses, and I hate myself a little too, for letting him kiss me like that. He starts lifting my shirt, but I pull away.
“You know the rules.” I tap him lightly on the nose. “Is she gone?”
“For the weekend.” He sulks, and I laugh because I know I’m supposed to give in, but I don’t. “She’s very depressed. I’m just worried about her. Really worried.” He looks down.
I cock my head to the side. Is he confessing to me that he’s worried about his wife? His wife who he said he wants to leave?
Does he want me to be sympathetic?
On what level is this—any of this—okay?
I fight the manic laugh trapped in my throat.
“We’re been married for almost six months, Riley. I care about her.”
Suddenly, I don’t feel like I’m a part of him anymore. I feel like I’m in another room, or another house, and something’s separating us. Maybe a curtain, or a window screen, or maybe I’m watching a fuzzy film of someone I used to know but don’t quite anymore, and the communication is delayed, like I can see his lips moving but the meaning doesn’t hit me until just a moment later.
“I’m so glad you understand me,” he says gratefully.
He’s wrong.
I don’t understand him.
And clearly, he thinks I’m an idiot if he thinks I’m going to stand by and let me be a little pawn in his sick game.
Rage squeezes my heart. The veins burst and blood spurts and I die inside.
If Jacqueline were to just disappear, maybe it wouldn’t be so weird. She is depressed, after all. And she is in the way. Of us. Of happiness. And she’s clearly a horrible person.
If only I were a killer.
I squeeze Alex’s hands. “I understand,” I tell him. I touch his face softly. Kindly. I am there for him, he thinks. I am his silly little waiting-around toy.
“Can I see you tonight?” he asks, his voice low and gravelly, and I know he is dying to get his hands on me. They drop to my waist and squeeze, and I wiggle away and sling my backpack over my shoulders.
“Thanks to your surprise meeting with my lovely parents, I definitely can’t get out of any more cheerleading practices or study sessions or anything without looking suspicious.” I kiss him lightly, but he furrows his brow.
“Huh? My meeting?”
I run my hands along his hairline and behind his ears. “Don’t be ridiculous, Alex.”
“I didn’t schedule that meeting.”
I smile. He wants to play. How cute.
I’m just not in the mood.
“I’ll see you at school, okay, Alex?”
I lean over and kiss him one more time, hard and fast, and his hands are everywhere they shouldn’t be, so I untangle myself.
“You need to be there soon yourself,” I warn him. “And don’t mess up my hair.”
And then I walk out the back door into the cold morning sunlight. A few snowflakes are falling from the sparse cloud cover, and I smile into the odd weather and put on my hat before walking through the back gate into the alley.
Alex Belrose is going to be all mine, one way or another.
I am sure of it.