Page 100 of Forbidden Romeo
But I was in a vortex. The whirlpool had caught me and it was drawing me deeper and deeper down until I was standing in front of them, somehow holding his Economics book which had fallen.
“Is this for real?” I whispered. “Addison?”
The world around us fell away as conflicting emotions warred inside of me. There was an intense numbness surrounding what I knew would be the most painful experience ever. Like when you accidentally cut your finger and you see the gushing blood before you feel the pain. My nerve endings were having a hard time catching up to the moment.
Beside him, Addison tittered. “You didn’t actually think he loved you, did you?”
“I wasn’t asking you,” I snapped. Addison was a conniving bitch. Even though I’d witnessed it myself… I needed to hear it from him. Because I didn’t believe it. I didn’t believe what I’d just witnessed. Holden would never… could never… “Holden?” I croaked.
“I got what I needed,” he said.
The words skimmed over me. He got what he needed? What… what did that even mean?
“And he told me all of it,” Addison continued on his behalf. “Who do you think showed me those bloody sheets after your ‘scene’? I have to say, I’m impressed. I didn’t think a little virgin like you had that sort of kink in you… oh wait. We can’t call her the little Virgin anymore, can we baby?”
I watched, mesmerized as her long fingernails slid into his hair and she leaned in, tracing her nose up his jaw.
A jaw I had kissed more times than I could count.
Push her away, I thought. Push her away from you. Tell her you’re mine.
But he didn’t. Slowly, Holden’s whiskey gaze darkened and lifted to mine. “You’re telling me I can buy your fucking panties. Buy videos and pictures of you touching yourself. Treat you like a whore. Get drunk on stage with you and fuck you for the first time in front of hundreds of peers and strangers… and the thing that is the dealbreaker is a goddamn kiss from another woman?”
The air knocked from my lungs. His words were a sobering punch to the gut that left me speechless.
It didn’t matter that I had no response… because he kept right on talking. “You nearly murdered my best friend,” Holden said. “So maybe I can get away with fucking another girl or two, don’t you think? Isn’t that a fair trade?”
Tears filled my eyes as my worst fear was realized. He did blame me for Duncan’s accident. Not Addison. Not himself. Me.
And the worst part was, I wasn’t sure I could fault him for it. Because I blamed me, too. I didn’t realize how desperate I was for him to tell me it wasn’t my fault until this very moment.
Everything bad happening to me, I’d brought on myself.
I made the choice to sell my panties. I agreed to send videos and pictures to him. I got together with a man who told me time and time again how he would destroy me. And I didn’t listen.
I thought I was different.
But the truth was… I’m not different.
And I’m not special.
Plain little Kate Harris loses again…
And will always lose.
Today. Tomorrow. And until the end of time.
No one was looking out for me… but me.
A scream tore from my throat as I threw the heavy book at Holden and stripped the apron off from around my neck, tossing it aside.
Don’t trust a single fucking person. Maybe I should thank Holden for that lesson. Because little Kate Harris needed to toughen the fuck up.
This was rock bottom.
The only solace I had in this moment was the fact that no matter how awful things would get for me…
Nothing could be lower than this moment here.