Page 118 of The Scientist

“I said I’d let you know,” I countered. I learned a long time ago you can’t let these guys push you around or they’d walk all over you, especially if you’re a woman in the biz.

“Fine,” he huffed. “But next time, answer your fucking phone.”

I didn’t take his advice. I shut my phone off as soon as we hung up, not ready to face what was waiting for me.

Chapter 27

On Thursday morning, I had no choice but to go home. I was out of clean clothes, and I couldn’t stay holed up at my mom’s forever. I went home early that morning, still hoping to avoid my problems, but it seemed my problems were waiting for me on my doorstep… literally.

Lex was sitting on my porch, eyes closed, with his head leaned back against my front door. He looked terrible. He had deep, dark circles under his eyes, and the angles of his face seemed sharper, like he’d lost weight.

“Lex,” I breathed. His eyes snapped open, and my heart picked up speed as we stared at one another.God, I’d missed him. I couldn’t help it. There was still a huge part of me that was elated to see him, despite what had happened.

“What are you doing here?” I asked as he stood up, slowly taking me in. I probably looked just as shitty as he did.

“Seriously?” His tone was full of disbelief. “You won’t return any of my calls or texts, and you’ve been making up crazy excuses not to see me. You’re avoiding me and I want to know why.” His voice was thick with despair. “Just tell me what I did wrong, Hadley. I’m going fucking crazy here.”

I sighed. I guess it was time to face the music. I opened the door as he followed in behind me.

“You didn’t do anything wrong.” I decided I wasn’t going to blame or accuse him, but I was going to ask for an explanation before I told him it was over.

“Then what is it?” he demanded. “We go from seeing each other every single day to now not having heard from you in a week.”

“A week’s not that long,” I said pathetically.

“That’s bullshit and you know it. Tell me the truth.” He closed in on me.“Are you done with me?” he asked miserably, just inches from my face. “Is that it? If it is, then just say it. I can’t stand not knowing.”

“It’s my fault, really,” I mumbled. “I just thought—”

“You just thought what?” He put his hands on my shoulders, and I hated that my body responded so easily to his touch.

“I don’t know. I guess I thought we were on the same page.”

His eyebrows pinched together. “What do you mean?”

I took a deep breath. “I’m falling for you, Lex,” I admitted in a small voice, eyes lowered to the ground. “I’vebeenfalling for you. I know we’ve only been seeing each other for a month, but I haven’t dated anyone else since we got together. I guess it just hurt to find out you were seeing other people, and I had no idea.”

He was breathing heavily. “What the hell are you talking about? I haven’t been seeing anyone else.”

Hot, burning anger rolled through me, and I couldn’t take it anymore. I pulled out of his grasp.

“God, I’m such an idiot!” I said angrily, trying to keep the tears from spilling over. “Even now you seem so earnest. I can’t believe I fell for this. I never thought you were capable of it, but here you are, lying straight to my face.”

“I don’t understand,” he said helplessly. “What makes you think I’ve been seeing other people?”

“This!” I said, pulling out my phone and showing him the picture.

A thousand emotions flashed across his eyes in the span of a single second. His face contorted with rage. He snatched the phone out of my hand before turning and racing out the door.

“Where are you going?” I called after him.

“Nicky’s,” he said without looking back at me.

Well, that’s just great. I didn’t know why he needed my phone to do that, but I ran after him, intending to take it back. Heran up the steps of her porch, taking two at a time, and started pounding on the door.

She opened it, and her face split into a sultry grin that made me sick when she saw it was Lex standing there.

“You bitch,” he said so harshly that I almost stumbled back from the intensity. “Stuart was right about you all along. I defended you even after you said the shittiest things about Hadley, about me, about my relationship, but I let all of that go because you were never even important enough for me to care about. But I still never thought you could do something like this.”