Total pages in book: 184
Estimated words: 186756 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 934(@200wpm)___ 747(@250wpm)___ 623(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 186756 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 934(@200wpm)___ 747(@250wpm)___ 623(@300wpm)
So I’m not going to lose it now.
Not over some slip of a girl I couldn’t get out of my head for the past year.
A girl who’s been lying for the past year.
That’s what she’s been doing, isn’t it?
She’s been lying.
She’s been fucking torturing me for the past year. She’s been playing with me, with my control. With my fucking emotions that I chose to bury and bury deep so I could keep it together.
Except when it comes to her.
When it comes to her, I can’t keep it together.
I can’t. Fucking. Keep it together.
One year.
One whole year of seeing them together, of her walking around on his arm, of her laughing with him, dancing with him, fucking looking at him like he’s the only thing she sees.
One whole goddamn year of this jealousy.
This burning in my gut, this restlessness.
I don’t know what’s worse. That a teenage girl, a girl younger than my sister, my boss’s daughter, a girl my twin brother is in love with, can make me feel things. Or she could do it to this extent that I couldn’t tell what was real or not.
I don’t know what’s worse: trying to hold on to my control or burning this whole world down like I want to.
Maybe if I give in to my urges, once, just once, it wouldn’t be so bad. Maybe if I explode and break everything in this room, if I break my twin’s face, I could calm down.
But no.
I’m not hurting my brother. I’m not going to turn into my father.
But I will end this.
I will fucking end this.
I will forget about her. I will push her out of my head, out of my life. And I know how to do that. If I can’t give in to this fire within me, then I’ll give in to her.
I know she’s the love of my twin brother’s life, but she’ll be mine first before I’ll let her go to him. She’ll be mine first to play with, to toy with. Mine to torture and to twist in pretty little knots before I’ll let her be anyone else’s.
With that thought, my fingers slip from around my phone but instead of throwing it against the wall, I set it on the nightstand and pick up my book. I read the same line over and over until exhaustion claims me and I pass out.
Chapter 9
The Next Night…
He’s bluffing.
He has to be.
He’s just messing with me. There’s no other explanation.
And I’ve tried to find one too.
All day today, during classes and rehearsal, I’ve tried to find an explanation as to why he’d be doing this. I think it’s because he’s angry at what I did. He’s angry that I lied to him and all of the world. And since he is mad, he’s trying to scare me.
Right?
Because the alternative is that he’s blackmailing me. For real.
And oh my God, I cannot believe that.
I cannot believe that I’m getting blackmailed. By someone like him.
By someone who everyone thinks is such a good guy. And yes, I have had my doubts about his goodness, but even so, I never expected him to stoop to this level.
Well, maybe you pushed him there…
Like you pushed Shepard to give you an ultimatum.
God.
How is this my life?
How in only a matter of two weeks, one twin gives me an ultimatum and the other blackmails me? And maybe if he was only hurting me, I could bear it—somehow—but I’m not the only one at stake here, Shepard is too and I…
I don’t know what to do.
I absolutely do not know what to do about it.
Okay, you know what, I know what to do. At least right this moment. I’ll figure the rest out later but for now, I need to stop thinking about him and focus on my boyfriend.
My would-be boyfriend.
If I earn his forgiveness.
So I pick up my phone and fire off a series of texts to him.
Isadora
I’m wearing a nightie.
It has cherries on it.
And lace.
I’m sitting on the bed like last night and the windows are open and the curtains are billowing. It’s all the same as yesterday, except I’m a lot more nervous and as the last whoosh fades, I think that was so out of the blue. All my texts sounded so random and context-less.
God, I’m an idiot.
This was supposed to be the perfect plan. But in my nervousness, I botched it up.
I pick up my phone again, ready to explain to him what I just did, when his text comes in.
Shepard
What color?
My heart bangs in my chest then as I reply.
Isadora
Pink.
Shepard
Are the cherries pink or the nightie?
I look down at my nightie as if I don’t remember what I’m wearing.
As if I didn’t deliberately wear it in the first place.
Isadora
The nightie.
Shepard
What color are the cherries?
Again, my heart races and races in my chest as I type out my response.