Sucker Punched (33 page)

He doesn’t know. Oh my god, he doesn’t know.

My heart manages to crack a little more. I didn’t think there was anything left to break.

I close my eyes, praying to God for a reset button. This is so not fair. But when I reopen them, nothing’s changed. Everything’s still fucked and broken.

I exhale a shuddering breath, suddenly exhausted. I’m done. With today, with Blake, with all of it. My voice is flat as I say, “I broke up with Hayden tonight. That’s the only reason I was with him.”

I didn’t think it was fair to break up with him over the phone. I wanted to do it in person. I wanted to give him a real explanation, even if it made me feel like an asshole and a cheater. I thought he deserved that much.

The color drains from Blake’s face as he glares at the floor. He runs a hand through his hair, the muscle in his jaw flitting as his nostrils flare.

“
Fuck!
” He picks up the bottle of Jack Daniels from the coffee table and throws it against the wall.

I flinch as it breaks apart, glass and whiskey flying. His eyes meet mine, and for a moment neither of us moves or speaks. His chest is heaving. His gaze tortured, apologetic. I know what he’s going to say before he even says it.

“Macy, please—”

I shake my head, stepping back every time he steps toward me. When he reaches out, I slap his hand away. “You don’t get to touch me anymore. You lost that privilege the moment you touched her.”

He looks like I just shot him. “I’m sorry. Macy, please. I’m so fucking sorry.”

He’s sorry? He shit all over my heart and he’s 
sorry
?

Well, then. That makes everything better.

I shake my head again, struggling to breathe through the tears. “That’s not enough this time.”

The crease between his brows deepens, like he’s finally getting what I’m saying. “We’re gonna get past this, right? Macy, tell me we’re gonna get past this.”

“How? How can I get past
watching
you fuck someone else, Blake? I can’t even fucking look at you right now because every time I do, I see her! And you know what hurts the most? It’s not that you fucked someone else—
again
—it’s that you did it while your semen is still inside me! God, I don’t even get a grace period before you’re between someone else’s legs?”

My throat hurts from screaming at him and I’m so mad I could punch him. The only thing stopping me is knowing that he’d let me. He’d let me beat the shit out of him right now if he thought it could fix things.

Blake swallows, looking genuinely scared. “For all I knew, you had someone else between
your
legs! I texted you twice before I called you. If you’d just texted me back and told me that’s what you were doing, none of this would’ve happened.”

“How could I have texted you back when I didn’t even know you’d texted me in the first place? I never saw the texts, never heard my phone go off until I felt it vibrating in line at the coffee shop. I’d barely said hello to Hayden at that point, so no, I couldn’t explain everything right then. But as soon as you hung up on me, I texted you. I
kept
texting you, all fucking night. But hey, thanks for trying to put this all on me.”

He rubs a hand over his face. “I’m not, I’m just panicking, okay?”

“No, it’s not okay.
None of this
is fucking okay.” I chuck his phone back at him and it bounces off the couch cushion he’s still shielding himself with. “And for your information, Hayden’s never even been between my legs.”

“What?” He slowly lowers the cushion, looking sicker than he did ten seconds ago, if that’s even possible. “You guys never. . .?”

I grit my teeth, shaking my head.

“Oh, God.” He drops the cushion, running his hands through his hair as he paces around the living room. “Why didn’t you tell me? I’ve been torturing myself for
weeks
now thinking about the two of you doing God knows what. It drove me fucking crazy thinking about him touching you, kissing you, and
now
you tell me that it was all for nothing?”

“It wasn’t any of your business!”

“
You
are my business!” He stabs the air, his scream ringing in my ears.

I shake my head, my vision blurring. “Not anymore I’m not.”

His voice softens as he steps closer. “There’s no excuse for what I did tonight, but Macy, please. . . I swear to God, I thought you went back to him. I
never
would’ve touched her otherwise. You have to believe me, Duchess.”

“The sad part is, I do.” I try to walk around him, but he won’t let me pass.

“Macy—”

“
No
. What’s done is done, Blake. It’s over. Now get out of my way so I can go pack.”

“You can’t leave. We can fix this.” The broken way he pleads with me absolutely slays me. As much as he’s hurt me, I don’t relish hurting him back. “Macy, please, let me fix it.”

Why isn’t he listening? It
can’t
be fixed. 

“Move!” I shout, trying to shove past him.

“No.” 

Sliding behind me, he wraps his arms around my waist, lifting me up. Shocked and pissed, I flail my legs, but instead of putting me down, we fall backwards, tumbling to the carpet. I try to scramble up, but he hooks his arm around my waist again, flipping me onto my back. Climbing on top of me, he pins my hands above my head. I buck and struggle against him, but it’s useless. 

“Get off!”

“Not until we fix this.”

“There’s nothing left to fix, Blake, you broke it beyond repair. Now get the fuck off me!”

He drops his head to the crook of my neck, burying his face in my skin. “I just lost my dad. I can’t lose you too, Duchess. Please. I know I don’t deserve you, but I’ll be better, okay? Don’t give up on me yet.”

My heart breaks at the pain bleeding through his words.

I feel for him, I do. But I can’t stay. I can’t pretend like everything’s okay. 

I’m not that good of an actress. And it’s not fair of him to ask me to take on that role.

Lacing his fingers in mine, he starts kissing my neck. There’s a sad, almost desperate urgency behind every one. “I didn’t know. I thought you picked him. I swear to God, I thought you picked him.”

My stomach churns as I think about where those lips have been tonight. I’m not sure if it’s psychosomatic or not, but I can smell her sickly sweet perfume all over him.

I think I’m going to be sick.

I turn my head as far away from him as I can, trying to get a breath of fresh air. “Please get off me,” I say through the tears. There’s no fight in me left. I’m too emotionally drained. 

Either he doesn’t hear me, or he doesn’t
want
to hear me. Squeezing my hands tighter, he presses his forehead to my shoulder, murmuring, “I’m sorry,” over and over again.

My tears come harder and faster as I mourn what was and what could have been. 

There’s a ringing in my ears from crying so much, so at first I think I’m imagining the dull pounding sounds. But when the front door gets kicked in and two cops come barging in with their guns drawn, I realize shit’s about to get very real.

Blake is immediately yanked off me, and as they’re trying to cuff him, he starts swinging.

“Oh my god,” I breathe when his fist connects with one of the officer’s faces. That drunk idiot just assaulted an officer.
And
he’s resisting arrest.

I climb to my feet faster than I thought possible, but they’ve already got him face-first against the wall with his hands cuffed behind his back. The officer that Blake decked is reading him his rights as the other officer pulls me aside.

Whatever he’s saying to me is going in one ear and out the other. All I can think about is how much trouble Blake just got himself into.

“I didn’t lay a fucking hand on her!” Blake shouts as the officer starts to haul him toward the busted front door. “Macy, tell them!”

Stunned, I watch Blake being led to the cop car waiting out front, its flashing lights casting blue and red glows on the crowd starting to gather. Mr. Frazier, our grumpy elderly neighbor, watches on in his bathrobe, shaking his head in disapproval when Blake’s loaded into the back of the police cruiser.

Our eyes lock through the glass, but his painful, pleading expression is too much for me to bear. I look away, but my eyes land on something even worse. 

The cop Blake punched is talking to the whore I kicked out. At some point someone gave her a blanket and she’s got it wrapped around her half-naked body as she points to me. The officer pauses writing in his notepad to glance in my direction.

I don’t know if she’s the one who called them or if it was one of the neighbors, but it doesn’t really matter. The end result’s the same. 

Blake’s being carted off to jail and I’m left holding the shattered pieces of a heart that I was stupid enough to give him, even though he told me time and time again
not
to.

“Ma’am?” My attention snaps back to the officer in front of me, who’s waving his pen in front of my face. In his other hand is a small notepad, just like the one his partner has. “We got a call about a domestic disturbance. Can you tell me what happened?”

Where do I even start?

“Whitmore. You’re free to go.”

I remove my arm from over my eyes at the sound of the guard’s voice. Sitting up, I climb off the tiny bunk bed, feeling like shit.

My head hurts, but the pain is nothing compared to how my heart feels. It’s like someone ripped it out, stuck it in a blender, and then poured my puréed heart back into my chest cavity before haphazardly sewing me up. And each godforsaken step that leads me out of this holding cell makes it slosh around, reminding me that I only have myself to blame.

I’m
the one who fucked up.
I’m
the one who ruined everything.

But hey, what else is new?

After signing some papers, I’m released into the lobby, where Declan’s waiting for me.

He shakes his head. “You were
living
with her? What the hell were you thinking? What could
possibly
make you think that would work out?”

It worked out for him and Savannah. Why couldn’t it work out for me?

Oh, that’s right—because I’m a worthless piece of shit.

“Where is she?” I ask, even though I have no right.

“She’s gone, man.”

My feet are suddenly moving me closer to him as I get up in his face. “
What?”
Deep down, I knew she wouldn’t stay after this, but I still wasn’t prepared to hear it.

She can’t be gone. She just
can’t
.

I push open the lobby door, making a beeline for his car.

I have to find Macy. I have to. . .I don’t know, beg for forgiveness. Grovel. Whatever it takes.

“Look,” Declan continues, “I don’t know all the details, but Savannah said she was a wreck. Whatever you did really fucked her up.”

His words gut me, making my chest ache as I stand in the middle of this godforsaken parking lot. I fucking
hate
myself right now. How could I do that to her? How could I hurt her like that?

What the fuck was I thinking?

“Where’d she go?”

Declan looks away, like. . .like he feels
sorry
for me.

“C’mon, man, just let it go,” he says, clapping me on the back.

I shove his hand off me, narrowing my eyes in outrage. “Let it go?
Let it go?
This isn’t some fucking game, Declan! There
is
no letting go for me, so tell me where the fuck she went!” My voice booms in the busy parking lot, but I don’t care. There isn’t a scene big enough that’d stop me from trying to get to Macy.

Declan looks momentarily shocked at my outburst, then shrugs. “I don’t know. And even if I did, I wouldn’t tell you. Respect her wishes and leave her be.”

He’s right. I know he’s right. I just don’t want to admit it.

“Fuckin’ Judas,” I mutter, pushing past him.

The twenty-minute car ride home is tense and silent. Declan knows I don’t want to hear it, so he keeps his trap shut. That is, until we pull into my driveway.

I’m halfway out of his car when he says, “Just give her some time. Let her cool—”