Page 96 of Wickedly Betrayed

I’ve never been scared of Mac, and I’m not now, but if I were the type of person to cower in the face of pure outrage, then I would be scared shitless of him. Never have I seen such fury on a person’s face.

“Mac.” I hesitantly raise my hand to his face, but he knocks it away, shocking me.

“You tell me right fucking now, Mia, that I heard you wrong,” he snarls at me. “You tell me that you didn’t let that fucker touch you. That you didn’t let that bastard put his hands on you.”

I say nothing because I can’t tell him that. As much as I want to, I can’t tell him what he wants to hear. It hurts to see him like this. It hurts knowing I put that tortured look on his face.

When I say nothing and just look at him with resolve in my eyes, he jackknifes off the bed with a curse.

“Fuck!” He grabs his jeans off the floor and jerkily brings them up his legs before stalking off to the bathroom, closing the door none too gently.

I roll to my side and curl into a ball, upset that he’s acting the way he is. I don’t really blame him, but it still bothers me that he threw off my touch. I’ll give him a few minutes to cool down before I go to him. Unfortunately, I haven’t told him the whole story yet. The part that he’s going to hate the most. Nevertheless, he needs to know the whole truth.

I get up off the bed and snag one of Mac’s t-shirts out of his dresser. Walking across the floor on bare feet, I stand in front of the door for a minute before knocking softly. When I don’t hear a reply, I slowly open the door and slip inside.

Mac has his back to me. He’s leaning over with his hands onthe basin, his shoulders hunched. I don’t know if he didn’t hear me enter because he’s so deep in thought, or if he’s ignoring me.

I walk up to him and lay my hand on the center of his back. His muscles tense, but he doesn’t move or try to push me away. I take that as a good sign and put my arms around his stomach. His muscles there ripple as I touch them. His head is down, but I hear him take in a deep breath when I rest my head on his back.

We stand like that for several moments before he takes my hands and pulls them from his stomach. At first, I think he’s pulling away from me again and my heart plummets, but then he turns around and leans back against the counter, pulling me in between his legs.

I look up at him. The anger is still there, but not as harsh. Now there’s also resolve and bitterness.

Oh, Mac. I’m so sorry for what I’m about to say.

“There’s more I need to tell you,” I tell him quietly.

His arms tighten around me when he says harshly, “Fuck that, Mia. What more could there be? I don’t need to hear the dirty details.”

His words hurt and piss me off at the same time. I understand him not wanting the details. Hell, when he told me what happened between him and Tessa, it took everything I had not to go into a rant and destroy shit. However, he doesn’t need to be an asshole. I shut my mouth when he spoke. He can do the same for me. As with his determination for me to listen, my determination is just as strong. This is something he needs to hear.

“Mac, I understand where you’re coming from. What I need to tell you isn’t what you think. Do you really think I want to relive it? I feel nothing but shame for that night. You need to listen to what I have to say. It’s important.”

“Shit!” he says loudly, and tilts his head back, taking in a few deep breaths. Once he’s composed himself, he looks back down at me and says, “Okay.”

Gathering every bit of courage I have, I start talking.

“After I saw you that night in bed with Tessa, I took offdownstairs. I stopped just long enough to grab two cups off the counter in the kitchen. I didn’t know what was inside the cups. I just knew that I wanted something to numb the pain. The pain I felt was so suffocating that I thought I was going to drown. I literally couldn’t breathe. It was unlike anything I had ever felt before. I downed the two drinks and collapsed on the ground.

“The longer I sat on the ground gasping for breath, the pain was slowly becoming overshadowed by rage. The pain was still there, but the hatred I felt helped. I was so pissed at you. I kept thinking to myself, ‘How in the hell could you do that to me?’ How could you give something to Tessa that was so precious and was supposed to be mine?”

I stop for a minute and look down at my hands on his chest, the pain I felt that night coming back full force. I push it down, making myself continue.

“I don’t know how long I sat there. I was feeling the effects of the alcohol so it could have been hours or just minutes. Either way, I came to a decision. I decided that if you didn’t care who you gave yourself to then why should I care about my own virginity? When I stood up to leave, my opportunity came sooner than I thought. There was Shady, leaning against one of the light posts, smoking a cigarette and watching me.”

Mac’s hands clench at my sides when I mention Shady’s name, but I ignore it, needing to get to the end.

“He came toward me and started talking. I could tell he was drunk. He was being sweet and considerate. I knew what his game plan was, but as it turned out, I was going to use him as much as he wanted to use me.

“To skip useless information, Shady took me to his truck.”

“Stop!” Mac demands, and puts his forehead against mine, eyes shut tightly.

“No, Mac. I need to finish. He’s a part of this. You need to know what happened that night, just like I needed the truth as well.”

I pull my head back from him and take a step back, not wanting to touch him when I tell him the rest. He gives me myspace and puts his hands on the counter on either side of his hips.

“When we made it to Shady’s truck, doubt started plaguing me, but I ignored it. I was hoping that if I let Shady do whatever he wanted with me, it would help with the pain. My brain kept shouting at me to stop, that I was making a mistake. While we were in his truck, we started kissing. I hated every minute of it. It just didn’t feel right. Up to that point, I had never kissed another guy, except you.

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