Page 35 of Resisted

The doorknob was cool against my palm as I turned it, the sound of the metal loud and echoing as it scraped right before I pulled the door open. It squeaked, the hinges needing oiling, and I made a mental note to do that tomorrow. The sound of their laughter was louder with the door open, hiding my footsteps as I walked down the hall.

I didn’t know why I was so nervous. This was my damn house. My space. My home. Only with her in it, it felt like more than that. I felt displaced, like an outcast within my pack, and not because they’d forced me to feel that way, but because I’d forced myself. The fact that they questioned me, knew me well enough to know that something wasn’t right, only made it worse. With each second that ticked by that I wasn’t honest, the more their suspicion grew, the more I let dishonesty wedge its way between us and tear us apart.

I stopped in the shadows of the doorway, knowing damn well they wouldn’t see me. Only the moment I stopped, her eyes came up and found my own. She didn’t speak, didn’t let on to the others that she knew I was there, didn’t give away that I was lurking in the dark and watching them.

She licked her lip, and my body tightened, then she cleared her throat. “Well, what’s it going to be, Vincent?”

“Vince,” he said on a growl, and I just wasn’t sure why he even bothered. He’d been trying to get her to call him Vince since she was a pup, but she was stubborn and her mind was set. “Dare.”

My eyes widened. Truth or dare? What had I missed up to this point? What secrets had been exposed? She reached for a plate in the middle of the table, snagging a fry off of it and popping it into her mouth before she slowly chewed it. All eyes were on her mouth. I felt the heat level rise in the room, and I knew what we all were thinking.

“I dare you to eat fries with mayonnaise.” She raised a single brow at him, her dare issued.

Vince groaned. “Don’t, Bella. Come on, that’s disgusting and you know it.”

“Then you should have picked truth.” She got up from the table, and all eyes followed her as she went to the cabinet to get a bowl, then to the fridge to get the mayonnaise. Was she intentionally putting an extra sway in her hips? She scooped the mayonnaise into the bowl, put it back in the fridge, then carried it back to the table, where she sat it in front of Vince. “Eat up, big guy.”

For added impact, she patted him on his back before finding her seat again. He glared at the bowl like it was filled with poison. “I don’t understand.”

“You don’t understand what?” she asked.

“How a pretty girl like you could put such foul things in her mouth.” He reached for his drink and downed it as she sat there, eyes wide.

“I’ve put fouler things than this in my mouth,” she said with a smirk as Vince choked on his drink.

“Bella.” His voice was a warning, though I wasn’t sure which way the warning fell. He took another drink, then a deep breath before he reached for a fry and dunked it into the creamy, gelatinous mass in the bowl. I had to side with him. Mayo and fries sounded absolutely disgusting. He brought the fry to his nose and sniffed before gagging. “You can’t be serious, baby. This is rancid.”

“You picked it. Open wide, Vincent.” She smiled then, her grin hinting that she was absolutely loving this form of torture.

“If this shoots back out, you’re on cleanup duty, baby.” He stared her down, waiting for a response.

“All right, I’ll clean up, wimp.” She leaned back in her chair, challenging him.

“Never in my life have I been called a wimp. I could crush you with my bare hands, kid,” he threatened right before he sniffed the offending food again.

Then he shoved it into his mouth, his face giving away his thoughts before he could verbalize them. He chewed slowly. Each chomp down was calculated and slow, almost torturous. When he swallowed, the sound echoed through the silent room. But he didn’t speak. He just stared.

“Well?” she prompted.

“You, baby, are completely, absolutely, fucking repulsive. How can you put that shit in your mouth? That’s foul.”

“You must have got a bad bite then. Maybe it was the fries.” She leaned back, crossing her arms, daring him to challenger her. “You should try again.”

“The whole concoction was a bad bite,” Vincent spat before grabbing the bottle of alcohol and pouring himself a shot and downing it. “It’s your turn.”

Her eyes flicked up to me again before landing back to Vince and Boyce. “What did I pick last time?”

Boyce reached for a fry, sans mayonnaise. “You picked dare.”

I wondered what exactly the dare had been, but I knew it was my damn fault I hadn’t been here to see it. I only hoped it was as harmless as mayonnaise on a French fry. If Vince had issued the dare, I knew it wouldn’t have been bad. But Boyce? I felt like he was a wild card. He was still too young to fully process all the consequences.

“Truth.”

I let out a breath I hadn’t realized I’d been holding. Truth. From my past experience, truth was such a safe option. Nothing too bad could come from it, minus some embarrassment on the admitter’s part. I leaned my body against the doorframe, ready to see what embarrassing admission she would have to blurt out.

Vince drummed his fingers on the table as he thought. “Age of first kiss?”

Okay, not information I wanted to know, but not that terrible.

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