Page 119 of Lotus

My hands plant on his chest, shoving him backwards with alarming strength until he stumbles back against the wall, his face a mask of utter confusion. Oliver’s hand curls around my upper arm, pulling me away, and everyone is staring at me. Gabe is pissed, hurt, breathing heavily, wondering what the hell just happened.

No, no, no.

“You,” I mutter, a tiny croak of betrayal.

Gabe just gapes at me, head shaking. “What the fuck, Syd?”

“Sydney, what’s wrong? What happened?”

Oliver tries to steal my focus, but all I can focus on is the fact that my best friend attacked me.

A sob breaks free as my knees go weak. Oliver catches me before I collapse, and I cry out, my heart smashed into tiny splinters: “It was you.”

T W E N T Y – S E V E N

GABE PULLS HIMSELF UPRIGHT FROM THE WALL,eyes wide and indignant, brimming with absolute bewilderment. “Care to explain what in thegoddamn fuckis going on?” he bites out, arms raised at his sides. Travis steps forward, a scowl thrown in my direction.

Oliver keeps me from tipping over, one hand on my shoulder and the other squeezing my hip as the tears fall hard. I stare at Gabe, dumbfounded. “It was you,” I accuse, each word slicing him harder than the last, stabbing him with razor sharp fury. “Y-You were therethat night.”

Stab.

“You werethere.”

Slice.

“You attacked me.”

Kill.

Gabe nearly crumbles where he stands, nostrils flaring, face flushed, lips parted as a gasp of disbelief breaks through and carries over to me. The look in his eyes is horror, purehorror, as if he can’t even process what I’m saying. “Are you kidding?” He half-whispers the words, too heartbroken to say them any louder.

I’m still buckling and shaking, my back pressed against Oliver’s chest as he holds me tighter.

The look on Gabe’s face.

That look will haunt me forever.

God, no, it can’t be true. He’s gutted—paralyzedwith incredulity.

Oliver attempts to be a mediator, muttering neutralizing words near my ear. “Perhaps we should discuss this rationally. There must be some sort of misunderstanding.”

“Misunderstanding?” Gabe repeats scathingly, wounds still bleeding out at our feet. Travis presses a palm to his son’s shoulder, loyalty lines drawn. “My best friend just branded me a fucking monster in my own house, in front of my family, on Christmas Day.”

The same knife I used on him twists within my own gut. Averting my eyes, I rasp, “Where were you, Gabe?”I can’t look at him, I can’t look at him, I can’t look at him.“Oliver heard me screaming. Where were you?”

Licking the tears from my lips, I finally spare him a glance.

Gabe’s tongue presses against his cheek, his gaze beyond wounded. “I can’t believe I even need to defend myself right now,” he hisses, head shaking side to side. “But I was listening to music with my earbuds in, as I do every fucking night, as youalready know.”

I flinch back.

“And how do you know that, Syd?” he continues, stalking forward ever so slowly, balled-up fists at his sides. “Maybe it’s because we’ve been best friends for two goddamn decades and youknowI listen to music every night, just like youknowhow I take my coffee, and youknowmy favorite beer, and youknowmy first car, my shoe size, my ridiculous fear of monkeys, and that I despise ranch dressing almost as much as I despise country music.”

The bile lodged in my throat almost chokes me, and I drag my fingernails through my hair, lowering my chin, confusion tearing me in half. What have I done?

What the hell was I thinking?

“And I’d like to think that someone who doesn’t know me even afractionas much as you do, would know with one-hundred percent fucking certainty, that I would never,ever, break into my best friend’s house, terrify her, and physicallyattackher.”

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