Page 138 of The Invitation

Jude puts me down, and I look up at him, scared to ask. “You paid our bill,” I whisper, remembering the waiter telling us. “It was you and her?”

His eyes close, his head dropping back, and my heart cracks that little bit more. “You have to let me explain.”

“Was I a bet?” I scream, sending myself back a few paces with the force, the anger making way for devastation. “Tell me the truth for once in your fucking life!”

He swallows, and maddening anguish contorts his face. “You were a bet,” he says quietly. Reluctantly.

My heart splits straight down the centre as I instinctively move away from him. He looks beaten. Broken. He has no fucking idea. “Why?” I breathe.

“Because he loves the thrill.” Katherine laughs. It’s like nails down a chalkboard. “The chase, the win, the buildup before he finally gives the woman what she’s begging for and then walks away from her.”

Jude flies around, savage. “Shut the fuck up, Katherine,” he hisses. “You’re fucking poison.”

“But great in bed, clearly,” she retorts, raising her glass.

I notice a smudge on Jude’s jawline. Red. It matches Katherine’s lipstick. I reach for it, and he flinches when I touch him, looking at me. “No,” he says, his eyes panicked.

“I’m so done.” I turn and walk out, trembling with the restraint I’m calling on not to fall apart. Cry. Scream. Hit myself for being so fucking stupid.

“Amelia!” Jude shouts, the pounding of his feet on the floor causing vibrations to travel up my legs. “Amelia, please, don’t leave.” I carry on, wobbly on my heels. “Let’s talk.”

“I have nothing to say.” I wrench open door after door, stalking through the corridors of Arlington Hall, Jude one step behind as he chases me.

“You’ve got to let me explain,” he pleads.

I take the stairs, holding the handle, very aware that he’s not physically stopping me from leaving. Because he knows he can’t.

I reach the bottom of the stairs and look into the Library Bar as I pass. I can see Rob’s plaything now. She’s blonde. Younger. The sick fucks.

Anouska walks in from outside, her face falling when she sees me doggedly marching toward her, a stressed Jude in pursuit.

“Did you know?” I ask her as I pass. Her face tells me everything. It’s all been a fucking lie.

I make it outside, finding the skies have opened, the rain coming down in sheets. I keep walking, enduring the pellets hitting me.

“Amelia, I’m begging you, hear me out,” Jude yells over the pounding rain, landing in front of me. I walk round him, my eyes set forward, refusing to look at him. “I was going to tell you.”

Every word he speaks shoves the knife into my heart that little bit more.

“I didn’t expect to like you so much.”

Like?

“It was a stupid bet that escalated.”

Keep walking. Close your ears.

“Come on, Amelia, where the hell are you going? It’s dark.”

Just keep walking. Get away.

“For fuck’s sake, Amelia, stop.”

I do, but not because he’s told me to. I swing around, raindrops flying off me with the force, and find Jude equally as soaked, his white shirt sticking to his chest.

“I came here to tell you I’d ...” I snap my mouth closed and try to think straight.

“What?”

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