Page 34 of The Lies We Told Ourselves

But I didn’t.

I held the woman who had captured my heart so thoroughly in my arms, and I counted myself a lucky man for Reece having found her way into my life.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

BOOKER

Istalked through the house in the worst mood I’d been in for days. I’d fucked things up so royally I was pretty sure there wasn’t a way back from this.

When there was a knock on the door, I threw it open, grabbed Dex by the shirt, and hauled him inside before slamming it closed. Even his little girlish squeak of surprise wasn’t enough to break through my mood.

“I fucked up,” I growled as I paced the living room again.

I’d been hiding out in the house and waiting for Dex to turn up since he texted me two hours ago to say he’d be stopping by.

From the look on his face, he knew this was serious.

Dex put the boxes he was carrying down on the couch and then, like he was trying to herd a wild animal, he approached me with his hands raised.

“There’s a good Booker,” he murmured. “Easy, boy.”

I reached out and slapped him upside the head, but the pacing at least stopped.

“Can you pretend you’re a grown-ass adult for like five minutes?”

“First, ow,” he said, rubbing his head and ruffling his wavy hair into an even bigger mess. “Second, what the hell is going on?”

I blinked in surprise at the annoyed tone of Dex’s voice. I’d never heard him snap at me like that before, which was kind of impressive when you considered that asshole was my go-to setting.

“I. Fucked. Up!” I stressed and then stalked over to my favorite chair and sank down, running my hands through my hair as I resisted the urge to tear it out.

Dex rounded the couch and slowly sat down, looking worried.

“Look, whatever happened, I’m sure it’s not that bad. Just tell me what’s going on, and we’ll figure it out.” Dex looked at me cautiously before adding, “You’re kind of freaking me out, man. I’ve never seen you like this before.”

I hadn’t considered until right now that getting help meant telling him what I’d done, and now that I was facing it down, I wasn’t so sure I could do it.

Dex pulled his cell phone out of his pocket as he watched me. “Maybe I should call Trace and Xander over here.”

“Absolutely not.” I snatched the phone out of his hand and shoved it in my pocket. “This is humiliating enough as it is.”

“Okay, humiliating is good.” I looked at him like he was insane, and then he added, “Humiliating seems less like you murdered someone, and I can work with that.”

I realized then how my meltdown looked from the outside and that I might be ever so slightly overreacting.

“I slept with Reece,” I blurted out.

“Ooooo-kay. And she was okay with that, right?”

“Are you actually asking me that?” I shouted, shocked that he’d ever go there.

Dex lurched back, quickly covering his head with his hands as he stared at me accusingly. “Don’t shout at me! I don’t know what’s going on right now!”

I sucked in a huge breath through my nose and then slowly blew it out. Christ, this was so fucked up.

“I did what you said. I had breakfast with Reece. It was nice. We talked, sort of. Then we argued about who was going to do the dishes. And then we had sex.”

Dex nodded thoughtfully. “I’m not seeing the problem here.” When he saw the look on my face, he winced. “Oh god, what did you do next?”

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