Page 20 of Breaking Matt
All had been going well and despite only meeting Taylor for the first time, I kept having the feeling that I knew her from somewhere. For most of the lunch I was trying to figure out why her name sounded so familiar. It was only later when we were finished eating when I had finally placed where I knew her from.
"Weren't you the girl who was kidnapped?" I blurted out. Matthew straightened up beside me and touched my hand with his. Taylor looked at me, a little shocked by my sudden question. Sin wrapped a protective arm around her.
They all looked at one another for a moment. The look on her face confirmed I was right.
"I thought I recognized you from somewhere," I added. It had been all over the news and at the time it had made my father even more nervous about my safety. I don't know if he had been scared more by the fact that we were the same age or by the fact that it had been local.
"My father is the district attorney and he'd been looking at the case before the guy had confessed," I explained further. He'd just gotten promoted when it had happened. My father wasn't allowed to discuss ongoing cases with me, but after the guy had confessed, he had told me about it.
There was an awkward silence.
"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to upset you," I said apologetically. I tended to say things without thinking.
"It's okay," she said, trying to give me a warm smile. This time it never reached her eyes.
Sin and Matthew shared a look and I had a feeling something more was going on that I didn't know about as I looked around the table.
"It must have been awful," I said, trying to remember all the details of it. I'd read she'd been taken from the scene of an accident.
"It was," she said softly. "But all that matters is that he's locked up."
"I don't think this is something Taylor wants to talk about," Matthew said, making me feel bad I'd brought it up.
So I let it go and Matthew steered the conversation to safer subjects.
Later, when we got back to my place, my inability to remember all the details of what had happened to Taylor had left me curious. I checked the story out on my laptop after Matthew had left. I googled her name and I found the article I was looking for. I read it and the missing parts began to fall into place.
There had been someone in the car with her at the time of the accident. Her bodyguard had been knocked unconscious when she'd been taken. The moment my eyes read over the name of person, it felt like I couldn't breathe. It felt like my heart had splattered onto the floor.
Matthew Weiss. He was a bodyguard.
Chapter Six
Later that day
"Is it true?" I asked, pinning him with a glare. I crossed my arms as I waited for his answer.
His eyes held mine. I saw the truth in his eyes; I didn't need words to confirm it.
"Yes."
Shocked and hurt, I spun around, unable to look at him while I dealt with the betrayal.
I could feel his eyes on me as I stood with my back to him. The feelings I'd had for him had been ripped from my chest, and now all that was left was the hollow pain. Most girls would cry and mope around eating junk food while trying to mend their broken hearts. I wasn't like that—none of that was going to ease the hurt I was experiencing. The only thing that was going to make me feel better was to make him experience the same pain. Glancing over my shoulder, I saw his eyes fixed on me.
Revenge was the only way. I needed payback.
"Sarah."
His voice reached inside me somewhere I kept my hurt, and the pain intensified. I turned and looked back to face the scenery outside of my window, and then closed my eyes for a moment as I tried to keep the pain from bubbling over to the outside for him to see. It took me a few moments to push it down again. No words were going to heal the crack in my heart. It was like trying to close up a wound down to the bone with a Band-Aid. It wouldn't heal. It would fester.
The only way to heal the wound was to keep it fully protected from being injured again. Building a wall around my broken heart was the only way to protect it from further damage.
I had to hold on to the anger that flared up inside of me at the thought of his betrayal. Anger simmered below the surface, and I hid my broken heart as I turned to face him. I surveyed him, trying to pretend my damaged heart didn't race at the sight of him or experience that weird feeling inside my stomach that felt like a flutter.
Our eyes met and I felt my heart break a little more. Before, the sight of him would have lifted me to the clouds where I'd float around, intoxicated with him, but now the sight of him turned my stomach and I felt physically ill. His deep green eyes pierced mine and I was reminded of his lies. I lifted my chin in determination as I walked to him.
"I can explain," he argued. His eyes pleaded with me but I kept the wall around my heart up to keep him from getting to the most vulnerable part of me. He'd lied to me. It didn't matter why. The pain wouldn't allow me to listen to any explanation he had.
