Page 220 of Boys Who Taint

“But you couldn’t even look at me. And then Mavis died. I felt so guilty. I knew you’d hate me. Everyone called me murderer, and they were right. I’m the reason she’s dead.” His face contorts. “I had nothing left. Nothing except your hatred, so I made it mine.” He pauses briefly to suck in a breath. “But then Grey stole you away. Do you know how jealous it made me to see you with him? You have no idea how much I yearned to have what he had. The way you kissed him right in front of me drove me insane. And hekept interfering, kept making things worse, and then I found out he was actually there that night, taping us. Fuck!” He pinches his fingers together. “I was so fucking close to making you hate me to death. And then it all fell apart.”

This is the reason.

This is why he wanted to stop Grey from showing me that video.

Because if I knew the truth about Mavis’s death, I’d stop hating him and let that part of my heart I thought died long ago live again.

Destroying me from the inside out.

Levi

The truth hurts far worsethan a thousand knives ever could.

God. The way she’s looking at me is eating me alive.

Why won’t it ever stop?

“Why didn’t you tell me?” She shakes her head. “I tried to talk to you.”

My heart hurts. “My own parents said I could never speak to you again.”

“Why? Why would they do that?”

“Don’t you understand? Your parents would’ve killed me if I got anywhere near you. They couldn’t lose me.” Her eyes connect with mine. “Youcouldn’t lose metoo.”

Her brows draw together as tears begin to form in her eyes, and I wish I could go over there and brush them away, but I know she’d never let me.

Not after the things I’ve done.

I lower my gaze to the ground. “Somewhere deep down … I believed I deserved it. Her death was my fault. We were friends, Aspen. And I killed your heart.”

She shakes her head.

“I killed you along with her.”

“No. I’m still here.”

“Because I made you hate me!” I roar.

The meaning of my words takes a few seconds to settle in with her, but when it finally lands, her face grows grim. All the freckles in the world couldn’t light up her face after the damage I’ve done.

“All those awful comments, and all those times you ignored me—”

“Hurt you,” I interject. “And it hurt me just as much. But I couldn’t let you see.”

I destroyed everything.

Even the only girl who ever truly cared.

Her lips shudder. “You needed me to hate you … so I could let you die.”

The rain pitter-patters down on my face, droplets rolling down my lips, and the scorpion tattoo still hidden beneath my hoodie.I’m not the butterfly she is. I’m nothing but a venomous insect that kills everything in its path.

I belong there in the watery depths below, and she … God, she would’ve been better off not knowing the truth.

I pull my hoodie farther down so she doesn’t have to look at me. I take out my contacts, letting go of everything that made me her Ghost.

“How could I live in a world where I could no longer touch you? How could I live in a world where the only girl I ever wanted got destroyed by my hands?”

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