Page 322 of Forbidden Billionaires: Vol 4
“I swear, Brooklyn.”
“I saw the way she touched you. How comfortable she was on your bed…”
“She’s been spending time with me because she can.” He ran his fingers through his wet hair. “But I haven’t slept with her. I haven’t even kissed her. She’s just stolen all my freaking time. Time that I’m very aware that I’m not getting back. Time I’d rather be spending with you.”
“Why should I believe anything you say?”
“I wouldn’t lie to you.”
I laughed. “You said you’d come back for me on Saturday night. I sat in your closet for fifteen minutes. All you do is lie to me, Matt.”
“And I’m sorry…”
“If you’re really sorry, tell me what she has on you.”
He pressed his lips together. “I can’t.”
I shook my head. “All that time you feel like you’ve wasted with Isabella? That’s how I feel about you. I’m done, Matt. I’m done wasting time on you.” This time he let me slide off the vanity. But I didn’t get far because he grabbed my wrist.
“I’m having someone follow her. That’s what all those pictures were. It’s just surveillance, but my guy hasn’t found anything.”
“So you’re trying to blackmail her back? That’s your solution?”
“It’s the only solution.”
I pulled my wrist out of his grip. “Fighting fire with fire is never the solution.”
“It is in this case.”
I stared at him. If Isabella really was blackmailing him, it would explain why he didn’t talk to me at lunch or in the halls. Just in class where we were assigned a project together. And even then he never came to my defense against Charlotte.Charlotte.“What about Charlotte?”
“What about her?”
“Are you sleeping with her too?”
“God no. I’m not sleeping with either of them. I swear.”
I wanted to believe him. But I was pretty sure lies fell from his lips more often than the truth.
“I have to be careful around all of Isabella’s minions because they’ll report back to her,” he said. “Even just a friendly hello in the hall and Isabella will lose it. And I can’t let this thing come out. I can’t.”
“So you’re trying to tell me that Isabella asked you not to talk to me as part of the blackmail? Why?”
“Apparently she doesn’t like the way you looked over at our lunch table on the first day of school.”
God, I had been trying to break that habit. I knew it would get me in trouble.
“And she figured out that I like you. She’s trying to make my life hell. The only way I can see you at all is thanks to this group being randomly assigned.” He put “randomly” in air quotes.
“Itwasrandomly assigned. Why are you using air quotes?”
“Everything in Mr. Hill’s class can be bought for the right price.”
“How much did you pay him to put me in your group?”
“Does it matter?”
“Of course it matters.”
