Page 118 of My So-Called Perfect Life
“Open this door now, you coward. You asshole!”
Danielle. Speak of the devil.
It’s like my mind conjured her up for me.
What is she doing here?
And what is she mad about? Because she’s most definitely angry about something.
My pulse beats strong in my neck at the thought of seeing her, even angry. I’ve been longing to lay my eyes on her. To feel her body melt against mine in a hug. To hear her laughter. To see her smile. In person, not pictures.
I glance over my shoulder at Cara on the couch. She doesn’t seem to be the least bit fazed by the noise coming from outside.
“Ryan, you’d better open this door!”
Crossing the small room, I don’t hesitate to open the door in spite of my uncertainty of what’s awaiting me on the other side.
All that matters is that Danielle is here.
Her eyes blaze with flames, and her hands are clenched in fists. “You fucking liar!” she curses at me as soon as the door is open. “How could you do this to me?”
Whoa! The animosity rolls off of her strongly, gripping my heart in a vise.
“Do what to you?”
I don’t know what she’s upset about, but I know whatever it is, it’s big.
“You didn’t push me away because you wanted me to be sure thatIwanted this.” She pokes her finger into my chest, and I have a wave of déjà vu. “You did it, so you could go make sureyouwanted me. What’s the matter? Couldn’t decide if one pussy was enough for you, Mr. Fun?”
That’s a low blow.
She doesn’t mean it, Ryan. She’s upset about something and lashing out.
The urge to pick her up and shake some sense into her is hard to ignore. Where the hell is her mind? I can smell alcohol on her breath, so I’m guessing it isn’t off somewhere good. Amelia stands at the end of the stairs, looking disappointed, but she’s not looking at me. She’s looking at her sister.
“Danielle”—I try my hardest to keep my voice even—“I don’t know what’s going on. But I haven’t thought about sleeping with anyone other than you since the day I met you.”
She laughs, but it’s a snicker and full of disbelief. “How can you lie right to my face? I just watched you walk up here with a woman. I can’t believe you’d cheat on me. Well, I guess it isn’t cheating since you decided we needed time apart. Why wouldn’t you just break up with me? Why string me along?”
Holy shit!This doesn’t look good from Danielle’s perspective, but this isn’t at all what she thinks. I have a lot to explain and not too much time before this all goes south.
“Okay, you need to take a deep breath and give me a second to explain.” Grabbing her hand, I pull her inside and let her see for herself what is going on here. “Cara had too much to drink downstairs. She was ready to pass out, so I brought her up here. To sleep. See?”
Evan’s sister is curled up on the couch, passed the hell out.
Danielle sees her and then just stands still as a statue with her mouth opening and closing like a fish. “She was leaning her head on your shoulder, and you had your arm wrapped around her waist,” she says to me, but her focus is still on Cara on the couch.
“She’s pretty drunk,” I add. “She was having a hard time tonight and tossed back a few too many. I helped her up here.”
It’s as if she’s glued to that part of the floor because she hasn’t moved a bit since seeing Cara. “That makes sense.”
Coming behind her, I place my hands on her shoulders and pull her back into me, hoping to calm down her emotions. “What’s going on, Danielle?”
Her body loses its stiffness as she sighs, but her voice is still filled with a ton of fight. Her words start off low before getting higher and more forceful. “I don’t fucking know. I don’t know anything because I’m playing by your rules in a game I know nothing about.”
“What game?” I’m trying to follow, but I can tell she’s stressed, and her mind is in overdrive. Even a month away from her can’t diminish our connection, my understanding of her and how she thinks.
“This distance thing you want between us.”
