Page 65 of Feels Like the First Time

Too empty to defend herself, Zoe just shrugged. “You’d know. You’ve never done anything to stop me.”

With that, she lifted her chin, wrapped the remnants of her pride around her like a cloak and stepped into the elevator. “Goodbye,” she murmured as the doors closed.

FIVE MINUTES AFTER he’d watched Zoe’s tearstained face disappear into the elevator, Dex flexed his sore fist as he stared down at Brad’s bruised one on the floor at his feet.

“That’s what I should have done ten years ago when you messed with Zoe the first time,” Dex stated as the jerk struggled back to his feet.“Dude, hitting me isn’t going to change the fact that you lost. You lost the girl.” Brad flexed his jaw from side to side and shrugged to show he didn’t care. But his fists clenched at his sides and he balanced on the balls of his feet in a way that told Dex he was biding his time. “You know, just like in school, once your usefulness was over, nobody gave a rat’s ass about you.”

Dex didn’t even bother using his fist this time. He shoved the idiot hard. Brad fell backward into a tall oak pedestal, sending a vase of autumn flowers crashing to the floor in wet, sloppy chaos.

Just great. His mother loved that damned vase. Breathing hard, Dex glared at the mess. He had to get out of here. Had to find a place to think, regroup. He pushed his way through the crowd.

“That looked like one of the moves from Class Warfare: The Takedown.”

Perfect. He had thought it couldn’t possibly get any worse. Dex hung his head as shame washed over him, and he turned to face his grandmother.

It only took a few words, some stern looks and a swat of the velvet case carrying her tarot cards to disperse the crowd.

“Sorry about the mess,” he muttered, kicking at the broken vase with the toe of his shoe. Then her words sank in. His head shot up and he gave her a quizzical look. “How would you know what the move was from? I didn’t think you even knew the name of my last game?”

“Don’t be a schmuck, Dexter,” Essie said, making a sweeping motion with her hand to indicate to the bellboy to come clean up the shards of pottery. Then she tucked her hand into Dex’s arm and, with strength he hadn’t realized she had, tugged him out the door. “Your father and I play all the time. Your mother tries, but bless her heart, she has no hand-eye coordination.”

Dex just stared. The words only added to the surreal nightmare quality of his afternoon.

Obviously sensing he didn’t want to talk about his mother’s gaming skills, his grandma sighed and patted his arm. “You and that other man were fighting over Zoe?”

“Not over her,” Dex clarified. “More like about her.”

It wasn’t like the winner got her as their prize. Or that she’d ever have anything to do with either of them again. That didn’t take away a single iota of the satisfaction Dex felt remembering Brad’s face after it’d encountered his fist.

It all spun in his head. Zoe had used him. She’d believed Brad. She really thought Dex had made up that obnoxious virgin moniker. After everything they’d had together, all they’d shared. Dex hadn’t realized he could hurt like this.

“She’s a sweet girl, but she didn’t seem the type to want anyone fighting over—or about—her.”

“She used me,” Dex muttered.

“Oh, Dexter,” his grandmother admonished in disgust. “Jump off the pity wagon already.”

Good God, not her, too. Too numb even to feel shock, he stared down at his lifelong champion. She rolled her eyes, then let go of his arm to take a seat on the garden bench.

“You have never in your life done a single thing against your will.”

He opened his mouth to rattle off his list, but before he could utter a syllable, she shook her head. “Don’t confuse people thinking they were using you with the actual thing. You have always seen through games. You’ve twisted them to your advantage if they interested you. Ignored them if they didn’t.”

“Maybe,” he admitted with a frown as he considered what her words really meant. Did that make him as big a jerk as he’d always considered the people using him?

“And this girl called you on it, didn’t she?”

“She called me things, all right,” he muttered under his breath. But his grandma’s words started to sink in. Dex hunched his shoulders against the cold and looked out over the golden fields of autumn grass.

He really was a schmuck. What had he had to lose by telling Zoe about Gandalf? Hiding behind anonymity was stupid. He’d known all along she wanted to talk to him. If he’d just let go of his need to be wanted for himself, his paranoia about being used, he could have settled it all a long time ago.

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