Page 66 of The Revenge Plan (Forbidden Descendants 1)

“Oh! Right. That makes sense.” As we sat together and took turns piling our plates, she added, “Yeah, I did notice you didn’t stock a lot of junk food around here.”

Busy trying not to think about how homey and natural it felt to share a meal with her, I glanced her way. “I try to keep my calorie intake down during the—”

“The season,” she finished for me, nodding thoughtfully as she watched me. “And you run and work out extra, outside practice too.”

I frowned. “How did you know—”

“I have my sources,” she cut in, still studying me with that critical squint. “So, you do all this extra work for football, making sure you’re in prime physical condition to play, putting in more effort than probably most of the other players on the team, watching what you eat, and yet…when you get cut from a game, you just…meh, shrug it off.”

My heart began to beat a little faster when I met her gaze. It felt as if I was about to be caught in a trap that revealed all my deepest, darkest secrets, and yet, rationally I had no idea how realizing any of that about me was even a big deal in the first place.

So I asked, “Was there a question in there somewhere?”

She shook her head, but said, “Yeah. Why did you totally downplay how upset you were about not being in that game last night?”

“What did you want me to do? Throw myself on the ground and beat my fists against the floor as I screamed about how unfair life was?”

“It would’ve made sense if you had,” she said. “Did we even win last night?”

“Of course we won.”

To which Haven lifted her hand in my direction and said, “See. There. You don’t even seem upset that they did just fine without you. I totally would’ve been secretly cheering for them to lose if I had been you. It’s like, my God, do you not have a single petty, passive-aggressive bone in your body?”

“Well,” I said slowly, surprised by the question, because to me, I always felt like I was battling petty thoughts. “I did think we would’ve won by more if I’d been there. And…” I lifted a finger before wincing. “I very much enjoyed the fact that Nicholl threw more interceptions last night than he ever had before.”

Haven lifted her eyebrows. “Did he?” Snorting, she covered her mouth. “He’s probably in a shitty mood today.” When she dropped her hand, a grin spread across her face. “Sweet.”

I sat back in my seat and no

dded my complete agreement. “Oh, yeah.”

“Alright,” she answered on a decisive nod. “I’m satisfied. You have just enough vindictive, petty outrage in you to prove you’re human after all.”

“Was that in question?” I had to ask as I tore off a piece of toast and popped it into my mouth.

She shrugged. “A bit.” Then she winked at me, smiling mischievously. “You were coming off a little too perfect there for a while.”

I choked on the toast I’d just swallowed. But what? Too perfect? Me?

Pounding on my chest with a fist, I coughed my food the rest of the way down, my eyes stinging with tears as I rasped, “You’re joking, right? In what universe am I even close to perfect?”

“You gotta admit,” she started, sounding reasonable. “These past few days, you’ve been a bit too unreal.”

“Unreal? How so?” I asked, feeling incredulously confused.

“Well, to begin with, the very moment I needed someone to offer me help when I was trying to escape Topher, bam, there you were.”

I pulled back, frowning. “That was just a coincidence.”

“A freaky coincidence,” she agreed. “But it wasn’t a coincidence that you chased him away for me or that you helped me get out of that building. It was in no way coincidental that you stayed up with me that night while my brain raced or you held me to calm me down so I could get through the night. Or that you got up while I slept in order to make my bed for me and then tuck me into it. Or that you stayed around when I had a freak-out moment Thursday night, or how you offered to contact your sister so I could get checked out Friday morning, or that you totally downplayed how upset you were about missing your game last night. And now…now you make me breakfast.”

“Okay,” I said slowly, frowning a bit when she stared at me expectantly after listing all that shit off. “Was there a question in there somewhere?”

“No,” she said. “Not at all. It all just made you look too nice, like suspiciously nice. Like ulterior motive nice. You went above and beyond what any roommate would do. Heck, you probably even exceeded best friend status in the helpful department, and yet you have no vested interest in me, nothing to gain from all this niceness. No secret agenda that I could see. No—wait.” Her eyes suddenly narrowed. “Do you have a secret agenda?”

I pulled back, shocked by the incredibly direct question. “A secret agenda?” I repeated dumbly before shaking my head back and forth. “No.”

But I must’ve looked guilty because she did that whole dissecting-squint thing she did that seemed to see deeper inside me. “So, you don’t want anything in return for all the amazing things you’ve done?”

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