Page 114 of I Promise You
“By the way, Meredith is here. You’re fucked, my dude,” Lopez whispers while trying to suppress his laugh. His dimples appear as he steps away from me.
I look up, and sure enough, she’s standing at the door. She’s murdering me with her eyes.
Shit. I didn’t want to hurt Meredith like this.
“Meredith,” I call out for her. I throw the napkin at Lopez and run past a quiet Daegan who hasn’t spoken since he saw Danny and me fight. He has his mask curled up just enough to expose his mouth and he inhales a cigarette in the corner of the porch, shaking his head.
Mother fucker never takes off his mask entirely, does he?
Creature catches me looking at him and blows smoke into the air.
“If I were Grim, I would have pulled out your teeth one by one so you could never bite again,” he tells me, his devilish grin on display, as he puts out his cigarette underneath his shoe.
Psycho.
“Whatever.” I scoff before chasing after a pissed-off Meredith. She’s taken off already, stomping away. Her heels click on the floor with each step.
“Meredith, stop.”
She keeps going, walking fast until we’re outside.
Coming to the ball separately is working out in her favor and the guilt eats me alive each time she ignores my pleads.
We’re in front of her car, and she scrambles for her keys. She lifts them from her purse, but they drop to the floor.
I grab her keys off the ground, holding them hostage, taking a step back. She leaps forward, trying to whisk them back out of my hands, but misses them completely.
“Give me my keys,” she orders me through watery eyes.
“No. I want to talk.”
“What’s there to talk about, Kane? I saw everything clear as day.”
“You shouldn’t have seen that, and I’m a fucking dick for doing this to you. I’m sorry.”
“Sorry for what, exactly? Are you sorry for kissing your best friend’s girlfriend? Or are you sorry for using me to get to Ari? Which one are you exactly sorry about?”
I don’t know what to say. I’m quiet. My nose throbs with pain. My back fucking hurts, and I’m choosing my next words carefully.
“I didn’t use you to get to Ari.” It’s true…I didn’t use Meredith as a tool to get Ari. I wanted to explore the possibility of a relationship with her, but now I know it’s not going to work.
“Do you love her?”
That’s an easy question, but does she expect me to tell her that?
I look at her, biting down, with my hands on my waist. She’s livid but, most of all,hurt.And I feel like I just hit a new low. This isn’t like me.
“Do you love Ari?” she repeats, stomping her heel on the ground once again.
I don’t answer.
“Dammit, Kane, answer me. You owe me this. Was it all a lie with me?” Her voice cracks, and it breaks me to see that I hurt her.
“No, Meredith. I have enjoyed our time together. You’re beautiful. You’re perfect, even, but—”
“It’s been her from the start, hasn’t it?” she bites out.
I nod. “I owe you an explanation. I didn’t mean for any of this to happen, it just did, and I know that’s a shitty fucking reason. When Paul died, I promised to take care of her.”
