Chapter 87 Chapter 87

Chapter 87 Chapter 87
Kimberley 

I throw the last of my clothes into the laundry basket, rounding on him.

“What the fuck are you doing here, you asshole?” I demand, unconsciously mimicking Caden’s words from when he found me in his living room.

Darren puts his hands up in surrender.

“Kimberley,” he says again.

“What, are you following me around now? Have you been following me around this entire time? I don’t know what the fuck you’re doing here, but if it’s not laundry, get the hell out.”

“Will you just listen to me for a second?”

“Why would I? Nothing you say is going to make a difference.”

“How do you know? I haven’t said anything yet.”
That’s not fucking true. He’s said my name twice—pierced my heart with a single word twice.

I want to shove at his chest, to take out all my anger at the three men on Darren, just because he’s here. But his words remind me of what happened with Ben when I ran into him outside Zia Sofia’s. I wouldn’t let him speak either. What was he going to say?

The need to know overtakes me, and I clench my hands, reeling in my anger. There’s no chance that he can make up for what he’s done, but if I don’t let him say whatever he’s trying to say, the question will always haunt me.

“Fine.” My voice is sharp as a knife. “Talk.”

He gazes at me for several long moments, his lopsided smile nowhere to be seen. He looks sad and serious, and a little disheveled. 

It occurs to me for the first time to wonder why he’s not at the party the guys are throwing. There’s no way it’s over already—given what a huge blowout it was set up to be, it’s probably going to be raging until the early hours of the morning.

So why isn’t Darren there?

“I think… things have gone too far,” he finally says.
He stumbles over the words, as if he’s not quite sure how to articulate what he’s trying to say.

But instantly, my plan to stay quiet and let him speak goes off the rails.

“Too far?” My lip curls. “Oh, do you fucking think so? Well, who’s fucking fault was that, Darren? I wasn’t the one who started this! Did Caden send you here? Is he scared of what other shit I might pull on him? On all of you? Because you know what, he should be. After everything you assholes did to me, I’ve got a long, long way to go before we’re even. Do you get that?”

I shouldn’t be saying all of this. I shouldn’t be giving him any warning about what’s coming. Gemma’s and my plan will be a lot more effective if it takes them by surprise.

But I can’t stop myself. The anger I’ve been keeping pent up for the past week and a half all bursts out of me in a rush, mixed with a pain that makes it hard to fucking breathe.

“Shit has gone too far? Yeah. It has! It went too far in fucking high school, but that didn’t stop you then, did it?” I step closer to him, my chest rising and falling fast as my voice rises. “You know, the more I think about it, Darren, the more I wish we’d never met in the first place. I wish the four of us had never become friends. This—whatever the fuck this thing is between us—was a curse from the very beginning.”

Tears are stinging my eyes, and I blink them back. I’d rather gouge my fucking eyeballs out than let him see me cry. He knows he hurt me. He knows they all hurt me. But I won’t let him see me break.
I keep expecting Darren to interrupt me, to fight back or make some excuse or do something. But he doesn’t.

He’s just standing there, absorbing my wrath. Anguish and resignation are clear in his expression, and for a moment, my stomach twists with regret. I hurt him. I don’t know how that’s even possible, given how little these men seem to care what I think, but my words have hurt him.

My hand twitches with an impulse to reach out for him, to try to soothe that hurt, but I can’t let myself do that. I can’t let myself believe a single thing any of these men say anymore.
So instead of touching him gently, I shove at his chest, making him stumble back a step.

“Don’t you fucking dare act like I’m the asshole here. Don’t look at me like that, you prick! Like I’ve wronged you in some way. I haven’t done shit to you yet. Don’t look at me like you’re all hurt or sorry! How the fuck am I supposed to believe you? You guys have yanked my emotions and lied to me over and over. That’s all we have between us, Darren! A pile of fucking lies.”

“No, Kimberley.” He shakes his head, looking stricken, and catches my wrists when I move to shove at him again. “That’s not all it was. Not for me.”

I rip my arms out of his grasp and beat my fists against his chest. “Stop it. Stop it, stop it, stop it!”
“I can’t stop.” His voice is soft, and his Adam’s apple bobs as he swallows. “I can’t. Believe me, I fucking tried, but I can’t stop thinking about you. And I don’t want to anymore. I don’t want to pretend this never happened. I don’t want to pretend there’s nothing between us. I fucked up, Kim, and I want to make it better.”

Something cracks open in my chest, bleeding poison into my veins. I can feel it seeping through my body, and it feels like I’m turning to stone. Like I’m dying with every feeble beat of my heart.
I waited for him to say those words.

For months.

For years.
And now he says them?

There’s a part of me that still, even now, wants to believe that he means it. Even though it’s too little, and way too fucking late. Even though I’ve opened my heart and been burned before. And that little part of me is what hurts the most.

“You. Can’t. Make. It. Better,” I tell him, my voice low and strained, vibrating with pain and anger. “And even if you could, I don’t want you to. I don’t want you in my fucking life.”

“Kimberley—”

“No! I don’t want to hear it, Darren. I. Hate. You. Don’t you get that?"