A loud scoff escapes my throat.
“An affair? You and me arenottogether. We were justthinkingabout trying things again. Stupid, considering that even when we were together, we both know out of the two of us,I was the only faithful one.”
Z gets flustered, hands shaking like it’s my fault for confusing things. “You’re changing the subject! You snuck off to Dallas. To seehim.”
I am not ashamed. I’m not the liar here.
I hate how he can twist things even when IknowI’m not in the wrong. I square my shoulders.
“You’re right. I went to Dallas. They were having a memorial for Helen.”
“You meanhewas having a memorial?”
“Yeah. Helen was his mother, and he was having a memorial for her. And you know what? After the memorial, he and I got to chatting. I bet you know what I found out in about three minutes of talking to him.”
I’m carefully watching Z’s face, and even though he’s trying to be stone cold, I see the nervous flicker of fear.
He knows that I know.
“He’s a fucking liar,” Z accusing angrily, whole body twitchy.
He’s definitely on something. His pupils are pinpricks.
Great. He promised me he was done with that shit, but I guess that’s just more proof that he’s a lying liar who lies.
“He always hated me,” Z rants. “He’d say anything to get between us. You never saw it, but I knew it from the second I met him.”
“Oh, cut the shit, Z. I know Helen diedthatday! She was already gone when you lied and said she didn’t want to see me. That’s so fucked up! It was in the paper that they had framed as part of the memorial—she died that afternoon—and youliedto me to get me away. God fucking damn it, Z. How could you dothat to me?” My voice breaks on the last words.
Z’s mouth drops open like he’s about to deny it, but no words come out. All sorts of emotions cross his face.
Terror that I finallyknowhas him stumbling a step backward. Denial follows on its heels, but I toss a hand up because I don’t want to fuckinghear it.
“He’s a liar?—”
“I know everything,” I yell. “I saw a picture of Helen and Caleb when he was Bruiser’s age. They’re identical. Bruiser isn’t your son! I fuckingknow.”
Tears choke my throat at the devastation of how deep the betrayal goes. At how the man standing in front of me is nothing like the one I thought I knew.
And then, literally in front of my eyes, I see the change as my words finally register.
All the denial on his face fades.
He knows that I know how deep his lies ran.
For a second, there’s just silence between us.
He stares at me, and I stare back.
Yeah, we were two people who were once lovers, and now… now, I don’t know what we are.Past fucking tense, that’s for damn sure.
“Look,” I breathe out, sodonewith his ass. “We are over, for good. Me and Bruiser are gone from your life. Meet the consequences of your own Goddamn actions.”
I go to push past him, but he suddenly steps in my path.
“No,” Z says, and his voice is like steel.
I scoff out a laugh and try to push him out of my way. “What the fuck do you mean,no? It was not a question. You don’t get any say in me or Bruiser’s life anymore.”