Page 27 of A Lethal Game of Trust

All excitement evaporated.

“How many men have you beaten up for me?”

“Just the one,” he said casually as if he were surprised himself.

“That’s not true.” He only raised a brow in question. “The bike sheds. Sam Yun back when I was sixteen.”

“Oh yeah,” he said and grinned at the memory. I could still picture him pummelling Sam’s face. I could still hear my screams for him to stop. “I forgot about that.”

“He was your friend.”

“No friend of mine,” he snarled. “No eighteen-year-old should be taking a sixteen-year-old’s virginity. Especially not yours.”

I laughed, I couldn’t help it. “Especially mine?”

Dom’s voice became gruff. “He only did it to piss me off, to get a reaction. Wanted to prove he could run in our circle. Pompous prat. When he told me, I said I didn’t believe him. So he got a picture of you naked in your bed. Your bed atmyhouse. He wanted me to know it had happened under my roof.”

I’d wanted him to know too. I’d wanted him to hear me,but he’d been out at the time at a party. Immediately after he came on my face, Sam had left me to join him there. So maybe there was some truth in what he was saying.

But the picture must have been from a time after that. There were many times after that, still waiting for Dom to hear or walk in.

“That’s the only reason why, is it?” I snapped. “Somehow, me losing my virginity was about you? No one could want to sleep with me for me? I wish you’d listen to yourself.”

“Of course it’s not the only reason.” His voice met my anger. “Everyone wanted to fuck you, but I’d made it clear you were off limits.”

“I wasoff limits?” I almost shrieked. My self-esteem had sunk to the inner core of Earth during school. As all my friends went on dates, I was shunned by every boy. The only one that paid me any attention was Sam and he made me promise to keep it a secret. Until he went blabbering. “Are you the reason no one asked me to the Christmas dance?”

He just shrugged. “You were too young for a boyfriend.”

“I was seventeen then!”

“Like I said, too young for a boyfriend.”

“Issy had a date.” She’d been ecstatic and I’d been happy for her, but I’d cried my make-up off that night. “Wait, yoursisterhad a date, but I wasn’t allowed one? I was the only girl who went alone.”

“One of those girls got pregnant that night,” he said, voice matter of fact. “And I drove you in if you remember.”

Yeah, in uncomfortable silence. He’d come home from his first year of university for the holidays and blared music the whole drive. Even though he’d been gone for months at that point, the Belov word was law in Darley. If the boys were toldnot to touch me, no one would touch me.

He wasn’t someone to piss off.

“You drove me in, but you weren’t mydate.” His mum had pestered him until he finally gave in and offered to drive me. “But why could Issy have a date and not me?”

He didn’t respond for a moment. Then, with a deep breath, he said quietly, “Because your dad died, your mother had a breakdown and you… weren’t yourself. I didn’t want you to do something you would regret.”

“This is insane,” I muttered.

But then something came back to me.

“The boys avoided me before my dad died.”

He glanced over at me quickly before focusing back on the drive. “Yeah, well, you were too young before.”

“I wasn’t. Issy had been on dates. I hadn’t.”

“They weren’t good enough for you. None of those boys were.”

“Maybe I do hate you.”