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I head into Corey’s room to see what clothes I still have here after Alicia messages to tell me she’s on her way.

I know I'm going to have to go home and speak to my parents eventually, but I think Dev’s right about giving them time.

They have to accept that I’m an adult now.

I’m responsible for my own decisions, and I’ve decided that I want to be with Dev.

Being in Corey’s room while wearing one of Dev’s t-shirts feels kinda weird.

I haven’t spent too much time thinking about how Corey would feel about the way things have turned out.

Of course, I’d like to think he’d be happy for us.

Corey was a kind soul; he cared about the people he loved, and he loved me and Dev.

Whenever I start to feel any guilt, I tell myself that he would have wanted us to find happiness in each other.

Who else would he have trusted to keep me safe?

And he was always telling me that he worried Dev would never find his person.

I have to believe that Corey would find comfort in that person being me, or guilt would consume me.

I keep looking through his drawers, knowing that I have at least one spare pair of jeans here, and when I pull open the bottom one and riffle through a pile of hoodies, I feel something I don’t expect tucked right at the back.

Pulling it out, I stare at the phone in my hand.

I’ve never seen it before, and I know it can’t belong to Corey, because Dev gave Corey’s phone to me last month.

Curiosity has me turning it on, and although I get a low battery warning, the screen lights up and asks for the passcode.

Since the code on the phone I have is set as my birthday, I try that first, and when it unlocks, I feel my heart sink.

This phone must be Corey’s. It’s hidden in his room and has my birthday as a code. I just can’t figure what he’d need it for or why he’d kept it a secret.

Sitting on his bed, I start reading through his messages.

There only seems to be one sender, and he hasn’t got their number stored under a name.

I click to open one of the image files sent, and when a picture of a naked woman comes up, I quickly place the phone on the bed, screen down so I don’t have to see it.

What the hell…? There has to be some kind of mistake. This phone can’t be his; Corey paid no interest in other girls. He wouldn’t have spoken to one the way these messages are reading.

I manage to pull together enough courage to pick up the phone, and as I scroll through the messages between him and whoever this girl is, it becomes very clear that they had something between them.

Almost all the messages are sexual, and there's more than just one inappropriate picture of her.

I feel tears building in my eyes when I get to the messages between them that mention me. How could he do that? How could he discuss our private, intimate details with this woman who, by the way, looks like she could be one of the whores from the club?

I’m too shocked by what I’m seeing to believe it’s true. Corey loved me; he was so patient and committed. He wouldn’t have spoken to another girl about our relationship the way he has in these messages, and there's no way he would have had sex with someone else.

What I’m reading sounds as if it’s been written by a completely different person from the one I knew.

I scroll to the start of the messages, finding the one where they arranged to meet, and when I type the address she’d given him into my own phone, I see that it’s an apartment above a bar on the outskirts of the city.

The area isn’t nice. My dad’s always warned me about going there, but I guess these days I’m done doing what my daddy tells me.

I jump when I hear a horn blast outside. Alicia must be here already, so I quickly scramble through the rest of Corey’s drawers until I find the jeans I’m looking for. Then, putting them on, I take the phone with me and head outside to meet her.

“Morning.” Alicia’s wearing a sassy smile and looking at me over the roof of her car when I step out the door.

Vike nods his head at me from where his bike is pulled up behind her, and when the phone in my hand feels as if it’s burning through my skin, I know we won’t be heading to the club like we planned.

I’m going to have to investigate what all this was about.

“I don’t know if this is a good idea.” Alicia looks up at the building, the maps on my phone directed us to, and when there’s a sharp tap on the glass of her window, she lowers it so we can hear what Vike has to say.

“I thought you went off track to get food. We can’t be here.” Vike pokes his head through the window, looking really pissed off.

“I’m sorry, but there's a girl who lives here that I need to speak with. She was messaging Corey before he died, and I want to know who she was to him.” I look between them both.

“I think it’s pretty obvious what she was to him, don’t you?” His eyes move up to the neon sign of a woman with her legs split open above the door, and Alicia gives him a stern look that makes him sulk off back to his bike, pressing his cell phone to his ear.

“Vike’s right, this place is…it’s seedy, Millie. I’m sure Trinity said she used to work here before she came to the club.” Alicia taps her fingers against her steering wheel, looking anxious.

“Alicia, I’ve just found out that all the promises Corey made me were lies. I really need to speak to this girl. So I can find out the truth.”

“But why?” she questions. “Corey’s dead. You and Dev are…Well, he made you his old lady, Millie. You don’t need to be here.”

“I need her to explain all this because this behavior wasn’t like the Corey I knew. He wouldn’t have done this to me,” I assure her. “You don’t have to wait if you don’t want to. I’m fine going in by myself.”

“As if I’m going to let that happen, and Vike isn’t gonna let either of us go in there without him either. We’re all in this together.” Alicia takes a deep breath and gets out of the car. “Come on, we’re going in,” she calls over to him, slamming her door and looking in full control.

“ Going in? ” Vike’s eyes widen as he quickly hangs up the phone. “Alicia, I don’t need to tell you what kinda bar this is, and we…The Souls got no influence over this joint like they have the others around town.”

“Influence?” Alicia looks as confused as I am.

“A lot of places like this one pay the club for protection. The owner of this place don’t. Let’s just go back to the club and leave this for Dev to deal with.” Vike talks to Alicia as if I’m not standing right here next to them.

“This isn’t for Dev to deal with,” I tell them. “One of the girls who works here was sleeping with Corey while I was with him. I need to speak to her.”

“Millie, I don’t mean to be insensitive, but she’s just a whore; it’s what whores do.” Vike scratches his beard, looking more and more nervous.

“They were talking like they were friends.” I hear the sadness in my own voice as his betrayal cuts me a little deeper.

“A whore will talk to ya however you want her to,” Vike sighs. “Please talk this through with Dev first, he ain’t gonna be happy about you being here.”

“I’m sorry, Vike, but I’m going in.” I turn my back on them and pull open the door before he can stop me.

Inside, it’s dark; the music playing is loud, and despite it only being eleven am, all the men who are in here are drinking.

There are a few of the girls dancing on podiums; none of them look happy, and when the guy who’s standing behind the bar sees that Vike has followed me in, he takes a baseball bat out from under it and starts heading toward us.

“I suggest you put that thing down before you get yourself hurt.” Vike doesn’t seem nervous anymore, in fact, he stands nose to nose with the guy and laughs in his face like he ain’t got a care in the world.

“Why are ya here? Do Soul men not have pussy of their own?” he asks in a thick, brash accent that I can’t quite place.

“We got plenty of pus…” Vike cuts himself off when Alicia looks at him, judgingly. “My friend here needs to speak to one of your girls. We don’t want any trouble,” he continues, clearing his throat and straightening his shoulders.

“Which one?” Bar Guy asks me, and since I don’t have a clue what her name is, I take out the phone and show him one of the many naked pictures she sent Corey.

“Ahhhh, Jodie. She doesn’t come on shift until two.” He shrugs.

“She lives upstairs, though, doesn't she?” I know that from reading through the messages she sent my boyfriend.

“Yeah, but, you can’t?—”

“I assume this door leads to the stairs?” I interrupt him, already walking toward it. Alicia is too busy watching the dancers to follow me, and when Vike gives her a yank to keep up, Bar Guy stands in front of him.

“Sorry, I gotta protect my girls. If she goes up, she goes alone,” I hear him tell him.

“I’ll be fine, wait there,” I assure Vike.

“Dev is gonna fuckin’ kill me,” he mutters as I keep moving through the door, heading toward 3b so I can find out the truth.

“Okay, okay. I’m coming,” I hear an irritated voice call out from the other side of the door I’m banging my fist against.

I’m taken aback by the girl who opens it. She looks much prettier than she did in her pictures. Far too pretty to work at a place like this.

“Can I help you?” She looks me up and down as if I’m a piece of shit.

“You knew Corey Kendrick?” I start; now that I’m here, I don’t really know what to say. I’m not even sure I want to know the truth anymore.

“Yeah, I know him.” She folds her arms over her chest defensively, “What’s it to you?”

“I’m his… ex-girlfriend. I found his secret phone.” I hold it up in front of her as evidence.

“And…?” She shakes her head and huffs a laugh, like this is no big deal.

“I need to know if you…Were you and him–”

“I can’t divulge anything; client confidentiality and all.” The sarcastic smile she makes triggers something inside me, and reaching out, I grip her neck and force her back into the room.

“Answer my fucking question,” I speak right into her face.

“Jesus Christ!” I suddenly feel myself getting pulled back, and when I look over my shoulder expecting to see Vike, I’m shocked as hell when I see Dev instead.

“What are you doing here?” I ask him.

“Vike called when you got here. What the hell are you doing here, Mill?”

He keeps a firm grip on me when the bitch starts laughing, and I go for her again.

“This little skank was fucking, Corey,” I tell him, unable to hold back my tears. “He lied to me. All that time we were together, he was fucking lying .” I think of all the nights I’d lain beside him, feeling guilty for the way I felt about Dev.

“Baby, what the hell are you talking about? Corey wouldn’t—He loved you, he would never have slept with someone else.”

“I found this in his room this morning.” I hand the phone to him so he can see for himself, and when the girl, whose room we’re in, angles her head to look at the screen, I want to knock the smug look right off her face.

“Millie, go downstairs, get in Alicia’s car, and leave,” he orders, looking as shocked at what he’s seeing as I was.

“But–”

“ Get out! ” he bellows when I try to protest.

“Dev, I want to know wha–”

“Don’t make me throw you over my shoulder and carry you outta here, Millie, just do as you’re fuckin’ told.

” I can see from the look on his face how mad he is, and as much as I want to fight him on this, I’m on the verge of tears.

I quickly rush out the door and down the stairs so I can find Alicia.

“What happened?” I ask her when I see Bar Guy on the floor, out cold in front of her and Vike.

“He tried swinging that bat at Dev,” Vike explains, keeping a tight hold of Alicia’s arm, then taking hold of mine, too. “Come on, we’re heading back to the club right now.” He drags us both out to the car.