Page 90 of Forbidden Billionaires: Vol. 11

Saturday

My foot slipped on the ladder and I started to fall. But a strong hand clamped around my wrist, holding me in place. I quickly regained my footing and stared up at...my past.

I cursed under my breath. “You scared the crap out of me, Axel.”

“What? Were you expecting someone else?”

Actually, when I’d heard the deep voice, I’d thought it might be my kiss thief, lurking in here waiting for me. But I didn’t dare say that out loud. “No, I was expecting no one.”

He stared down at me. “Well unfortunately I’m here. And like I said. No girls allowed.”

I laughed.

He smiled.

I didn’t think the no girls allowed sign was the sign I’d been asking for.

But I was very aware of the fact that I’d felt the treehouse calling to me tonight.

And that Axel had been sitting in here the whole time.

I tried to shake away the thought, but it was impossible when I was staring up into his blue eyes. “Help me up.”

He pulled me up into the treehouse, abandoning his no girls allowed policy pretty quickly.

“What are you doing up here?” I asked.

He shrugged. “Thinking about our project.” He put his hands behind his head and leaned against one of the old wooden walls.

“You were up here thinking about our coding project? Instead of celebrating your victory?” It was very unlike him to be thinking about homework on a Saturday night.

He shrugged again.

“Dreaming of princesses and princes, huh?” I scooted forward to see the wall of pictures.

I smiled at my dad, Uncle Rob, Uncle Matt, and Uncle Mason all looking young and ridiculous.

The four of them had stayed friends their whole lives.

I wanted that to be true for the four of us too.

But our four was a lot more complicated than theirs.

“Something like that,” Axel said.

I turned to see him staring at me.

“I figured I’d also run into you,” he said. “You come here every time we throw this party.”

“Am I really so predictable?”

“Not recently.” He leaned forward, putting his elbows on his knees. And his gaze fell to the number 18 on the varsity jacket I was wearing. “Because I certainly didn’t expect you to be wearing Jacob’s jacket tonight when you showed up here.”

I felt the weight of it on my shoulders. What did Axel want from me? It just so happened that number 18 liked me and number 10 didn’t. I placed my hand over the number on my sleeve as I folded my arms across my chest. “I told you that I liked him.”

“Do you also like August Ward?”

I opened my mouth and closed it again.

“And Billy? And Ryan? And Henley...”

“I didn’t kiss Henley.”

“That doesn’t really answer my question. I asked you not to hook up with my best friend and now you’re hooking up with half my team.”

Three guys were hardly half the team. “It was for charity.”

“I didn’t realize you handed out kisses so easily.”

It felt like he’d slapped me. “I don’t.”

“Have you handed out any more than those three?”

“No.”

“What about Jacob? Have you kissed him too?”

“No, I haven’t kissed Jacob.” Not definitively anyway. So he could get any ideas of kissing Gigi out of his head.

Axel had a stupid smug smile on his face. “Interesting. So you went from never been kissed to kissing everyone...”

“And what about you?!” I said.

“What about me? I also haven’t kissed Jacob.”

I laughed. “That’s not what I meant.”

“Then what did you mean?”

“I bet you’ve kissed more than three people this week. So...whatever.”

“I actually haven’t kissed anyone this week.”

“Great,” I said.

“Great.”

We both just stared at each other as his words settled in my head. If he hadn’t kissed anyone this week...that meant he wasn’t my kiss thief. Or that he was a liar. And if there was one thing I knew for sure about my kiss thief was that he lied.

I forced my gaze not to drop to his lips. I’d already told him I’d saved my first kiss for him. I didn’t need him to have any more ammunition against me. Besides, I didn’t know what my kiss thief’s lips looked like. I only knew how they tasted. “So you haven’t been making out with Gigi nonstop?”

“I told you it was one time. She kissed me. You saw what happened. I pushed her right off. But our deal stands, Scarlett.”

God, him and his stupid deal. Why was he doing this to me? And I hadn’t seen his whole kiss with Gigi. I’d turned away because I couldn’t bear it. Just thinking about that kiss made it feel like there was a knife in my chest. Could Axel really not tell how much that had hurt me?

I pressed my lips together. Maybe he just didn’t care.

For my whole life, I felt like I somehow belonged to him.

That our fate was twisted together. At least, that’s how I’d seen it.

I’d hoped that one day he’d wake up and see it too.

But I was so sick of being his when he wasn’t mine.

I glared at him. “Did you make the kissing booth explode on purpose with that shitty pass?”

He chuckled. “I definitely didn’t mean to make it explode.”

“You know what I meant, Axel. I know you think of me like a sister. Jacob told me. And I know that you’re just trying to be protective. Or something. But you can’t go around blowing things up to prevent me from living my life.”

He opened his mouth to say something when there was a creak on the ladder beneath us.

Sophie popped her head in. “There you guys are. We’ve been looking all over for you.” She peered down. “Jacob, they’re up here!” She climbed into the treehouse and sat down.

Jacob climbed up next. He sat down next to me.

And for a second...everything felt wrong. Like the four of us were suddenly strangers.

“Why do you always come up here?” Sophie asked me.

I hadn’t realized I’d been so obvious every year. “It’s fun to look at our parents when they were our age.” Although, most of the pictures were of them younger. I hadn’t seen many of them together as teens now that I thought about it. But my dad had probably stopped coming up here.

I guess I was the only one stuck in the past. The only one having trouble moving on.

After all, I was sitting in this treehouse like I did every year, apparently.

I’d been trying to move on from the past, but now it felt like I was trying desperately to cling on to it.

Just me. Not the three of them. It was a sobering thought.

“Yeah.” Sophie turned to stare at the pictures. “My dad was always so much cooler than yours.”

“Hey!”

She laughed and turned back around. “But really. Feeling nostalgic tonight?” She lightly tapped her shoe against mine.

I sighed. “Yeah, a little, I guess. It just feels like everything is about to change. I just want all of us to always be friends. No matter what. The four of us against the world, you know?”

“I don’t think anything will ever change that,” Jacob said as he put his arm around my shoulders.

Axel cleared his throat. “Us against the world,” he said as he stared into my eyes. “Always.”

“Always,” Soph agreed. “And speaking of the four of us...we need to figure out homecoming. Because there is no way in hell we’re not all sharing a limo this year.” She stared daggers at Axel. “It’s our senior year. You can’t ask some rando as your date and ditch us again.”

“Fine by me,” he said.

“Actually, I’ve been meaning to ask.” Jacob looked down at me. “What do you say, Scar? Be my date for homecoming?”

My heart pitter-pattered against my ribcage.

I’d never been asked to a dance before. Ever.

But I was very aware of the fact that the person I’d always hoped would ask never would.

I could feel Axel’s eyes on the back of my head.

But he’d just promised it would always be the four of us.

This didn’t have to change anything. I took a deep breath. “Absolutely.”

Jacob smiled.

It was my senior year. I deserved to be asked to homecoming. I deserved to be happy. I knew going with Jacob meant Axel would ask Gigi. But I couldn’t let his threats break me. It was really starting to feel like the two of them were written in the stars.

“You two are so cute together,” Sophie said.

I felt my cheeks flushing.

“Well,” Axel said. “I guess that leaves the two of us, Soph. What do you say? Should we just go together? Then I can’t possibly ditch you guys for another limo.”

It felt like the world had stopped spinning.

Had Axel just asked Soph to homecoming? Was he serious right now?

The one year he decided to ask a friend and he asked Soph?

It felt like he’d stabbed me in the heart.

And then thrown sand in the wound. And I hated that he was smiling. Like his words hadn’t just killed me.

“Ugh,” Sophie said. “It feels so desperate to go as friends. But fine. Whatever. The man of my dreams has rubbed me all wrong tonight.

I cringed thinking of Mr. Halifax.

“Besides, he never says yes when I leave him notes asking him to the dances anyway. Let’s do this thing.”

“Great,” Axel said. But he wasn’t looking at Sophie. He was looking at me.

Yeah, he knew his words hurt. And I think he liked it. He liked hurting me.

And I didn’t care that my mom said my dad had hurt her heart. I didn’t think love was supposed to hurt like this.

I wish I’d never told Axel I’d saved my first kiss for him.

It was better when he didn’t know I liked him.

I used to be able to brush everything he did under the rug because he didn’t know how I felt.

He hadn’t known he was hurting me. So it was easy to forgive.

But now he knew. I used to think he was kind.

But I knew the truth now. Axel Stevens was cruel.

And I didn’t know how to forgive him for all this hurt.

Not that he was asking for my forgiveness.

“This’ll be fun,” Sophie said. “All of us going together.”

It actually sounded like a nightmare.

Sophie lightly kicked my foot again. “Right?”

I cleared my throat. “Yeah. So much fun.”

Jacob squeezed my shoulder.