Page 137 of The Revenge Game

“Yes.” The admission feels like ripping off a Band-Aid that’s been superglued to my skin.

“That was you? All that time, it was you?”

“Yes.”

Confusion is written across his features. “But you helped me fix everything.”

“That’s because I couldn’t stand to see how panicked you were. I mean, after the Striker presentation, when you were desperate, I realized I couldn’t go through with it. Then I thought…” I swallow hard. “Then I thought the best way to get back at you would be to become friends, so when you found out the truth, it would hit you harder.”

Justin laughs, but it doesn’t have a single trace of humor in it. It’s bleak, brittle.

“I’d say you overachieved on that one.”

The bitterness in his voice slices through me, leaving jagged edges I didn’t know I could feel. My fingernails dig into my palms painfully.

“I didn’t mean… I didn’t mean for this to happen.”

“For what to happen? For me to fall in love with you?”

The word love feels like a weapon.

I hang my head. “No. I didn’t mean for that to happen. And by the time I realized, it was too late.”

His eyes are hard as his gaze meets mine. “So what was the endgame here, Drew? Or should I call you Andrew? Were you planning to reveal everything at the class reunion? Make a dramatic speech about how the golden-boy quarterback fell for the guy he used to torment?”

Anger flares inside me, surprising me. I thought that the events of the past eight months had healed my wounds, but apparently, some of Teenage Andrew’s wounds are still bleeding.

“I understand you’re angry, and you have every right to be, but you remember what you did to me, right? You remember the Handy Andy nickname? You made my life hell for FOUR years!”

“I know I did. Don’t you think I know that? Don’t you think I’m so ashamed and embarrassed about that? I told you how guilty I felt about bullying someone just like you—” He trails off, then releases a laugh tinged in bitterness.

He takes a deep breath, then lifts his gaze to mine. “Except he wasn’t just like you. Hewasyou. And you sat there and listened to me pour my heart out about it, knowing the whole time…”

“I tried to tell you then it was me, but then you told me you loved me…” I swallow hard.

“And what?”

“And I couldn’t handle hurting you by telling you the truth,” I say quietly.

He just stares at me.

“I know what I did was terrible, but I was a fourteen-year-old kid being abused by my stepfather when I started bullying you! You’re twenty-seven, Drew. You knew exactly what you were doing.” Justin’s breathing speeds up. “You made me fall in love with you when the whole time you were pretending.”

“I wasn’t pretending! Well, I was in the beginning, but then…things changed.”

Justin rakes his hand through his hair. He looks out across the river, his jaw muscles working. “You know what hurts the most? Not that you lied about who you were. But you took all those moments when I was finally being real—coming out to you, telling you about Bobby Ray, trusting you with parts of myself I’ve never shown anyone—and you were just…what? Collecting data points for your revenge algorithm?”

My chest constricts as if someone’s wrapped barbed wire around my heart and is slowly, deliberately tightening it.

“No. I wasn’t collecting data. Everything changed, Justin, don’t you get that? As I got to know you, when you told me what happened with Bobby Ray, I forgave you. And then I didn’t want to hurt you. Because I’d started to care about you…and then I fell in love with you, and trust me, that wasn’t part of any revenge plan.”

Justin’s face does this complicated thing that makes my chest ache, like watching someone try to hold on to their anger while processing grief at the same time.

His blue-green eyes meet mine. The raw hurt sears my heart.

“Trust you? How can I trust anything you say to me?”

Chapter Thirty-Seven