Page 138 of The Revenge Game

Justin

My words echo in the air around us, mixing with the mournful cry of a seagull wheeling overhead.

Drew flinches like I’ve struck him. Those familiar hands that I’ve watched fix countless computer issues, that have touched me so tenderly, come up to adjust his glasses in that gesture I once found endearing but now feels like watching a stranger wear a beloved actor’s face.

Because he’s not Drew Smith, IT technician.

He’s Andrew Yates, multi-millionaire tech entrepreneur.

Everything I know about him is a lie.

The shame and embarrassment I carried from discovering I was the person who had made Drew’s life miserable has now curdled into anger.

Because he lied to me. So many times.

Everything that has happened between us, every moment of laughter, every touch, every secret confessed, was all built on a lie.

And that anger forces me to steel myself when I see the devastation on Drew’s face. Because I want to comfort him, and that betrayal cuts deeper than any other. That he’s made me lovehim so much that I still want to ease his hurt even while he’s breaking my heart.

“What else?” I ask.

“What do you mean, what else?”

“I mean, I want to know exactly what else you did that I don’t know about.”

He drops his gaze to the ground.

“Um…I was the mystery bidder for the date with you at the Second Chances auction.”

His words are like a sucker punch, forcing the air from my lungs. I put my hand on the railing to steady myself.

“You paid seventy-five thousand pounds to go on a date with me?” My words come out strangled.

“No, I paid seventy-five thousand pounds so you wouldn’t have to go on a date with Vivian! Because even then, even before we kissed, I cared about you!”

My mind spins back to the evening at the TING, how relieved I felt when my mystery date didn’t show up, how perfectly everything worked out.

How I had no idea my mystery date was actually sitting across from me, laughing with me about fancy desserts.

“Is there anything else I don’t know about?” I demand.

He bites his lip. “Um…I might have built an app for you.”

“You built an app for me? What do you mean?” The words are just out of my mouth when I clue into what he’s talking about. The world tilts sideways as puzzle pieces slot into place.

“The Recall+ app? You built that?” My lips feel numb.

“Yes. Well, I didn’t build it completely myself because I wanted it done in a short timeframe, but I hired app designers and oversaw the project.”

I claw my hand through my hair. “Fuck, was any of it real?”

“My feelings for you are real.” He says the words quietly, but they hit me like he’s shouted them.

He raises those brown eyes to mine.

“It started out as a game. Well, actually, I think I was honestly distracting myself from how empty my life was. And then, I started falling for you without realizing, and it reached the point where I didn’t want to tell you the truth because it would hurt you, and I didn’t want to do that!”

He stands there shivering in his thin dress shirt, his shoulders hunched against the wind, looking more like the vulnerable kid from high school than a successful tech entrepreneur.