Page 130 of The Truths We Burn

“But not for you it isn’t,” Thatcher says, “This is for Sage, and please, don’t try to deny it. I’m tired of pretending I don’t know.”

I look over at Silas, his subdued demeanor settled into his shoulders. That unhinged look in his eyes from earlier is gone, but the feeling in my gut isn’t.

I watched him take them on Rosie’s anniversary and every morning before that in the dorms. He was on schedule with them, but something’s still wrong, and convincing him to go to the doctor for a new medication is not going to be easy.

But nothing with him had even been.

“How long,” Alistair says again, but this time it’s not a question.

I take a breath, scratching the back of my head, knowing what I need to say but not knowing how to explain it.

“Start of senior year. It wasn’t supposed to be anything serious, I just wanted to twist the princess into a little knot of chaos. Show her that she wasn’t any better than me, than us. But then she started to change, it started to change. She was different than what I expected. Better.”

Trying to consolidate what we were is hard. How do you explain that someone was everything and nothing at the same time?

That she had been the first person since the guys and Rose I’d wanted to see me. To see all of me, know everything. Because I’d thought she’d accept it.

I thought—

“Wasn’t she engaged to Easton during senior year?”

I grind my teeth. “Yes, but I didn’t know about that until the end. I knew she was still dating him, and I let it go because she needed to wait until graduation to break things off. Her parents would have lost their shit, I just didn’t know why. I thought it was because of me. I don’t exactly have Easton’s reputation.”

“So that’s why the stick up his ass has been extra annoying.” Alistair scoffs. “So what happened?”

Everything.

Nothing.

“I found out about the engagement, and she—” Fucking destroyed me. “She ended things with me. Spitting some shit about me just being a phase, that she never planned on leaving Easton.”

“That’s why you showed up at my door? I’ve been slicing you up over her?”Thatcher says, in a tone that’s close to anger, but with him, I never know.

“Yes.” I drag my hands down my face in frustration. “I tried to cut her out. I wanted to punish myself for being so fucking stupid, for trusting her. But she’s like venom, a goddamn tumor, man. She just keeps growing back.” I let out a heavy sigh. “Now I don’t know what to believe or think. She came clean about Cain and told me that she was forced into the engagement. Apparently, her father was getting money from Stephen, and in exchange for that, he wanted a wife for his son. Then Easton found out about us and threatened to take Rose instead. So she made a choice, and we’ve been hating each other since.”

And there it is.

My truth to burn going up in smoke.

My pretty poison all out in the open.

Saying it out loud does exactly what I thought it would.

Makes me feel like even more of an idiot.

The fool who’d fallen for a girl who didn’t give a shit about him, and the worst part is I knew. I knew Sage was a dangerous creature. That she was wrapped in caution tape.

Seamlessly made.

Designed for deception.

The exquisitely colored frog with neon patterns, stunning jellyfish with a bioluminescent glow, the exotic caterpillar. All designed to bring attention and ward off danger.

I know what she is, and yet I chase it anyway with no idea of how much damage it would wreak on me.

“What was the point of keeping it from us?” Alistair asks.

I take the cigarette back from Alistair, filling my lungs with the tar.