Page 50 of Game Night: Truth or Dare

I scanned the circle, taking in the faces. Bianca grinned when I got to her, confident I’d ask her some dumb question. As I passed her by, her eyes went wide, the realization of what I must be planning dawning on her. I continued my slow circuit till I got to Ben, with his dumb expression and his tattooed forearms and his big, brown, too-innocent lying eyes. I felt a rush, that deep-in-the-guts thrill you get before you do something naughty. The person I hated most, sitting less than three feet away from me, bound by the party gods to answer any question truthfully or perform any dare dutifully.

“Benjamin.”

He chuckled, sort of. More like, his body hitched as he released a puff of air. He didn’t want this, but he wasn’t surprised. He met my gaze, and his eyes seemed harder than they had before.

“Oliver.” His voice was as cold and slick as his stare, despite the little grin beginning to curl his lip. He may have seemed uncomfortable a second ago, but he wasn’t a coward, and he’d steeled himself for whatever. For a second, I regretted not stopping on Bianca after all, but it was too late now.

I forced myself to smile. I wasn’t a coward, either, and I wasn’t a dumb slut who slept with other guys’ boyfriends. Justice would prevail. “Truth or Dare?”

He looked down, found his beer, and raised it for a quick sip. When he swallowed, he said, “Truth.”

Okay. He was at least a little nervous. Someone truly fearless would have dared me to dare them. My heart rate slowed to a slightly less manic rhythm.

The whole room was still, dead silent. All eyes on us. Bianca looked like she might shit. Even Sienna, still under my grip, had half-raised her head to listen.

Whatever. I was used to being on stage.

“When you poach someone else’s boyfriend, do you feel slimy about it? Or is it just par for the course with you?”

If I’d thought the circle was quiet before, now it was a tomb.

He half rolled his eyes and huffed out another little laugh. In fact, he seemed to relax, his shoulders dropping and his head giving a tiny shake. Not what I’d expected, and his sudden ease made me nervous. He licked his lips and took another sip of his beer, and if I hadn’t been giving a massage, I think my hands might have started shaking in the eternity it took him to answer.

“When a guy who’s been flirting with me tells me he’s single…that he broke up with his ex for being…how did he put it? ‘Immature?’ ‘Highly dramatic?’ I think that’s what he said... Anyway, when a guy tells me he’s already unattached, I don’t feel bad at all.” Someone gasped, and someone else giggled. I don’t know who. But Ben was still talking. “Especially when I don’t know that ex. When he’s never said a peep to me, but I can kind of tell from a distance that he does seem immature and highly dramatic. In cases like that, I don’t feel slimy at all.”

I couldn’t breathe. Had Elliot really said that? To a fucking stranger? And had Ben actually repeated it in front of everyone just now?

I’d never felt so betrayed.

Like, yeah…I was…I was a lot more colorful than Elliot. More social. But if he’d said that, if he’d really said that, if he’d shit-talked me like that just to get in Ben Quinn’s pants…

I wanted to die.

It wasn’t even that I was in love with Elliot. He hadn’t broken my heart or anything. But I’d liked him a lot, and we’d had fun together, and I thought he’d liked me, too. I’d never realized that he’d thought so little of me, that he could talk that way about me.

I’d thought the worst was over when he dumped me. I didn’t realize how hurt and humiliated I could feel now, nearly a year later, with him long gone.

Across from me, something shifted in Ben’s face. He swallowed, and his eyes softened. They turned…pitying. He looked down and started talking again.

“I’m sorry, Oliver. I found out after the fact that Elliot had been a little slippery with the timeline. Like, he never cheated on you, but I didn’t realize when we got together just how quick the turnaround was between you and me. That was shitty, and I did regret it…once I knew. But at that point, we’d been together for a couple of months, and we’d already decided we were going to make a clean break when he graduated. It didn’t seem that serious.” He looked up then, and his expression was actually tender. I would have clawed his stupid face if I weren’t still paralyzed. “I could have come to you…maybe should have come to you. Tried to smooth things out? But, at least from a distance, you seemed fine, and besides…you’d made it crystal clear you didn’t have any interest in talking—about me, maybe, but not to me—so I didn’t see any point in troubling trouble.”

It was fucking nuts how connected I felt to him in that moment. Not in a good way, but like I’d been pushed off a cliff, and he was clinging to me, weighing me down, accelerating my descent.

But fuck his I’m sorry and fuck his pity. None of that would stop my face from burning or the back of my neck from prickling. It wouldn’t wrap a bandage around the hurt I felt about the things Elliot had said.

I realized I’d stopped massaging, that I’d frozen with Sienna’s shoulders clenched in a death grip. For whatever reason…maybe because the whole fucking room felt awkward after hearing me get socially crucified…she hadn’t said anything. I let go, and her body relaxed beneath me.

“Okay,” I said. “Asked and answered.” I looked down and blinked, then tentatively started massaging again, taking care not to hurt Sienna. “Your turn.”

“Ol…” Bianca said. “You wanna go get…?”

“Your turn,” I repeated, louder, cutting her off, my eyes now burning into Ben. He could humiliate me, but he wouldn’t drive me out of the circle. These were my friends. I’d been at Roundtree longer. I belonged here.

He met my gaze, and there was nothing dopey about his expression anymore. It was sharp and intense. That pity was still there, but it was mingled with pride and maybe something sad. I had no idea what I looked like to him. I was close to crying, but over the years I’d learned how to hold that shit in. I tried to give him nothing but hate.

Finally, he blinked. He looked down and said, “This game is…” A soft, mirthless chuckle escaped him, then he looked up at me again. “We should talk, Oliver. This is obviously still bothering you, and, to be honest, I don’t feel great about it either.”

“Take your turn.”

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