Page 43 of Living Hell

FOURTEEN

Iona

“YOU’RE SO CUTE WHENyou’re mad.” I reached out to poke his nose.

Tyler shook his head and lowered the letter. “What?”

I sighed. “Nothing. Go back to reading your mail.”

Since we fucked like ravenously horny rabbits last night on the picnic table, I hadn’t been able to get enough of Tyler. It was strange since all the other guys I had sex with I couldn’t wait for them to leave.

“Have you seen this, Iona?” He swatted my hand away and held up the letter.

I knew what would make reading that letter much more enjoyable—if it had a hole in it and his dick happened to slip through. Most of my thoughts this morning involved his cock. Like, should I lick it or massage it or let him poke me with it?

Licking my lips, I lifted the paper from his hand and winked. He was sexy when he was confused.

“I’m being blackmailed, Iona.”

“What?” That woke me from my cock worshiping thoughts.

He pointed at the paper. “Read it.”

As I scanned the letter, I noticed it was signed, Asking For A Friend. The person didn’t even have the balls to sign their name.

“This is a lie. I never had an abortion.”

His hand reached out to me and his fingers laced with mine. There was concern etched into his features. I worried something like this would happen. The gossip rags would cling to any tiny nugget of information they got and twist it into clickbait. Now Tyler was being thrust into that world—something he never asked for.

“If that is what happened . . . you can tell me the truth. I can’t imagine how scary it was to be pregnant at eighteen with only your mom to help you. I can’t say it would make me happy if that was the outcome, but I wouldn’t judge you.”

I yanked my hand back and stood from the kitchen bar stool.

“I told you I had a miscarriage. Look, Tyler, Hollywood may gloss over the truth with pretty shiny things to distract the public, but I don’t. This is who I am. I never pretended to be perfect. I never pretended that I work for the art or passion of acting. I got into this to help pay bills because my mom struggled with her job cleaning other people’s shit.”

“I’m just saying—”

I held up my hand. “Save it. I would never lie to you. There are women, some of them just young girls, who are in situations where there may be no other choice. The world isn’t set up for people like me or them. They’re damned if they do, and they’re damned if they don’t. But I did have a choice and maybe it wasn’t the best choice, but I wasn’t about to let go of that little bean inside me. But as it turns out, that wasn’t up to me. So, you go and believe an anonymous coward, someone who is too chickenshit to give you their name. It’s easier to believe the worst in people than to really understand who they are and what they deal with in life.”

I crumpled up the paper and threw it at him. Sure, that was childish, but I was angry. This man knew me, yet he doubted the words I spoke to him only a day ago.

He reached for me, but I stepped back. “Iona.”

I shook my head. “No.” I held up my hands. “You weren’t there. That person, whoever they are, wasn’t there. What evidence would they have? This is ridiculous. I may not be a saint, not that I want to be, but I won’t let anyone twist my heartache into something meant to hurt me. I wouldn’t lie like that.”

“But you’d lie about us getting married?” He stood and bent over, reaching for the wad of paper on the floor.

“Fuck you.”

I left. My feet thundered up the stairs and into the spare bedroom, which no longer held my clothes. Tyler’s brother was coming today, and he needed a room to sleep in. I was looking forward to sleeping in the same bed as Tyler tonight, but not anymore.

Slamming the door, I locked it.

Throwing myself onto the bed, it felt like I was a teenager again. A fight with my boyfriend, only this time it was my fake fiancé.

The door handle jiggled and next came a few knocks at the bedroom door. “Iona. Open up. I’m sorry.”

“Yeah you are.”

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