Page 47 of Rush
When they were off, she came to me. We hung out, we talked, we were real for a few days, but that was it. When they were back on, I was dumped like a ton of bricks. Deep down, I knew she was using me, but I didn’t care. Like a starving dog, I was desperate for any scrap of attention I could get.
Before me sat some rich kid’s house. It was this two-storied, double-garaged, manicured-lawn bullshit. Pushing inside, I ignored the murmurings and filthy looks and began searching for Jade. She was here. I knew she was. There was no way she would miss this party.
Pausing in the doorway to the lounge room, I spied her head of red curls, and my heart leapt. She was sitting on the couch…next to Hunter. Her arms were wrapped around his neck, and they were laughing at some private joke. He kissed her on the lips, and she smiled before going in all the way.
I watched them kiss—full-on sucking face—and felt my bravado evaporate. She’d gone back to him.Again.
I couldn’t believe she’d fallen for his dirty tricks for what felt like the fiftieth time that year, but realizing that she didn’t care he’d been off kissing another girl—especially since he’d come back to her afterward—I scowled. She looked so fucking happy.
What could I offer her? Nothing. I’d just been slapped back into reality. In what world would a rich girl like Jade Forsyth look twice at a piece of scum like me? Not this one. She’d proven it over and over again. I was the idiot who didn’t want to see. I was nothing to her while she was everything to me.
Turning, I walked back down the hall and disappeared, leaving her perfect little world intact.
17
Jade
Iunderstood it now.
Why Ryan had asked if I was being a selfish bitch when I went to see him at Pulse last week. All that time, he’d had feelings for me, and I’d been blind to it, my focus firmly on a life that turned out to be completely shallow and unfulfilling.
I’d given up a guy like Ryan—a genuine, hardworking, sweet, kind, funny guy—for a pair of materialistic, selfish assholes named Margaret and Hunter. Afraid of being alone, I’d latched onto something poisonous rather than grow a spine.
I wasn’t a strong woman. I was a pathetic little rat.
Leaning against the front counter of the Mercure Hotel, I waited for the clerk to arrange a room for the night. All I wanted to do was drag myself upstairs, collapse into bed, and cry. My suitcase sat beside me, full to bursting, my handbag perched on top.
I could still feel him—Ryan—between my legs and all over my body. My heart was torn in two knowing I’d hurt him.
“I’m sorry, Miss,” the woman said. “But your card has been declined.”
“What?” I blinked, bewildered. “That can’t be right. Can you try it again?”
She raised her eyebrows and swiped the card again, knowing full well that once declined, meant always declined.
“Declined,” she said, sounding bored. “Do you have another card? Cash, perhaps?”
“No,” I muttered. “I don’t have anything else on me…”
The woman blinked at me, signaling her annoyance. That was that, then.
Retreating across the foyer, I sank down into an armchair and rested my forehead against the edge of my suitcase. Why couldn’t something go smoothly for once? Why was I being punished for something Hunter did? I mean, Ryan… Ryan had helped me, but I’d been blind to his feelings, making everything about me and my heartache.
Ryan was right. I was a selfish, shallow little girl.
Fighting back tears, I fumbled through my handbag and found my phone. Knowing the bank was closed on a Sunday, the only recourse I had was calling. Not that I would be able to get any money today, but it was something proactive at least. I didn’t want to think about where I was going to stay tonight. Maybe it would be another all-nighter, only this time, I would be sitting at a filthy table at one of the twenty-four-hour fast-food joints down on Swanston Street.
Calling the number for the bank, I went through the automated prompts, pressing numbers until I was led to a real live person.
“Thank you for calling Westpac, my name is Khushi. How may I assist you today?”
“My card keeps getting declined, and there’s money in there, and I don’t know what’s going on,” I blurted.
“Okay, let’s check that for you,” the woman went on, sounding like a robot. “May I confirm some details with you before we begin?”
Pinching the bridge of my nose, I gave her all the details she could ever want to know—short of giving her my life story, culminating with my cheating ex-fiancé and my lapse of judgment with Ryan—and she put me on hold.
Sinking back into the chair, I never felt more humiliated in my life. Dumped and kicked out,twice. Even the fucking hotel receptionist had looked at me like I was scum. Was that how I’d treated people who I thought were beneath me all this time? Was I really that superficial? Vomit was beginning to percolate in my stomach, the acid eating away at the lining…just like my engagement ring had wormed its way into the innards of my handbag.
