Page 79 of Dirty Roulette
“What?” Ryder snaps, his hand clenched into a fist.
“Where’s my video?” Brody nails me in a coffin with his voice on the other end.
“You need to back off...”
“Or what?”
“Stop sending her videos. I’m done playing your games.”
Brody laughs, as he unscrews the nuts and bolts that once held me together, and pieces of me are falling apart. “Oh...she must have enjoyed your homemade movies then?”
“I’m done with you harassing her. You are taking Roulette too far.”
“All you gotta do is sleep with her and make a video. How hard is that?”
“Fuck you man!”
“Did Trash tell you she met a friend of mine last night who’s really interested in getting with her?”
Ryder darts his eyes and glances at me. He puts the call on mute, leaving it on speaker. “What the hell is he talking about?”
I swallow ten pounds of razor blades. The guy’s hands were all over me, touching me in places I never invited him to. “I... umm.”What is wrong with me? Why can’t I spit out the truth about anything or talk? I’m stuttering with it just at the tip of my tongue.
“Did someone touch you?”
“Hang up!” I holler, reaching for his phone and slapping the red button on the bottom to get rid of him. The call disconnects, and I sit up with my hands covering my face.
“Payton!”
“Stop, it’s fine!” I shout.
“Who the hell touched you?”
“I kicked him in the balls. I’m fine...”
“Don’t lie to me too!” He pulls my hands away from my face. His grey eyes are torture, gazing into mine. The pure fear in them is possibly only an ounce of what I felt when that stranger grabbed me.
“Last night was a shit fest and Charlie knows. I had the chance to just tell her how I felt about you and I didn't. I just lied. She...” I heave in a mouthful of air. “She kicked me out of the car and when I walked upstairs... it just happened so fast.”
Terror fills his eyes as he glances at all of me with a hand running down his mouth. “No, no...” He grabs me by the cheeks, pushing away the hair sticking to my face. He’s white as a ghost. I’m opening my mouth to suck in air but only tasting the salt on my lips. I’m trembling all over, chills running down my back. My head can’t think straight. It’s me stomping on my tiny box to delete the memory of that freak touching me. All I can process is that I’m crying. My face is blistering hot, and my cheeks are sore from the amount of times I’ve wiped the waterfall of tears. “Talk to me, Payt. Stop bottling it all in.”
“No... I. ” I shake my head, sucking in air from a foreign planet and I don’t know how to get in any oxygen. “That’s why I went home last night, and that’s why I came here. I don’t want to be alone.”
“We are done hiding this. Let’s call Charlie right now. If everyone sees that you’re my girl, no one will dare touch you. If I’m not there and someone...” He bites his bottom lip. “I won’t ever be able to live with myself.”
“I’m fine...”
“No, you’re not. Look at yourself. This is not okay. He’s taken Roulette too far. This is not okay.”
Chapter twenty-seven
Ryder
Imanaged to calm Payton down, she stole my comforter and wrapped herself into a tight knot and fell asleep. I’d rather her stay here than go back to the dorms, especially if Charlie isn’t going to be there. We tried calling her, but it went straight to voicemail each time, and my text messages were left on read. It’s eating at my soul that I couldn’t protect her from being attacked and groped.
I’ve woken up a dozen times throughout the night staring up at the black nothingness in the room. Not because I’m cold from the fan, but because a little thought in my head has carved itself into my cranium. It won’t budge or move out of my head, and each time I wake up, I convince myself more that this isn’t going to work with Payton.
She cares about me, I know that. But since this started, I don’t truly think she wants a relationship with me. I don’t think she wants to be tied down by anyone. I think she likes the idea of dating me, but in the long run, she’s not going to come around and announce to the world I’m her boyfriend. If Paytondidwant more, Charlie would know atthis point. She wouldn’t hide me like the skeletons in her closet. Her admitting she lied to Charlie again proves it.
