Page 21 of Winging it with My Ex
“Hadley… just?—”
“No.” Her voice cracks. “No, I’m done. I don’t play sports, and you don’t have three strikes. I’m tapping out, Jett. I never want to see you again.” She goes to shut the door but stops. “And tell Vivi to stay away from me too. Both of you can rot for all I care.”
The door slams in my face so hard that the current it kicks up knocks my hair out of my face.
The worst part? She’s not wrong.
We did plan it… sort of. Just not like she thinks.
Vivi had the idea to stage something light—just a paddleboat ride and a photo Greer could spin. I thought it was harmless. I’d never have gone along with it if I knew she’d end up soaked in a white shirt, humiliated in front of the whole town. I never wanted to hurt her… again.
But I didn’t stop it either. Didn’t come clean.
And now she thinks the whole thing was a setup—like we threw her in that pond on purpose. Like we played her.
I turn and walk down the steps, cutting through the crunch of old snow on her walkway. I reach the gate and pause.
I’m not doing that again. Not just walking away.
I race back to her door and shove the door so hard the hinges groan.
Her eyes are wild when they meet mine, and it takes her a second to catch up. “Get out!” She yells as she comes off the couch.
“No.”
Her face scrunches up. “This is my house. I said get out.”
“I said no. I walked away last time because I didn’t think I had a choice. This time, I’m not going anywhere until I say what I need to say,” I nearly growl it. Not angrily, but with some force, so she knows I’m serious.
She crosses her arms over her chest. “Well, you can talk, but that doesn’t mean I have to listen.”
I expect her to just stand there, but instead, she takes off at a sprint. Before I can catch up to her, she shuts her bedroom door and locks it.
fourteen
. . .
hadley
“Hadley,come on. I need to tell you—” I hear something thud on the floor. I’m guessing it’s a stomp. “Please, just hear me out.”
I press my back against the door and clench my fists. I can hear his voice—low, shaky—and I hate that it still does something to me. I hate that I care what he has to say. That somewhere in my chest, my heart is still waiting for him to make this make sense.
“Just text it to me. That seemed to work for you last time.”
I don’t care what he says. There’s nothing that can justify what he and Vivi have done. Nothing.
My doorframe creaks. I suspect Jett has braced his hands on it.
“Hadley, I didn’t want to leave you. I didn’t. The reason I did is that I had to. Dad was in rehab, and I needed the money. I didn’t want you to know?—”
His dad was in what? He needed… money?
The words rattle around in my brain, clashing against every story I used to believe. Every lie I thought he told. I freeze.
Then I lunge for the door and jerk it open. “We told each other everything, so now I know you’re just lying.”
Jett locks eyes with me, and I’m momentarily stunned by what I see in them. Anguish, regret, remorse, and a host of other emotions that I’ve never seen from him.
