Nightfall (Devil's Night #4) - Penelope Douglas Page 0,196

you remember that pool party Michael and the guys took you to when you first moved to Delcour?”

Erika nodded, hopping off the stool and walking over to sit in the chair next to Alex.

“Aydin was there that night,” Alex told us. “He went to Yale with one of Michael’s teammates, and we hadn’t seen each other in a long time.” She paused, and I could see the memory playing behind her eyes. “The more I drank, the more I hated him, and the braver I got.”

Why did she hate him? I’d gotten pieces of a story at Blackchurch. He wanted her. He denied it, because of family pressure. She survived without him.

Alex looked over at me. “I was roommates with his girlfriend in college, you see?” she told me. “We played together one night while he watched us over Skype. That’s how we met.”

Played? I couldn’t imagine that. I couldn’t imagine Aydin in college. Experiencing youth like a real human.

I could see her, though. Performing for him. Taunting him.

“You should’ve seen his eyes.” Alex closed hers for a moment as everyone listened. “It was like he was in pain or something. I could almost feel his breath and the heat in his arms.” She opened her eyes, lost in thought. “And then a few nights later, he wanted me to himself, but when push came to shove, he couldn’t step up, and he chose her.”

I remained in my spot as Will dropped down into the sofa on my right.

Alex shrugged. “It was okay. He wasn’t mine to begin with. I had no right.”

Setting her glass down, she exhaled and continued, glancing at Erika. “The night of the pool party, I’d heard they weren’t together anymore, and when he couldn’t stop looking at me across the room, the stronger I got,” she told us. “But I wasn’t going to let him win. I wasn’t a dog, sitting there waiting for his affection.”

“What did you do?” I asked.

But it was Will’s voice I heard next. “You let me take off your top in the pool.”

Another man taking her top off in front of him…

“And he was watching,” I said.

Alex tipped her chin up, the pride covering up the pain from a few moments ago. “Life goes on,” she said, “and my bed wasn’t cold. I wanted him to know he didn’t matter, and I wasn’t ashamed of anything I’d done. He didn’t exist.”

And Aydin couldn’t look at her, but he didn’t want his fiancée anymore, either. He got sent to Blackchurch over it.

She looked over at Will. “Everyone looked at me. Your hands on me.”

“And then everyone else got naked in the pool,” Will continued.

Alex’s gaze drifted off. “And he watched me look at you and you look at me and knew that he’d lost.”

“And what did you win?” I asked.

Believe me, I knew something about staying on your feet and not letting anyone get the better of you, but she’d been hiding behind Will to fend off the loneliness and despair.

Because when they enabled each other in their vices, they felt accepted and didn’t have to face the harder road ahead.

That road was inevitable.

“Not everyone is born knowing their path is from point A to point B, Alex,” I bit out. “You and Will are the same. You sit up there on your high horse, all ‘love conquers all’ and shit, and refuse to understand that there are impossible choices others have to make, but it doesn’t mean we don’t love.”

My voice grew harder, and I glanced around the room and then back to Alex.

“Does it suck? Yes!” I yelled, feeling Will’s eyes on me. “But do you understand it? I know you do. Sometimes the uncertainty seems like more of a risk than just staying with what’s familiar. It takes time to grow that courage. Don’t you understand that?”

They could all do whatever they wanted in high school, and now years later in Thunder Bay, because Damon was right. The villain was just a matter of perspective. It was as easy as pie for them to judge me, because on the rare occasion they weren’t doing fucked-up shit themselves, they got these splendid little attacks of sanctimony when it came to anyone outside their little group.

“You’re so self-righteous,” I snarled, looking around the room. “All of you.”

I lashed out and kicked the table so that the vase sitting on it toppled over. Alex tensed, a fire lighting in her eyes.

Will sat there like ice.

“You’re not good enough for me,” I