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“Jared.” His name came out softer than I’d planned. Where was the confidence I’d been rehearsing in my head the whole way over?

It was Owen who looked at me. Jared continued staring at his glass. It was dark brown, and I was sure it was alcoholic.

“Jared, you at least owe me a conversation.”

“Do I?” He spoke without turning. He swirled the ice around in his glass. “I wasn’t aware I owed you anything.”

Hailey smacked him in the back of the head. “Quit being an asshole.”

“What?” He looked at her, still not at me. “If I owed something to every girl I fucked, I’d be paying debts the rest of my life.”

My vision tunneled. Did I really mean that little to him? I had to press on. “I had no idea what I was, not that I have to explain myself to you.”

He finally looked at me. His eyes were cold and empty. The emptiness was so much worse than the anger I expected to see there. “No. You don’t. Just like I don’t have to pretend you exist.”

Normally I’d have been crying, but the ache in my chest became something else entirely. I felt a twitch in my back and knew my body wanted to transform. I let the anger wash over me, but I forced myself to stay in control. “Like I don’t exist? You don’t have to make this so much worse. You want to pretend I’m no more than a girl you slept with? Fine. But you can’t avoid me.”

“Just because Levi decided to acknowledge his bastard sister doesn’t mean I have to.”

My hand moved on its own volition. My palm made contact with his cheek in what felt like slow motion. His head jerked sideways. Then he had his own hand on his cheek with his mouth gaped open.

I turned away. “Good seeing you again, Owen.”

“Same to you, Casey.” Owen gave me a tight smile. He felt bad for me.

I didn’t need his pity, but I needed to act tough. I forced a smile at him before I headed right back to the front door of the hotel. I made it back to Hailey’s Jeep before the tears started. They started lightly, barely noticeable drops of warm salt sliding down my face, but then they changed. I sobbed, and Hailey just sat there. She didn’t put a hand on me, she didn’t make sounds of understanding, and that silence was the greatest gift she could have given me. She gave me the chance to grieve without being alone. I spent an hour that way. We sat in Hailey’s Jeep while cars drove by and happy tourists strolled past. I thought over the night we spent together and then the tears stopped. It had been a night. It was an intense and passionate experience, but it wasn’t a relationship. I’d made a mistake spending that night with Jared, but that’s all it was, and it was a mistake I wouldn’t make again. I began to laugh.

Hailey looked over questioningly, but she remained silent.

I was lucky. I found out my true nature before my feelings for Jared could become something more, before my memories would take an entire night to relieve instead of a few minutes. I was also stupid, but I couldn’t dwell on that part yet. “We can go.”

“Yeah?” Hailey fiddled with the driver’s side visor.

“Yeah.”

“Okay. I know what you need.” She pulled away from the curb and drove back uptown. I stared out the window the whole time, trying to get lost in the scenery instead of the dull ache in my chest. Rejection never got easier, not even when you expected it, but I could get stronger. How I responded to rejection was entirely up to me.

One large frozen strawberry daiquiri later, and I was starting to feel like myself again. Who knew there were actually drive through daiquiri stores? Obviously, the alcohol and sugar couldn’t do anything to make Jared’s words hurt less, but I took what I could get. I leaned back on my hands, dangling my feet over the edge of the building. Hailey had taken me to one of her favorite places. The roof of an abandoned house a few miles outside the city. We arrived just before sunset, and now the sky was completely dark. The night was warm, and I was comfortable in a fitted t-shirt and jeans. I could have stayed up there all night.

“You feeling any better?” Hailey watched me with concern. She’d been mostly quiet, seemingly lost in thoughts of her own. There was so much I didn’t know about her, but it wasn’t the time to find out. She’d open up to me eventually.

I took a final sip of the sweet, frozen drink. “Yeah. I’m going to be okay.”

“Yeah. You are.” She smiled. “Tell me when you’ve recovered enough to talk about Allie’s party.”

“I’m ready.” I still felt ready to throw up, but focusing on the negative wasn’t going to help me. Jared had clearly moved on, so it was time for me to do the same.

Chapter Twelve

Jared

I don’t like being an asshole. I really don’t. Sure, I like pushing buttons and messing around with people, but hurting someone I cared about sucked. It seriously sucked. I just kept seeing her face. That look of complete and utter devastation and betrayal that filled her eyes and made her lips, those damn gorgeous and perfect lips, quiver with anger. I’d only done what I had to do. There was no reason to regret it. She’d move on if she hadn’t already. So would I.

I tried to get drunk. I tried to get shit faced to make the feelings disappear, but it didn’t work. I switched to shots, but they eventually wore off, making me feel even worse. Those eyes. Why couldn’t I get them out of my head? And her voice… the voice she used when she spoke to me, so different from the breathy one she used in the heat of passion. Why her? Why did the one girl who managed to physically fulfill me and who made me actually feel alive have to be a Pteron? It wasn’t fair. I replayed the night for the millionth time in my head. For once, it wasn’t her body I focused on, but her words.

I’ve never been able to give myself to someone so completely before.

Yeah?

The one guy I was with… I didn’t even like having the lights on.

I’d be able to see you even in the dark.

I know… and I like that.

I took another shot before burying my head in my hands. I needed to be numb. I needed to stop picturing the way her eyes lit up and her chest heaved when I was inside her. This was ridiculous. She was just a girl. Just a stupid Pteron girl I needed to forget.

“You look like shit.” Owen broke his silence. I gave the guy a hard time, but he knew when I didn’t need his nagging. Well, most of the time he did.

“I feel just about that good.” We were at one of the hole in the wall bars near our house. I needed to be somewhere that I couldn’t possibly run into her.