Deception. Betrayal. Mistrust.
It seems the closer Rayne gets to the truth, the more she finds herself wanting to run away from it. It's complex and terrifying-more than she ever fathomed.
New family members, good and bad, pop out at her like a br...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
𝗜t had been about a week since the last time he entered the living quarters of the secondary team. He blew all of them off, including Maverick, by convincing him that he had other things to do; in reality, he spent his days locked in his room, playing video games, waiting for the phone call that stated Jonah got the warrant to search Clarke's office.
It took him all day to decide on coming here.
Closing the front door behind him, he walked past the main entrance and wandered into the kitchen. Snagging one of the closed water bottles on the island, he took a seat and threw some of it back.
If he was being completely honest with himself, the biggest reason why he'd been dodging this place was not that he wanted to distract himself due to the case, no. It was because of the person he was involved with that lived here; part of him knew that he owed him nothing, but most of him thought it was unfair, the way he treated him.
Pushing him to the side, despite the label of a rebound wasn't cool on his side of things. And the longer he spent being this selfish, asshole façade of himself, the more his guilt crawled into his mind, stemming from his brain to all areas. He had never been the type of person to belittle others as much as he has lately, yet he couldn't figure out how to stop it.
Pumping the brakes was hardly enough; he could slow down with Maverick as much as he wanted to—and he had, but they still ended up in the same spot. He was a sore thumb, ruining everyone around him, and Mav was getting absolutely nothing but reprimanded.
While his words that day sounded sick and twisted, he understood where he was coming from more than he wanted to admit. If Kai ever did that to him—
Mason shook his head, ridding that thought from his mind.
It's my fault.
I made him this way.
Taking his phone out, he texted a message to him, asking when he would be returning to the house. He wanted to go wait in his room and avoid the others, but he knew that an expectation would be waiting for him for doing so; at least like this, the thoughts were just speculation.
Maverick replied a minute later, expressing that he'd be there within five.
Annoyed by his lack of time management, he laid his phone out in front of him and placed either hand on the side of his face. He stared at the message chats between his friends, Maverick, and then the two at the bottom; the ones that ate at his heart and erased any and all thought-through decisions.
Suddenly inquired by one of those, he clicked on Kai's contact and scrolled up. He scrolled and scrolled, waited for the messages to load, and then continued—all until he got to the messages that were shared between them before they slept together.
Mason pulled his lip between his teeth as he read them over and over again, moving the screen barely each time—he wanted to suck up every pinch of feeling he got out of reading them again. Honestly, just seeing something of his—forgotten words in the shapes of grey bubbles—made his heart beat a little faster and his throat jam.
