Page 107 of Dirty Player
I flew out of the hotel, only thankful I’d managed to park on the street and not valet.
That look in his eyes when he’d seen me.
I cried when I got to my car, my hands shaking so badly that I couldn’t control myself, couldn’t get my key in the ignition.
Everything about that moment.
It hurt more than when I’d seen Patrick. Then, I’d been angry.
This wasn’t anger rolling through me so hard it seemed to take forever for me to stop crying enough that I could drive away.
Never, in all of that, did he come to look for me. He didn’t call. He didn’t text or explain.
He had just stood there, looking at me like I was nothing to him.
Chapter TWENTY-SIX
OLIVER
Fuck. Fuck fuckfuck.
“Well, you totally screwed that up.”
I dropped my hands to my sides and glared at Bethany. Bethany who was in only a damn robe and had just come over to drag my ass out of bed because the night before I’d gotten so fucking drunk in the hotel bar that she’d had to practically carry me to my room.
She’d only come over that morning to make sure I was still alive and bring me coffee.
“What the fuck?” I asked. My mind was moving too slow—the result of too much tequila. It barely registered that Shannon was inside that elevator before it closed.
“If it helps, I told her it wasn’t what it looked like.” Her nose scrunched and she looked at the elevator doors. “I don’t think she believed me.”
A harsh laugh escaped me. “You think? Damn it.” My hands went to my face again and I tried to scrub away the remainder of the hangover pounding at my temples.
I’d been a dick to her.
A complete, fucking dick. I had no excuse and I had to make it right.
“Bethany,” I said, turning toward my friend. “She’ll never forgive me for this. Never, not after her ex—”
She rolled her eyes and let her Southern drawl flow free. “Not if you stand here talking to me. Goafterher. You spent hours last night droning on and on about how much you loved this woman, and she was here even after you said those things to her. Go explain it. All of it.”
I couldn’t. Not now. Not when my head hurt too much to think straight. Not when she’d just seen what she thought she saw.
Fuck. We were both half-naked.
There was absolutely no way she was going to believe me.
“Damn it!” I balled my hands into fists and forced myself not to punch the wall.
For two days, I’d sat with my father, fucking pissed at myself for the awful things I’d said to her, the way I’d handled her. Beaux had said nothing when he’d shown up at the hospital with most of the team to support me and my dad. He’d wanted to hit me.
I could see it in the glare in his eyes and the tenseness in his body.
“Oliver, go to her. Go talk to her. Make her understand.”
Bethany was sweet. Too innocent for her own damn good. The very fact that she thought that would work—after Shannon’s past and her lack of ability to trust again—told me she didn’t fucking get it.
“I can’t. I’ve got to shower and get my parents home. Damn it.”
