Page 76 of Fake Crown

I sigh. “I might have liked him a little. The tiniest bit. So small it’s hard to even see.” I present my thumb and forefinger with barely any space between them.

“You’ve been obsessed with him for years. Not surprised you came to care a little when your starting position was rampant lust.”

I gaze at Nick over her shoulder, and I give her a pointed look. “Uh-huh.”

She rolls her eyes. “Yes, he’s attractive. He knows he’s attractive, but he’s not the guy I used to know. He’s become the worst kind of manwhore.”

After having been sex shamed for the last few days, the whore comment makes me flinch. “I’m with Nick. Sex doesn’t have to mean anything.” Though I have to admit that I’ve enjoyed the meaningful sex I’ve been having with Brent much more.

Why, why, why do I have to think of him every minute of every day?

“Have you read his text yet?” Julia asks.

“No,” I say. The first line is visible in the preview—that we should talk when I get back—but if he doesn’t understand what I need from him, then there’s no need to talk. Destiny is right. If he’s not willing to defend me, I don’t want him.

Even if I really, really want him.

“He’s not the right guy for me,” I say, and somehow, I make myself sound far firmer than I really am. Because the truth is that we felt perilously close to having something genuine and real and lasting. But I can’t be with someone who believes everything bad will pass easily and with no consequences.

For the rest of the year, whether or not I’m with Brent, everyone will believe I was part of a cheating scandal. Any time my name comes up, that’ll be attached to the conversation.

Isn’t she the one who slept with Brent Faulkner in Bermuda while he was there with Valentina?

Turns out Brent Faulkner isn’t my knight in shining armor. He’s just like every other man. A disappointment. More than anything, I wish that thought didn’t make my heart constrict in my chest.

That night after dinner and way too many drinks for me, Julia knocks on my bedroom door. While she has her own apartment in the center of Tucker’s Town, she’s spent quite a few nights at Mom and Dad’s house. I think she’s worried about me, but there’s nothing to worry about.

I’ve been lying here for the last hour resisting the urge to read Brent’s text or to reach out to him. The last time I called him drunk, I ended up in Chicago, and if I called him now, there’s a chance I’d book a red-eye flight back to Michigan. The last few weeks, we’ve filled all our spare time with each other. It’s normal to miss a person who wiggled so deeply into your life, and this crushing pressure in my chest is withdrawal, but it doesn’t mean we’re supposed to be together. If I ever give this boyfriend thing another try, I want someone who is going to listen to me, who’ll support me when I need it, and who’ll recognize when I’m fading instead of flourishing. Brent seemed like he could be that guy, but I was definitely wrong on all counts.

After hesitating at the doorway, Julia perches on the end of my bed, and she examines the walls, which haven’t changed since I left for college four years ago. High school photos litter the room, and my black-and-white color scheme is still classic enough to have endured. It’s the only room I didn’t touch in my flurry of redecorating since I returned.

“Why didn’t you tell me things had gotten so bad online?” she asks.

“Have they gotten bad?” I curl into a ball on the bed and stare at the wall across from me. “I haven’t looked.”

“You really haven’t checked?”

“Not lately. Why would I look? Val spewed a whole bunch of lies about how I lured Brent away from her in Bermuda, and how we’ve been engaged in a secret affair behind her back for weeks. People ate the details like candy, and now I’m a social pariah on campus. Assholes I’ve never met think I should die for having sex. Not Brent, though. Nope. He’s the man. Two hot women? All that pussy? Score!”

Julia sucks in a deep breath. “I think it might actually be worse than that?”

“Worse than random strangers wishing I’d die? Doubtful.”

“Brent was at her apartment today.”

“What?” I sit up, and the room swirls. But I manage to grab her phone. “Show me.” The screen is blurry, and I blink to focus. Whatever she’s going to show me must be old. He wouldn’t get back together with her. He wouldn’t do that. Not after what she’s trying to do to me. My stomach dips into my toes.

She reaches across me and clicks on an app, and then Brent and Val are on the small screen, standing in the snowy parking lot of her apartment. There isn’t just one photo; there are three. Someone from campus must have snapped the pics. No one else would care. In the photos they’re talking in the parking lot, walking toward her apartment, disappearing inside.

Like everything else Brent touches lately, these photos have also gone viral with the hashtag reunion attached. The assholes have even tagged me as though I’ve gotten what I deserved.

I toss her phone toward the end of my bed and flop back into the blankets, staring at the ceiling. My brain won’t latch onto anything coherent. Instead, my chest feels like it might cave in. Tears prick at the back of my eyes.

Fucking Faulkner.

“She drags me all over campus, and he goes to her apartment? Do you think he’s back together with her?” My voice is so thick I don’t recognize it. The idea of him with her makes my stomach roll.

“I don’t know him,” Julia says. “It doesn’t look good. Maybe he went there to tell her to back off?”