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“I have no idea what you're talking about.”

“You're torturing yourself.”

“I don't need to torture myself. He handles that for me.”

Her expression softened.

I hated that too. Pity.

“I touched his shoulder,” I told her quietly.

She waited.

“He flinched.”

Her face changed.

“He actually flinched away from me.”

“Hazel—”

“And told me not to touch him.”

Sadie's eyes went toward the window. She looked back at me. “He’s an asshole.”

I had a gut reaction. “No, he isn't.”

She stared at me.

I sighed. “Okay. He is to me.”

“Which is the part that matters,” she insisted.

Outside, Megan laughed. My hand tightened around the towel.

Sadie noticed. Of course she did.

“Maybe you need to stop looking for reasons,” she said gently.

“For what?”

“To believe there's something underneath it.”

That hurt because it was true. Or maybe because I was terrified it was true. I looked through the window one more time.

Declan stood with his back partly toward me. Megan was close. Too close.

Sadie was right. Maybe there was nothing underneath. Maybe Declan Bishop really had stopped loving me.

Not romantically. Maybe he didn’t love me at all.

Megan reached up and touched his face.

He let her.

I looked away. This time I made myself keep looking away.

Clayton was never one to talk me out of trouble. Never. Mayhem was his nickname for a very legitimate reason.