Worse for Hope- Book #2 in the WF Series

Chapter 8: Bathroom

✮Rider's POV:✮

I'm back from "calling my mom" who I haven't even seen for a long-ass time, but I don't think I could face Beth's parents and her without screaming. Not in anger though, just screaming. I didn't know what I felt when I ran into her. It's surprising considering I've been waiting for this moment for three years. And that's no exaggeration. You would expect me to at least understand my emotions after dreaming about this moment for so long, but the mixture of hurt, pain, grief, happiness,...everything confused me more than anyone ever has.

God, I missed her. Beth, not my mom. I mean, I miss my mom too...not really. What was I talking about again? Oh right, Beth. Fuck, I missed her.

She's talking with Ivy, Alaiya, and a couple of other girls now, and my eyes will not concentrate on whatever the guys are going on about. I have problems concentrating anyways, but Beth makes it even harder to focus on anything besides her. Her perfect everything is kind of hard to look away from. The way her jeans hug her thighs so tightly and her shirt hugs her breasts so damn well. Her face is even more perfect than it used to be which is unexpected because seventeen-year-old me would've never been able to imagine that she could get better than her already flawless state. She cut her hair to her shoulders, and the fucked up thoughts I'm having to do to that hair and body even after what I did are spinning in my head like a torpedo.

I'm being a dick. It's like I'm ten and discovered porn for the first time. You should've seen my shock when I discovered girls don't have dicks. In my defense, I was actually trying to watch a movie illegally and the video just popped up.

Anyways.

I scan her body, look away, and scan it again twice because I can't stop. It literally hurt to see her step away from me in the bedroom, and the anger and sadness that I could see by the way she was biting the inside of her cheek sent a pang through my chest in the most brutal way possible.

I never wanted to do that to her. That was a promise I made to myself and yet I still broke it. I broke it in a way that I couldn't have even imagined myself breaking it.

As she's talking, her head looks away from giving that small smile toward Ivy which is the best smile I have ever seen on anyone in my entire life.

She looks at me.

Her brown eyes meet mine, my entire world stopping right there. Her perfectly, heart-shaped lips go into an emotionless line, her body stiffening. I can't tell if her eyes are glassy from the resentment she feels towards me or the hurt I caused. She has the right to feel both either way.

All of a sudden, as I'm gawking admittedly, a hand slaps the back of my head, and I ow in pain because I think I was taken out of existence for a second.

What the hell!

I look over at Roman in annoyance who's glaring at me with his jaw ticked.

"What the hell was that for?" I rub the back of my head which I think has a dent now.

"Out of all people, you had to pick someone out of my family!" He ushers in anger.

My eyes widen instantly as to what he's talking about.

Oh, so he never realized in high school when we were literally staring at each other every five seconds, but now, when I'm just checking her out and she's a million miles away from me; physically and mentally, he suddenly has 20/20 vision. He picks and chooses when to be observant.