The Bad Boy's Babysitter

• Chapter 25

Chapter 25 // Test The Truth

I should have assumed that Luke loved me the way you would towards a friend. But the way he said those three words this time made me feel like he didn't mean it like that at all.

So, I wasn't sure what I was so upset about; the fact that he dropped me a bomb at a time like this or the fact that I was stupid not to have realized it sooner. Maybe I had been blinded by our close-knitted friendship. And maybe I thought everything we did seemed normal for friends who spent half their lives together. I thought we came to a silent agreement that we were never to date or feel that way about each other.

But I thought wrong. As always.

Jade Greyson constantly being wrong for most things that were right smack in her face.

I stared at Luke, feeling my insides twist and my eyes swell. He looked back at me too, and in that moment, I realized I was so mad at him. "You jerk." I said, my voice wavering. "Why would you say that?"

"Because I do." Luke said, no hesitation. "I wouldn't say something I don't mean. Besides," He added. "I figured there wouldn't be a right time to say it."

"Now isn't the right time."

Luke shrugged, sighing simultaneously. "You better fix things with the bad boy."

With that, he took off.

He was so bloody selfish. How could he not tell me? My knuckles turned white from clenching my fist too hard, and I gritted my teeth from effort to remain silent, to keep myself from falling apart. But how could I when I was already feeling so shattered? You couldn't break something that was already in pieces.

And I couldn't believe Luke had the nerve to leave me. Just like what Carson had done. He was no different from the captain.

I stood there in the middle of the rooftop, wanting nothing more but for the earth to swallow me up. Anything to take away the ache in my heart and the exhaustion in my bones. I concluded that this may just have been karma. For not treating my mother right or for wanting to get back at Carson when we made the deal. Whatever it was that I had taken for granted, thinking I could get away with it.

I fell to my knees and allowed the heated concrete to graze my knees and burn it just the slightest bit. I should have been smarter to move into a shaded area, or to at least get away from this place because it was starting to bring bad memories. But instead, I just sat on my legs and cried silently, an action not new to me.

But then I felt a pair of arms wrap itself around me.

Under normal circumstances, I would have moved back from the stranger. But I was too miserable to do so, and at the back of my mind I was half hoping it would be Luke who chose to come back. I let whoever it was holding me, to hold me a little tighter. While doing so, I caught a familiar scent. When realization washed over me, I immediately sprung back in utter shock.

Looking back at me was none other than Carson Ford.

Carson bloody Ford.

It took me a while to let the scene unfold in my head. Carson, who seemed unaffected, just stared back at me with those firm sea-green eyes – the same ones that looked at me on the night of the Halloween dance.

I'm going crazy, I thought. After days of calling him and trying to get him to talk to me, he just appeared here. Just like that.

"F-Ford." I stuttered.

"Greyson." He said.

Okay. I'm going insane. My mouth ran dry and my stomach turned in an unfriendly way. I felt as if my brain were full of static, either firing off a million unhelpful thoughts at once or offering nothing at all. It also occurred to me that my eyes were probably red and puffy from crying all week. My hair must not have been in the best condition after the wind kept blowing it. And god, I was sitting there in the middle of a rooftop looking as pathetic as I'll ever be.