The Heartbreaker [DISCONTINUED] || S.M.

Chapter 10 || "Unfiltered Truth"

"I'm not doing this." I say abruptly. I push back from the table, standing up from the chair. I begin to storm off, but of course, Shawn has to follow after me.

"You're going to take the zero?" he asks, following me out of the Starbucks and outside onto the quad.

"No, I'm just going to do the work on my own. I'm going to tell Marley that this was a mistake, and that you and me are incapable of working together."

"Who said we're incapable of working together?"

"I just did."

"Helaina," he breathes, grabbing my arm and spinning me around. I jerk my arm back, glaring at him.

"Don't touch me."

"If this is about last night-"

"Of course this is about last night!" I yell. "What the hell else would it be about?"

"Well, you got your answer!" he yells back. A part of me is surprised he's actually fight back. Shawn had seemed to be taking the more passive aggressive road lately. I blink.

"I never asked for you to kiss me. You can't just go around kissing people that you're not dating, especially if you're talking to someone!"

"That didn't seem to bother you when you kissed Ben. Or when you kissed me when you were dating Xavier. Or when you kissed Alex. Or Sebastian. Or Alex again." he shoots back, his voice full of venom. I swallow hard, my eyes turning glass at his low-blow.

"Wow, real mature of you to bring that shit up again. Then again, I don't know what I expected from a guy who saves my nudes and distributes then around."

I turn on my heel, quickly walking away.

"That was a month ago! Can't you just let it go already?"

"Oh, just like how you let go Ben kissing me our fucking junior year of high school?" I scream. "And sure, it might've been a month ago, but you still have the picture like the piece of shit you are, and you're never going to let me forget it!"

"What are you talking about?"

"Don't play dumb with me." I laugh. "You told me so yourself that you still have that picture of me."

"When did I say that?"

"Last night! God, are you really going to insult my intelligence that much? I was perfectly sober, Shawn. I think I can remember our conversation."

"Well, whatever I told you was a lie."

"And why should I possibly believe you?"

"Fine. Look through my phone if you really need to."

Without any hesitation, Shawn unlocks his phone and hands it over to me. I stare at him uneasily. For some reason, I can't help but feel like this is a trap. I mean, am I really out of line for thinking that? After what he did to me, I think my feeling of paranoia and distrust around him is completely warranted. Still, I take the phone from his hand and begin to look through it. I go through his photos, but there's nothing. I look through his recently deleted. Nothing. All of his messages older than 30 days are deleted. He doesn't have any other photo saving apps like Google Photos. As far as I can tell, Shawn really did delete my nudes.

I expected to be satisfied with this discovery, but it instead leaves me with the even bigger question of why he lied to me in the first place. I decide to ask him this.

"Okay," I begin, handing him back his phone. "So if you really did delete it, why would you lie to me last night?"

"Why do you think? I was angry and I knew it would be the easiest, most effective way to hurt you in the moment." he explains.