Bastard.
We enjoy our meal in a relatively comfortable silence, looking out at the view of the hills. The sun shines on his golden skin, and when our eyes meet, it’s easier to make out the green flecks in his eyes. It’s a blend of beautiful colors fit for a beautiful man.
“So,” I say, placing my now empty mug on the table. “Should we talk now?”
Baz nods slowly, almost thoughtfully, moving his gaze toward the sunny hills. “I probably should’ve warned you about the guys. They can be … protective.”
I mull that over. “Have they always been that way? I mean, I get it. I can be protective of the girls, too, but to what extent?”
Baz laughs, but it’s without humor. “The guys don’t have limits. They take things too far, and more often than not, I’m left to clean up the mess.” My eyes shoot toward him at the admission.
What does that mean?
“Bringing a woman into the mix is always frightening for them. It’s why the bachelor lifestyle works for all of us. We don’t have to worry about a woman changing the dynamic of our friendship. It’s been the five of us for as long as I can remember. We’ve always had each other’s backs and bringing you to the gala was—”
“It was like I was stepping in on their territory, wasn’t it?” I sigh, shaking my head. “That definitely explains why they all felt the need to belittle me last night.” Baz’s lips thin at the news. Obviously, the idea of me being hounded by the guys doesn’t sit well with him.
Reaching across the table, I take his hand in mine, diverting his attention from the scenery to me.
“Look, Baz, the last thing I want to do is cause rifts between you and your friends. There’s no telling what this”—I gesture between us—“is, but while I’m here, I do want to see where it goes. So if that means I need to prove to your friends that I’m not a threat, I’ll do it. What about dinner? Or we can pop in at the club?”
A frown mars his face at the suggestion. “They’re not going to like it, but if you’re comfortable being around any of them again, especially Trent, I can … I’ll see what I can do.”
I smile in victory, popping a kiss on his cheek. I finish off most of the fresh fruit on my plate, turning back to gaze at the hills. Baz wasn’t lying when he said the guys wouldn’t be happy about me inserting myself into their lives, but after the way they tried to bully me last night, they have it coming. I’ll play the part of the sweet “girlfriend,” but what they won’t know is I’ll be there to take them down. No matter what the cost.
“I didn’t know you had a sister.”
I pause with my fork halfway to my mouth. Dread takes root in my belly as I try to process why he’d say this. Slowly, I lower the strawberry, the fork clanging against the plate as I turn toward Baz, the color slowly draining from my face.
“How did you …?” I can’t even finish the sentence. I’m thrown for a loop because this is exactly what I’ve tried to steer clear of. Baz remembering me. My two lives colliding.
Mackenzie and Scarlett.
The real me and the false prophet.
“At the gala, I heard you talking to Ava.”
Tightness grips my chest when I hear her name. I still don’t want to dwell on the fact that I’ll probably never see her again. She was a little slice of heaven while I was dealing with the assholes from the Sixth Circle of Hell.
I replay the conversation I had with her last night in my head, and I silently curse myself for spilling parts of my real life. He heard. There’s no denying it now. Now, it’s just the waiting game to see if he’ll put the pieces of the puzzle together.
I swallow and work to keep the tremble in my tone steady. Just the thought of speaking about Madison with Baz feels wrong, but in a way, it also feels right to share this part of my life with him. I’ll just need to bend the truth a little.
“That friend I was telling you about?” He searches my face in silence, waiting for me to go on. “I was really talking about my sister. I don’t know why I didn’t just say it. Maybe it’s because I try not to think of her very often, but that’s impossible. She’s everywhere. Even when I wish she wasn’t.” Baz’s eyes soften, and my own start to sting. It’s not even for show. Every time I say her name out loud, it takes me back. It brings me back to the pain her death brought our family. “We were twins,” I whisper, my throat tightening with emotion. “She was always so … beautiful and extraordinary, and compared to her, I was always second best. It was always a competition with her. She had everything on me, and she knew it; yet, it was like she always had to push harder. Leave me in the dust just to show me what I was worth.” A tear glides down my cheek, and I swipe it away angrily, hating that after nine fucking years, I still can’t seem to hold it together when it comes to Madison.
There were times I wanted to hate her—hell, there’s a small, minute, part of me that still does. After everything she put me through, after the way she treated me from the moment we entered high school, I should despise my twin sister. I should’ve said good riddance after her death and went on to live an extraordinary life. But the bigger part of me that loves her won’t let that happen. I love Madison, despite all the bad.
“Mackenzie, you don’t have to finish. I get it.” The understanding on his face makes me shake my head because he doesn’t get it. Even though we hated each other, I still loved my sister with my entire heart, and without her here, I’ve been fading. I’ve been dying without my other half.
“Even though we fought like hell, she was still … everything I wasn’t. I looked up to her. She was the beautiful version of myself I wished I could one day grow into. The night she died, we fought.” I laugh without humor, sniffling. “We always fought, though, so that wasn’t really a surprise. But … I keep thinking, maybe if I’d done something different, then maybe she’d still be here. Maybe she would’ve had the opportunity to live her life much better than I’ve lived mine.”
Baz drags my chair toward him, leaning into me so our gazes are level. With a gentle touch that is so unlike him, he swipes the tears off my cheeks. We stare at each other. Me, my eyes glimmering with tears and him, looking gentle and well put together. My heart starts to grow angry because even though he’s wiping away my tears, his friends and possibly even him had a hand in Madison’s death. Had a hand in taking her from me.
I grind my teeth together, fire suddenly soaring through my veins. “But she’ll never get to do that. She’ll never get to live the life she was always meant to because someone thought they could play God. Someone took it upon themselves to take her from me. To ruin my family. And the real kicker is I still don’t understand why. All these years later, I still don’t have the answers I need.”
Baz’s expression clouds with anger. “You mean they never caught the son of a bitch? Wasn’t it a boyfriend, the one she was dating?”
And this is where it gets tricky. Because I said my best friend had moved and her boyfriend there had hurt her. How the hell do I possibly connect both stories without jogging his memory?
“My sister was angry when we had to move. She had to leave her friends and her boyfriend behind. Sometimes, she wouldn’t tell anyone when she’d go back to visit. And one night, she just never came back. They found her body a few days later. He had an alibi, so it could’ve been someone else. It might’ve been.”