Edge of Chaos (Love on the Edge #1) (19 page)

Done with the idea of knocking, I pushed open the door and walked inside.

Justin’s focus was intently on the flat screen in his living room, but Mark and Andy saw me. All their eyes were rimmed in red. So they’d been up all night, and from the look of the amount of beer cans strewn across the floor, they were probably still drunk.

Wonderful.

“Hey, Blake,” Andy said, rubbing his eyes before grabbing the controller sitting next to him. I gave him a closed mouth-smile, trying to keep the adrenaline in my veins from fully unleashing. Justin hadn’t officially bailed on me . . . yet. I took a deep breath.

“Justin?”

He finally noticed I stood in his living room. His eyes grew wide, recognition flickering behind them. “Oh, yeah, sorry. I meant to text you.”

My heart sank, the sensation so familiar it made me angry. I think I’d already known he would do this.

“Why?” I managed to ask.

He glanced around the room and then at the screen. “Isn’t it obvious? We’re still playing.”

“But you promised. We were going to . . .” The fight went out of me. The main hope I’d had for today was a good talk with him to clear the air but it quickly vanished.

Justin glared, visibly upset by my plea. He stood up, coming closer and lowering his voice. “Damn it, Blake, was the concert not good enough for you?”

“What?”

“Seriously, I took you, played nice all night. That should’ve bought me time. I shouldn’t have to do anything for a while now.”

My mouth dropped. “You only took me because you were . . . buying me off so I wouldn’t ask you to do anything with me?”

“Well, it sure as hell wasn’t because I liked the band.” He had the audacity to laugh then, turning to fist-bump Andy.

The laugh, paired with his nonchalance about blowing me off, for the umpteenth time, broke something within me. The last piece of my heart that cared about him, ached for his attention, his love, died. With it came a rushing sensation of clarity, and it was like my eyes were open for the first time in years.

Justin would
never
change.

And I was done being afraid to leave him. I chased tornadoes for God’s sake—I could do this, and I wasn’t waiting one more second. I would not be treated like garbage. Never again. I don’t know if it was Dash’s words last night, the fact that I
could
chase down a tornado and barely flinch, or the culmination of one too many emotional blows from Justin, but I was so fucking done.

I took a deep breath. “We need to talk,” I said, not letting my anger seep out. I would end this maturely. I glanced at Mark and Andy, suddenly grateful for their presence. Hopefully they could keep him calm and rational, prevent him from hurting himself . . .
if
he resorted to that again. Even if he did, though, I couldn’t take it anymore. Dash was right; real love wouldn’t place that on someone, and Justin’s actions made it clear he didn’t love me anymore.

He walked past me toward his bedroom. I followed him, pausing in the entryway, the door having disappeared from the last time he’d kicked it in. I shook my head at the memory, and it was like I saw it from a different angle—how the hell had I let it go on so long like this?

“What is it now?” Justin stood in the middle of his room, arms crossed.

Icy fingers curled around my heart, the image of him grabbing the nearest knife flashing in my mind. My fingers trembled, but I pushed on. “We have to stop this.”

Justin’s jet-black eyebrows scrunched his forehead. “Stop what?”

I motioned between us. “Us. All we do is fight—”

“Yo!” Mark called from the other room, cutting me off. “Justin, man, you’re up!”

Justin made to return to the living room, but I stepped in his way, placing my hand on his chest to stop him.

“This is really important, Justin,” I said, pinning him in place with my eyes.

He sighed. “So is this tournament we’re in.”

“No. Not now. We need to finish this conversation.”

Justin jerked away from my touch and nudged me out of his way. The ice melted, damn near evaporated with the rush of anger that flared within me.

“Justin,” I snapped, sharp enough to get him to stop before he made it to the living room. “I’m done,” I said as he turned around.

He tilted his head, giving me a look like he doubted my seriousness.

I walked toward him, stopping only a foot away. “I’m done. Now, we can talk about it like adults or you can go play your game. Either way, I’m sorry, but I’m done. I can’t do this anymore.”

His eyes cleared and he focused them more fully on me, as if he just realized I’d shown up at his place. “What are you saying?”

“I’m saying we’re through. And since we’ve been together so long, I thought you deserved a rational explanation, but if you’re more concerned about your video game tournament, then I don’t think it’ll make any difference.”

He glanced over his shoulder at Mark and Andy who were failing at acting like they couldn’t hear everything I’d said. He then turned back to me, grabbing my hand. “This is all over me not going to breakfast?”

“This has nothing to do with that. This has to do with the fact that we aren’t right for each other. That I’ve been drowning for the past few years and you haven’t even noticed.”

“Don’t do this now, Blake. Just . . . can’t we talk about this after the tournament is over? They need me.”

I jerked my hand away, his declaration of need for an online tournament sealing in my anger like a pressure cooker. I huffed and reached in my bag for my keys. “There is no later, Justin. There is now.” I gripped the cool key fob in my hand. I felt the need to explain myself, to even say I was sorry to leave him like everyone else had in his life, but he looked over his shoulder again, toward his friends, toward the game, and the words died in my throat.

“If the game is more important than hearing the end of us, then go. I don’t care. Honestly, you’ve done it to me so many times it doesn’t even sting anymore. But, Justin? Don’t hurt yourself, all right?”

He focused on me again, his eyes turning to slits. I was aware that Mark and Andy heard my plea, and I was fine with that. I wanted them to keep him level if he went off balance after I left.

“This is that asshole Dash’s fault.” He flexed his hands into fists at his sides.

“What the hell would he have to do with it?” I took a micro-step back, like his accusation had physically pushed me.

“Don’t play dumb! I saw the way you acted around him. He’s more than a fucking study-buddy and you know it.”

I opened and closed my mouth a few times before sighing. “You’re right. He’s actually become a really close friend, one I couldn’t tell you about—not because of anything awful like you assume—but because I knew you’d make me choose. You’ve
always
made me choose. You put your life in my hands every time I had an inkling of becoming someone other than your girlfriend, and I can’t do it anymore. I just . . . won’t.”

“I only force hard choices on you to keep you safe . . . which is with me. I’ve loved you since we were kids.”

The words stung, and maybe in some twisted way he believed them, but I didn’t. Not anymore. Not after realizing the way he treated me was no better than a doll he used to fuck. I sucked in a deep breath and shook my head.

He unclenched his fingers before balling them into fists again. “You’re really ending this? You’re leaving me after everything?”

“Yes.” Guilt threatened to swallow me whole. My worry over his safety had been a constant for years, and I couldn’t change that right this second. But the anger was there and the pain and the now crystal-clear knowledge things would never change. “We aren’t right—”

“Don’t,” he cut me off, raising his hand. “Don’t bother with the excuses.” He gave Mark and Andy a sideways glance before returning his focus on me. “And just so we’re clear, I only ever made that threat to keep you.”

An ice-cold bucket of water doused the fire burning in my veins. The cold was so instant my stomach rolled. “What?”

He shrugged, smirking at his friends. “Worked for a while.”

My mouth dropped, and I couldn’t find the right words. There weren’t any. Wait, yes there were.
Blake you’ve been a fucking idiot.
Those fit me to a T. I swallowed hard and steeled my nerves. I’d seen the blood drawn from the knife. Maybe he had done it to keep me, or maybe he only said that now to save face in front of his friends. Either way, I wasn’t sticking around to find out.

I gave him a slight nod, holding back tears.

“We’re done.” I turned on my heels, not bothering to shut the door behind me.

No sleep and a knock on my door before ten in the morning. I rubbed my palms against my cheeks, trying to restore life into my face. I swallowed hard, assuming I’d find Justin on the other side of the door.

Instead I found Dash holding two white paper cups. “I was hoping you’d left something in my truck after the concert so I’d have a legit reason to come over here this morning, but you’re annoyingly non-forgetful. Figured coffee was the next best excuse.”

I chuckled, the sensation breaking the sour fear that still churned in my stomach. “You know you never need an excuse to come over.”

“Good to know,” he said, setting the cups on the coffee table and petting a sleepy Hail. She’d agonized with me last night, despite not understanding what it was about.

I sighed and pinched the bridge of my nose, a fierce headache throbbing like an ice pick lodged in my brain.

“Hey,” Dash whispered, suddenly standing so close I could feel the heat coming off his body. “What’s wrong?” He pried my hand away and forced me to look in his eyes.

I pushed past him, sinking onto the couch and grabbing the coffee he’d brought. After a quick hot gulp, I found my voice. “I ended it.”

His eyebrows shot up before he smoothed his expression and took a seat next to me.

“Are you all right?” He didn’t need to ask why I’d done it.

“I’m more all right than I thought I’d be.”

“Why don’t I believe you?”

I glanced at him, my eyes squinting. “I hate it, but I’m worried about him. He didn’t give me a chance to explain or talk it out.”

“And you think that would’ve made a difference?”

I shrugged. “I thought it would. It meant something to me. To explain myself. To get closure. I was so angry with him because he was more concerned with his video game tournament. And the fact that he said he’d only ever threatened suicide to keep me with him. But I don’t know if that’s the truth or if he was just playing the tough man-card in front of his friends. I just left him there yesterday morning. Anything could’ve happened to him.”

“I’ve always thought it was a trap for you.”

A cold chill ran through me. “I know, but after all the threats and what I’ve seen him do . . . You can’t blame me for still being worried.”

He placed his hand on my back. “I don’t blame you. It’s natural you’d worry, but I don’t think you need to torture yourself over it.”

“Don’t I? I was all he had left. Everyone else left him, too, because of me.”

Dash shook his head. “Not possible. No matter what event led up to them kicking him out, their minds were already made up. It wasn’t your fault. And if you were really all he had left to hold on to in the world, he would’ve treated you differently.”

I pressed my lips together, the truth in his statement making me feel better and worse at the same time. “I’m so torn. Happy to be free, but terrified of bad news just around the corner. It’s like in a horror movie, you know something is about to jump out and scare the crap out of you, but it just hasn’t happened yet.”

Dash rubbed his hand up and down my back. After a few moments he stood up. “All right, you need distraction. That’s the key. So, you want me to go grab food or you up for a breakfast-lunch outing?”

“I think I’m up for a little distraction. I’ll go get dressed,” I said and stopped on the way to my room. “Thank you, Dash.”

Brunch turned into a two-hour event, followed by a trip to the weather lab on campus. After four hours of checking forecasts and mapping routes for the next week’s upcoming storm cells, we’d landed at Bailey’s for dinner and much needed beers.

I smiled at Dash over my half-eaten basket of chicken fingers. I had to give him credit. He’d successfully kept me busy all day and my thoughts well accounted for. My enthusiasm vanished as I set my beer bottle down on the table. Now that we weren’t moving, or talking, the thoughts I’d managed to keep at bay crept back inside.