The Naughty List (The Naughty List #1)(59)

“You let him touch you here,” he whispered. “And now …” His thumb paused in the middle of my lip. “I can never kiss you again.”

Dropped. My stomach dropped as his eyes glassed over, and then he moved his hand and broke from me. He walked across his room, and I tried to breathe. I wasn’t sure I could. I heard his bedroom door creak open.

“Go home, Tessa,” he said to my back.

I couldn’t turn. Please. Let this not be real. Let me wake up. Please.

“Tessa?” And he was pleading. He wanted me to go. This was the warning before he became rude.

Blinking quickly, I turned to look at him. He stared past me, looking at the wall above my head. He wasn’t going to forgive me.

I walked to the door, pausing in front of him, looking up and waiting for him to see me. Finally, his green eyes flicked to mine. They were sad. So very, very sad.

“Goodbye, baby,” he said, letting his voice crack.

My lip quivered and I wanted to grab him. But he put his hand on my back and pushed me gently through the door. He walked me downstairs and left me on his front porch. Aiden didn’t even look at me again before he shut the door, locked it, and left me outside. Alone.

SOS DISCIPLINARY ACTION

FROM: Leona

TO: Kira

You have violated one or more of the SOS rules and are therefore subject to disciplinary action. You are hereby suspended for one mission for violating the rule(s) marked below:° Confirming a cheat with insufficient evidence

° Violating the gag rule

° Reinvestigating a subject (double jeopardy)

° Making personal calls during a mission

° Intervening with a cheat in progress

° Spying on a non-subject

Other:X Hooking up with the subject of investigation!

X Wearing heels while on a mission

SOS

Text: 555-0101

Exposing Cheaters for Over Two Years

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

KIRA TOOK ME TO THE EMERGENCY ROOM AFTER Aiden called her to come pick me up. It was sweet of him to make sure I got home okay, even though he wasn’t willing to do it himself. At one point while I was walking, I thought I’d heard someone following me, but when I turned, no one was there. I chalked it up to head wound delusions.

Kira had picked me up about a block away from Aiden’s house and driven directly to Good Samaritan Hospital. When we got there, the blue plaster walls were filled to the brim with patients. But the nurses quickly evaluated me. Probably because I was still in uniform.

I needed a stitch, but luckily, I didn’t have a concussion. And although I asked, there was no medication for a broken heart.

As Kira and I waited in the lobby for me to be called back, the nurse gave me a gauze pad that I held to my forehead. My life was shattered, and my brain was throbbing. Things would never be okay.

“I’m not trying to be nosy,” Kira said from the hard plastic chair next to me. “But what exactly happened when you and Christian were in his car?”

I didn’t want to tell her. I’d glossed over the details the first time for a reason. No, all I wanted right now was to listen to coughing patients and the hum of the monitors.

“I’m a horrible person, K,” I mumbled, staring at the receptionist behind the desk. She had on those chic, beehive-frame glasses with a dainty silver chain dangling from them, looped around her neck. I’d have to tell Leona about them. They were fabulous.

Kira gasped. “No, you’re not, Tess. You’re the greatest person I know.”

I scoffed. “I kissed Christian,” I said, turning to stare at her. “I was upset and I cheated on Aiden. What kind of person does that make me?”

My best friend smiled and reached out to take the gauze from my head, checking my wound. “It makes you a regular person, Tessa Crimson. You can’t be spot-on all the time. You made a mistake. Aiden will get over it.”

She refolded the bandage and applied pressure. She was too good to me, but she was wrong. Aiden would never forgive me. I saw it in his eyes tonight.

“I don’t deserve you,” I said, feeling it was true. “I don’t deserve to be a Smitten Kitten.”

Kira squeaked and touched her chest. “Are you kidding?” She stood up in front of me and tilted her head. “Last year when I was dating all those football players, who told me that I was more than a piece of tail?”

I looked at her. “I did.”

Kira glanced around the room, not seeming to care that people were watching her. “And who saved Leona from that Kitten fight at the pool with Lucy McGill after Leona called her fat?”

“Me.”

“Who told Izzie that being adopted was better than having regular parents because it meant they’d handpicked her?”

I nodded. I saw what Kira was doing, but it wouldn’t help. I had guilt so deep in my skin that I didn’t know if I could ever perk up.

Kira leaned down, putting her hands on either side of my chair. She got close to my face. “And who”—her eyes began to water—“was there for me when my dad left?”

I sniffled. “Me.”

“And that’s because you’re a great person. You’re the queen bee for a reason.”

I nearly burst into tears as I reached out and hugged her. The smell of her strawberry shampoo filled my nose and set me at ease. I could always count on Kira.