A Truth and a Lie

by V. Sousa

  “Hold up. You never told me you needed a ride back too.”

  “Well, how else are we supposed to get back? Uber? Walk? Do you want us to get kidnapped?”

  “Fine.” He sighed in defeat. “I’ll pick you guys up, but I have some things to take care of, so watch two movies or something.”

  “k bye” She slammed the door, and Tommy sped off.

  Turning to me, she asked, “Are you ready?”

  That was a loaded question if I’d ever heard one. “As I’ll ever be, but first, we have to look and see where Lorenzo is. I don’t want him telling my father that we’re not at the movies but at a twenty-one-plus club instead.”

  Looking around both sides of the sidewalk, I spotted him leaning against a tree, and I marched straight up to him. It was better to come off abrasive. That way, he would think twice about arguing with me.

  I popped out in front of him, and he quickly jumped back. I always enjoyed the look of shock he got on his face when I spotted him, and he thought he was incognito. Don’t get me wrong, he was very stealthy and could keep quite a low profile, but I’d been dodging guards my whole life, so finding him was easy.

  “Lorenzo,” I said when he started to open his mouth.

  “Rose.” He cocked an eyebrow at me.

  Lorenzo Moretti, my bodyguard for about six years now, tall as fuck, smooth tanned skin, black hair, and deep blue eyes that always looked like his thoughts were very far away from here, and most importantly, he was my other best friend.

  “So, Claire and I are going to the club across the street, but if my father asks, I want you to confirm that we are at the movie theaters.” I smiled at him.

  Lorenzo pinched the bridge of his nose and huffed. “Not happening, Rose. You know I can’t do that. Are you crazy?”

  “See, I thought you would say that, so I’m prepared to offer you a deal. In return for your discretion, I won’t tell Father about the ‘break’ you took the other day at the mall when you went to go fuck that blonde chick with the big boobs in the dressing room of Express. And before you say anything, yes, I knew, and no, I won’t tell, but only if you don’t tell him about this.”

  Lorenzo searched my eyes to see if I was bluffing or not. “Fine. But if he finds out, you have to say you threatened my life or something, and I’m going in with you, no disappearing on me when you get inside either.”

  “Deal.” I held out my hand, but he was hesitant to shake it.

  “Just shake it, for goodness sakes,” I said, shoving my hand in his.

  Reluctantly, he shook my hand and laughed. “Are you sure you don’t want to take over when your dad retires? You’d be a really good asset.”

  Yeah, that was going to be a hard no from me. I gave Lorenzo a sharp “Positive” and grabbed Claire’s hand.

  He probably regretted his words because he gave me a sad smile and apologized.

  I looked at Claire, still holding her hand. “You ready?”

  “Yeah, let’s go,” she said, wearing the same sad smile as Lorenzo.

  We checked to see if any cars were coming and made our way across the street. As I walked toward the end of the line, Claire grabbed my arm, tugging me in the opposite direction, toward the bouncer. “I am not waiting in that long-ass line. Follow my lead.”

  She walked right up to the bouncer and lightly grabbed his arm with a sultry smile. “Hey, handsome. So, my friend here and I were hoping you could let us skip the line. She and her boyfriend just broke up, and we’re trying to have little fun, but I don’t want to kill my buzz by sitting in the line.” She said with a pouty face at the end to add to her little show.

  The bouncer looked her up and down, then shifted his gaze to me and proceeded to look me up and down.

  After his viewing or whatever you call it, he finally smiled and licked his lips. “Sure, baby, you got your ID’s on you?”

  Moment of truth…

  “I do, but my birthday isn’t for a few months, and as I said, I want to have a good time,” she said with a wink.

  He looked inside the entry of the club and then around us, “Fine, you can go in, but don’t get yourselves into any trouble.”

  She gave him a big smile in return and kissed him on the cheek. “Thank you. I appreciate it, babe.” She grabbed my hand once more and pulled me into the club.

  I looked back to check on Lorenzo, and that’s when I noticed that Lorenzo gave the bouncer a head nod and walked right in behind us with no problem.

  I turned back to Claire to see if she’d noticed, but she was too busy looking around to have seen the exchange. “Hey, didn’t you say this place just opened?” I yelled to her over the music.

  It took a minute for Claire to understand what I was asking since it was so loud in here. “Yeah, why?”

  That was weird. How would Lorenzo already know the bouncer? He definitely didn’t work for my father because I’d never met him, and my father only ever dealt with clubs of the stripper variety.

  We walked further into the club, and just as I had suspected, it was packed with people, bodies surrounded by bodies, sweating and breathing all over each other. On the plus side, though, this place was heavily air-conditioned and wasn’t as hot as I’d expected. It was still hot as fuck, don’t get me wrong, but not get me the hell out of here hot.

  Claire pulled me straight toward the bar and ordered four lemon drop shots. She barely had the order out when I heard a guy to the left of us ask the bartender to make us two more shots on him.

  And that brought us to reason number one of why I hated going to clubs. Guy buys girl a drink, and then girl feels obligated to dance with the said guy and/or talk to him as a form of thanks.

  We downed all six shots easily because lemon drop shots went down like juice, but just as I thought we were in the clear with the guy and he wasn’t going to talk to us, I heard him clear his throat loudly.

  “You ladies come here often?” He must have gotten really close because I felt his breath gliding across the back of my neck as he spoke.

  I turned around to look at him and was surprised to find that he was kind of cute—light brown eyes, dirty blonde hair pulled up into a man bun, and a smirk on his face.

  I wasn’t usually the type to flirt, but since everything was going to shit, I might as well throw all caution to the wind.

  I gave him the sweetest smile I could conjure and shook my head. “No. This is my first time here. Thank you for the drinks, by the way.”

  “No problem,” he replied. “You girls want another round?”

  Claire wasted no time popping her head out from behind me and giving him a strong yes.

  I guess he really wanted us drunk because he ordered another two shots for us and four shots of jack honey for himself and his friend that I just noticed was seated next to him.

  He lifted his shot in the air and winked at me. “Cheers to new friends.”

  “Cheers,” Claire said, and all four of us clinked our glasses together.

  “I didn’t catch you two beauties’ names,” the one next to me asked while putting his hand on the back of my chair.

  “Well, I’m Rose, and this is Claire. And yours?”

  “Landon and this is my buddy, Dave. You ladies wanna dance?”

  Now, normally, I would politely decline, but I did just take four shots, plus the shots from earlier, so my ability to think clearly had gone out the window. I was definitely feeling them now. I looked at Claire to see what she thought, and when she got up and grabbed Dave’s hand, I followed her lead and grabbed Landon’s.

  I looked back at the bar to make sure I didn’t leave anything behind when I noticed the bartender staring at me and talking, but nobody was there, and he wasn’t on the phone.

  I was too drunk to put too much thought into it, so I turned back around and let Landon lead me away.

  We were barely on the dance floor when Landon grabbed my hips and started aggressively grinding into me. I was instantly annoyed because he already had a hard-on,
and I’d barely touched him. I didn’t know what kind of girl he thought I was, but this definitely wasn’t it.

  I tried to pry his hands that were currently digging into my hips really hard off me, but he just dug them deeper.

  He turned me around, grinding into the front of me, and slid one of his hands down to grab my ass, and I looked up to tell him to stop, but just as I was about to make eye contact, my eyes caught something else instead and I froze at the sight of Emmett charging right at me, looking murderous.

  Oh, fuck.

  There had only been a small handful of times where I’d seen Emmett mad, and let me tell you, it was a scary sight to see. Emmett was so good at keeping his anger at bay that when he finally did let it lose, it was best you kept your distance.

  I jerked my head up to tell Landon to run, but I think he thought I was going in for a kiss because the next thing I knew, he was slamming his lips onto mine and biting my bottom lip so hard that I instantly tasted blood.

  I pushed at his chest, trying to get him off me, but he just held on to me tighter. I brought my knee back, ready to go for the balls, when he was suddenly off me and on the ground in front of me.

  Emmett was standing over Landon, breathing heavily with his fists clenched on either side of him, staring at him like a psychopath, not saying a word.

  Landon opened his mouth, closed it, then opened it again. “Look, man, I don’t want any problems. She came onto me, begging me to dance. I just agreed so she would stop asking,” he stuttered.

  What a pussy. He would never last in my world, and to think I thought he was cute.

  Emmett jerked his head toward me with a hard glare. “Is that true?”

  I laughed at the question. I wasn’t even going to respond to that.

  Maybe I was trying to avoid a fight between them, or honestly? Maybe I just wanted him to feel an ounce of the hurt that I felt. It even could be the fact that I was wasted right now, but when I looked up at him, all I saw were those black eyes, looking back at me with disappointment, so I shook my head and walked away.

  I stomped outside like I was on a mission but then stopped when I realized I had nowhere to go. So instead, I just leaned against the building and waited for Lorenzo to come out so I could ask him to take me home.

  I spotted the bouncer giving me the side-eye, and it all clicked as to how Emmett knew I was here.

  I crossed my arms and glared at him. “You knew the whole time who I was.” It was supposed to be a question but came out as a statement.

  All the bouncer did was shrug his shoulders, so I continued, “So if I try to run away, are you going to tell him which direction I run in?”

  He looked at me and nodded. Well, at least he was honest.

  Giving up my fight, I sank down and sat on the sidewalk, not even caring that this was gross.

  Lorenzo came out to find me a minute later, and once he saw me, he gave me an apologetic look and sat down next to me.

  He opened his mouth, probably to apologize, but I didn’t want to hear it, so I cut him off before he could say it. “Yeah, I know. I feel sorry for me too.”

  At least that lightened the mood a little and got a chuckle out of the both of us.

  I was sitting with Lorenzo for what felt like forever when I heard Claire shouting from inside the club, and it was getting louder.

  “So, what? You think you can just drag us out of here like we’re children? You already broke her heart, so why not take her happiness too? Or is that your next task? Why don’t you just put a leash on her so you can pull her back whenever she’s being disobedient.”

  And that was why she was my one and only friend. She would fight to the death for the people she cared about. You didn’t get many of those these days.

  Lorenzo quickly got up at the sound of Claire’s voice and reached a hand out to help me off the ground.

  She walked over to us just as I was getting on my feet. Emmett looked between the two of us with a glare, pointing to the street. “Get in the car. Now,” he growled at us before going back into the club.

  I followed where his finger was pointing and saw his car there. I was surprised I didn’t notice it before since it wasn’t an ordinary car you saw everywhere.

  He’d had the same car since I was fifteen—a matte black 1970 Dodge Charger RT.

  I remembered when he first got it. He was so excited when he showed Sammy and me, and all I kept thinking was, Damn, this car looks like a hunk of shit, but I never told him that. He’d rebuilt the whole engine with the help of Sammy and Tommy, and they’d cleaned up all the rust and repainted the whole car, making it look brand new.

  During the summer, Emmett, Sammy, Claire, Tommy, and I would ride around for hours, going wherever the car would take us, just cruising.

  I think that was the happiest I’d ever been in my life. I had everyone I cared about so close to me, and everything was so fun and carefree. It saddened me to think of all the shit that had changed and how I’d never again feel that happiness.

  I didn’t realize I was crying until I felt a tear hit my boob.

  I could feel everyone’s eyes on me, but my feet were frozen in place, and I just couldn’t stop looking at that fucking car.

  Someone lightly grabbed my arm, and then Claire stepped in front of me, blocking my view of the car.

  “Come on, Rose. We should get out of here. I’m really tired.”

  I frowned and nodded my head at her. She sounded so sad, or maybe it was me, I didn’t know. This was why I didn’t drink.

  She tugged at my arm, and I finally snapped out of it and moved toward the car.

  I hated feeling all this emotion, but with Emmett showing back up in my life, it opened old wounds, and I couldn’t get the bleeding to stop. I wiped my eyes one last time, and I hopped in the passenger seat with my head down.

  Emmett stomped out of the club a few minutes later and flew into the driver’s seat, slamming the door.

  As we pulled away from the curb, I leaned my head against the window and closed my eyes.

  I expected the ride home to be quiet, but I was obviously wrong because Emmett suddenly went off.

  “Did you think that was funny? Going out dressed like a fucking prostitute and having some random guy practically fuck you on the dance floor. Was that fun?” He slammed his hand against the steering wheel when I didn’t respond and continued, “Well, I hope it was good while it lasted because if you think I’m going to allow my fiancée to go around embarrassing not only herself but me as well in my own fucking club, then you’re sadly mistaken because this is the last time you will be doing this. I fucking tried to be patient with you when you walked out on dinner, and I tried to give you the benefit of the doubt because this was sprung on you, but now you’re just being fucking disrespectful.”

  Wow. What fucking nerve.

  He popped back into my life twenty-four hours ago, and he thought he had some sort of claim on me?

  Well, I hoped he had at least got off on his little rant because it was my turn now.

  Letting out a crazed laugh, I turned to him and spewed the venom at him that I’d been holding in for years. “You’re joking, right? Who the fuck do you think you are? You aren’t my boyfriend, you sure as fuck are not my fiancé, and to be honest? You’re not even my friend. You think you can order me around? That’s cute. Did you forget that you broke up with me? I’m glad you’re upset. You deserve so much worse than feeling embarrassed.”

  I took a breath and gave him one last humorless laugh.

  “I will never forgive you. I gave you everything I had in me, and do you remember what you did?” I was met with complete silence, so I continued, “Oh, you were so brave before, but where’s that now? It’s okay. I’ll refresh your memory. I gave you my virginity, and then not even twenty-four hours later, you broke up with me at my brother’s funeral. I lost the two most important people in my life in a matter of three days.

  “Maybe I’m just being a bitter bitch, but you have no ri
ght to give me any shit for my decisions. Did you see what I was trying to do back at the club? I was trying to pry his hands off me because his fingers were digging into me so hard that there are probably bruises now. So, to answer your question, Emmett, no, I didn’t think it was funny, and no, I didn’t have fun.”

  I was out of breath and almost panting by the time I finished.

  He finally pulled up outside of my house, and he was staring straight ahead. He wouldn’t even turn to face me. Fucking coward.

  “I’ll marry you because I have to, and I don’t want to make my father’s life any harder than it has to be, but don’t think this will be anything more than an obligation. Just know that I will never love you again. You don’t deserve it. Love is a weakness, and I never intend on becoming weak again. This is all your fault. I hate you for what you’ve done to me.”

  I was waiting for a reply, and when I finally concluded that I wasn’t getting one, I unbuckled the seatbelt and opened the door to leave.

  I swear I heard a whispered, “I know,” just as I was walking out of the car, but when I turned to look at him, I saw he hadn’t even moved and was still staring straight ahead.

  My eyes started filling with tears, and I turned right back around, walking up to my house and not looking back again. I refused to let him see me cry. He didn’t deserve the sight of my tears.

  I was about to close my front door when I heard my name being called, a door slamming, and feet slapping the pavement.

  Shit. I forgot about Claire. I turned around and met her halfway.

  When she reached me, she smiled and wrapped her arms around me. “I’m so proud of you, Rose.”

  I hugged her back and laughed. “For what?” I had no idea why she would be proud of me for that. I didn’t like being mean. He deserved every bit of that lashing, but there was always a part of me that told me I needed to let go of the past and move forward.

  “In all the years that we have been friends, I never understood why you never stood up for yourself when it came to the guys. Anytime they were mean or yelled at you, you always just sat there and took it. So, yeah, I’m proud of you.”