The Enemy Series

by M. E. Clayton

  “But…I’m sorry,” she wailed.

  I shook my head. “Even if I cared, Tiffany, which I don’t, Ramsey will never let you know a second’s peace now that Emerson has you in her crosshairs,” I explained. “Do yourself a favor and fade away, Tiffany.”

  I let go of her chin, stood, and walked off after Ramsey and Emerson. Deke’s footsteps fell in step with mine and neither of us looked back at the shocked faces of Windsor Academy. Not a single person in the hallway mattered; only Roselyn and Emerson.

  Only Roselyn and Emerson.

  Chapter 31

  Roselyn~

  My room was a scattered mess as I laid on my best staring at the ceiling.

  After Brandon had hobbled back to his room, all my frantic regret spent and faded to an uncomfortable truth, I fell on my bed and have been staring at the ceiling ever since.

  I’m not sure how long I laid there, but I heard Brandon’s shout from his bedroom. “Answer your phone, Roselyn!”

  I had forgotten I had silenced it when I started searching for apartments earlier. I sat up, walked over to my desk, and saw I had a bunch of missed calls from Emerson. I ignored all the other missed calls and texts and called her back. She answered on the second ring. “Em?”

  “Where are you?” she questioned.

  “Uh, home.”

  “I’m coming by to get you and we’re going to go…somewhere,” she ranted. “I don’t care where, just anywhere that’s not this goddamn place.”

  I was instantly alert. “What’s going on, Em?”

  “I know,” she said. “We’ll make it a day trip and go visit Scott, Henry, and Sally in Hantover.”

  I’ve never met Emerson’s friends from her hometown, but I knew she still kept in touch with them, and she considered them still very close. She’s mentioned a few times that there wasn’t anything she wouldn’t do for them. She had grand plans when she graduated college to help them. I also knew Ramsey has offered his money to her countless times and she’s refused. She lived with him and les him support her in that sense, but she didn’t take money from him.

  “Uh…okaaaay…”

  “Grab your stuff and be outside waiting,” she said. “I’ll be in front of your house in less than two minutes.”

  We hung up, and I quickly grabbed my stuff. Truthfully, a day trip away from this place was just what I needed. I was halfway down the hallway when Brandon actually popped in my head. I wasn’t sure why I kept caring what happened to him, but I did.

  I swung by his room, and because his door was still open, I peeked my head in. “Hey, that was Emerson-”

  “I know,” he said cutting me off. “I’m not sure how she got my number, but she called me telling me to tell you to answer your phone.”

  I nodded. “Sorry about that...”

  He snorted. “Yeah, like I’m going to hang up on Emerson Andrews.”

  “Anyway, we’re heading out for a girls’ day, but…” God, I didn’t think this would be so hard to do. Being cordial and decent to him felt foreign. “Look, I know we’re not friends, far from it, actually, but do you need anything before I just take off, leaving you here alone?”

  Brandon was propped up against his headboard on his bed and I wondered how comfortable that was for him. “I’m fine, Roselyn,” he answered. “I’ll be fine.” I gave him a simple nod and went about my business. The exchange was uncomfortable for the both of us, but I couldn’t in good conscience just walk out of the house. A part of me kept hitting me upside the head reminding me of what he had almost done to me, and while I still hated him for it, he looked like he paid for it in spades.

  As soon as I shut the front door behind me, I saw Emerson’s car parked by the curb. She was still driving her old car that used to belong to her mother, and no matter how much Ramsey wanted her to have a reliable vehicle, she wasn’t going to part with her car until it was dead.

  I jogged down the walkway and opened the car door, getting in without asking any questions.

  That was, at least, until I saw her hands on the steering wheel. “Holy crap,” I gasped. “What happened to your hands?”

  Emerson didn’t look at me as she pulled away from the curb, making sure she was in the clear. Once we were on the road in a steady drive, and I was buckled in safely, she surprised the shit out of me by saying, “I beat the shit out of Tiffany Sulton.”

  Holy fuck.

  “You did what?”

  She side-eyed me really quickly before focusing on the road again. “Have you spoken to Liam yet?”

  I leaned back in the seat and got comfortable. “No,” I told her. “He’s been calling since last night, but I’ve been ignoring him.”

  “Hmm,” was all she said, and I wondered how much she knew.

  “But Brandon told me everything,” I admitted. “He told me about the Tiffany, the video, her forcing Liam to break up with me. Everything.”

  Emerson’s brows shot up as she looked over at me. “He did?”

  I nodded. “Yep,” I confirmed, and went on to tell her everything. I even told her how Brandon could barely move.

  She didn’t comment right away. Instead, she drove a few more miles out of town before finally saying, “I may or may not have…uh, put hands on Tiffany at school this morning. Seriously, this time.”

  “What?” I gulped in shock.

  Emerson turned her attention back to the road. “The guys told me what happened this morning, and it was all just bad timing,” she replied.

  “Bad timing?”

  “I was coming out of the boys’ restroom, because that’s where we had our little pow-wow, and she was coming down the hallway.” Emerson shrugged a shoulder. “I was surprised to see her because I figured, after last night, she’d call off going to school, but there she was, in all her blonde hair and perfect face glory, and I lost my shit.”

  “Jesus, Em,” I breathed.

  “Ramsey had to pull me off her,” she confessed.

  Liam was kicking Brandon’s ass and Emerson was kicking Tiffany’s ass and, here I was, not doing any ass kicking at all.

  We rode in silence for a few more miles before Emerson asked the hard question. “Are you going to forgive him now that you know what the breakup was all about?”

  I looked out the window and watched the scenery go by and thought about her question. That was at the heart of all this, wasn’t it? Now that Liam has saved the day, he expected he could just explain, apologize, and all would be well. The means, the end, and all that. The greater good. He’s the man, I’m the woman; it’s his job to protect me.

  “I don’t know,” I admitted a while later. “What Tiffany did was just…it just created the situation we found ourselves in. She just set the stage. It was Liam who didn’t trust me. It was Liam who hurt me. At the end of the day, Emer, he didn’t have to break up with me as horribly as he did to get the job done. Breaking up with me would have devastated me the same had he been kind or cruel. But he chose cruelty.” I took a deep breath. “He chose cruelty,” I whispered.

  “A scorpion,” she mumbled quietly.

  “Will do what it’s in its nature to do,” I finished. “I get that now.”

  “I’m not going to tell you what to do, Roselyn, because I’m not the one who has to live with your choices,” she said. “I just want you to know I’ll support whichever decision you make regarding Liam.”

  The tears came unexpectedly. I didn’t know why I felt so emotional at her statement because I already knew that’d be the case. I knew Emerson would pick me over Liam. I knew it, but it still felt overwhelming to hear her say it.

  “How did you forgive Ramsey?”

  Emerson snorted. “I’m not entirely sure that I have, Roz,” she chuckled sadly. “What Ramsey did to me was…well, unforgivable, if you want to know the truth. But…when he came after me…I don’t know. I see a side of Ramsey that no one gets to see. Hell, it’s a side I don’t think anyone has ever seen except me. So, when he dropped to his knees in front of the
entire school and begged me to forgive him, that was big. That was huge for someone like him. I chose to focus on what that would mean to someone like Ramsey and I put all my faith into that single gesture.”

  “Do you ever doubt your decision?”

  “Every day,” she confessed. “Every day I learn a little more about the kind of guy Ramsey is, and the kind of man he’ll grow up to be one day, and I know I’m playing with fire.”

  I looked over at her. “But?”

  “But when I’m not inside my head, all I do is feel,” she said. “And all I feel is Ramsey. He’s every emotion I feel, Roz. He’s my fear. He’s my strength. He’s my bravery. He’s my weakness. He’s my anxiety. He’s my love. He’s my passion. He’s my insanity. He’s my…everything.”

  I looked back out the window. “I don’t want to forgive him,” I said, replying to her confession.

  “But?”

  I took a deep breath. “But I know what you mean,” I confessed myself.

  Chapter 32

  Liam~

  I was pacing the floor of Ramsey’s game room, losing my goddamn mind.

  Emerson had taken Roselyn to Hantover to visit some hometown friends of Emerson’s, and the only reason I knew this, was because Emerson had found enough compassion in that heart of hers to let Ramsey know what she was about.

  Emerson’s words were like a battering ram inside my skull and I had a goddamn headache, no lie. It never occurred to me that Roselyn would be more hurt by how I broke up with her than she would be about that video getting out. All I could think about was how that video would destroy her, I never considered that it wouldn’t if I stood by her, rather than give in to a blackmailer.

  Roselyn was so hung up on what being with me and Deke represented to society at large, I just really thought I was saving her from her worst fear. I didn’t stop to think that maybe her worst fear was losing me. I mean, she could get over me leaving her, but not the entire world seeing her like that and knowing that about her, right?

  I fucking didn’t know what to think.

  Goddamn it!

  “You’re going to wear a hold clean through my floor, Lee,” Ramsey joked.

  I stopped at looked over at him. “You said she was coming home,” I reminded him.

  Ramsey was sitting on the couch, game controller in hand, while he and Deke battled it out for world dominance on the screen. He didn’t bother looking at me when he said, “There’s no fucking way Emerson would never come home unless I knew about, Lee. I’d fucking kill her, and she knows it.”

  “And she’s bringing Roselyn?” Ramsey had told me that Emerson had sent him a text earlier telling him that Roselyn was spending the night because she wanted to avoid both me and Brandon.

  “Yep,” he replied. “At least, that’s what she texted.”

  Deke let out a whoop of laughter. “I can’t wait for the girls to get here,” he grinned. “They’re going to see Liam here and I’m going to sit back and enjoy the show.”

  “Deep down, Emerson knows Liam will be here,” Ramsey replied. “Roselyn knows it too. So, if they’re coming here together, it’s to clear this shit up once, and for all.”

  “Yeah, but that doesn’t necessarily mean Lee ends up with Roselyn,” Deke pointed out as if he wasn’t discussing my entire life’s purpose.

  “Are you fucking kidding me?” I barked at him.

  He just shrugged a shoulder, his eyes still on the screen, not paying me any attention. “I’m just saying.”

  “Asshole,” I muttered.

  Deke just laughed. “Look, I’m the last guy to guess what goes through a girl’s mind, but Emerson made some pretty good points about trusting them.”

  Ramsey dropped his controller and gave Deke the same incredulous look I was giving him. “Are you fucking serious?’ He asked Deke. “I trust Emerson with my fucking life.”

  Deke set his controller down and looked back and forth between me and Ramsey. He took a deep breath and, suddenly, he reminded me of a frustrated and disappointed parent. “Look, assholes, there’s a difference between them not knowing what we do because they don’t want to know and us not trusting them to know. Don’t confuse the two.”

  “Emerson doesn’t want to know,” Ramsey pointed out.

  “Yeah, until you fucked over her best friend,” Deke retorted. “Emerson doesn’t want to know about the shit that doesn’t affect her. Roselyn affects her.”

  “We were doing what we thought was best. Hell, you were even on board with it,” I reminded Deke.

  “I agree,” he replied. “And I’d do it the same way again if I had the choice. But Emerson and Roselyn aren’t my girlfriends. They’re not going to feel as betrayed by me as they did you two.” Before we could both fuck Deke up, we heard laughter coming from the inside the house.

  I was out the door before Deke or Ramsey could talk common sense into me.

  My feet came to a screeching halt as I rounded the office room and saw both girls laughing in the living room. I couldn’t help myself. “Roselyn.”

  Their laughter immediately ceased and the look she gave me would have driven me to my knees if I had been a lesser man. But I wasn’t and I couldn’t lose.

  I couldn’t lose her.

  “What are you doing here?” she asked.

  I could hear Deke and Ramsey walking into the room, and I glanced at Emerson to see what she was going to do, but to my surprise, she pulled a Deke; her face was expressionless.

  “I couldn’t find you anywhere else,” I answered, deciding against blurting out that Ramsey told me she’d be here. “There’s only one person who you’d be with.”

  Her baby blue eyes raked me from head to toe and back up with a curl to her lip. Roselyn looked like she hated me. “There’s only one person in this room worth being with,” she scoffed.

  “Can we talk?” I asked, cutting to the chase. “Barbs and insults aren’t going to accomplish anything, Roz.” She cocked her head and the look on her face bothered me. I should have let her keep insulting me because the pensive look on her face scared me, no lie.

  “Barbs and insults,” she murmured. “Let’s talk about barbs and insults, Liam, shall we?”

  Fuck.

  “Ros-”

  “Better yet, let’s discuss why you’d want to even talk to a person who isn’t worthy to be on your arm? Let’s talk about how you can’t have the vision of your wife with another guy’s cock in her mouth rattling around in that head of yours,” she said mercilessly. “Why don’t we talk about that?”

  “I had to make the breakup believable,” I defended, but the excuse fell lame even to my ears.

  “Well, congratulations, Liam,” she chuckled. “It worked. It was extremely believable.”

  “Roselyn-”

  She threw her palm up to stop me and shook her head. “Don’t, Liam,” she bit out. “There’s nothing you can say that will erase yesterday from my mind. There’s nothing you can say that can make me forget what your words made me feel like. Hell, I still feel them. I feel them everywhere, Liam. Everywhere.”

  Fuck it.

  I stepped her, but when I reached for her, she stepped back, making sure I couldn’t touch her. “Don’t!” she hollered. “Don’t ever fucking touch me again, Liam McCellan.”

  I was in the wrong.

  I knew this.

  I understood this.

  But there’s no way I wasn’t going to be touching her for the rest of my goddamn life.

  And hers.

  “That’s not going to happen, Roselyn,” I informed her. “I didn’t mean a word of what I said yesterday, and you know it. Now that you know what’s been going on, you know it.”

  She shook her head sadly. “I only asked one thing from you, Liam, when we started this. Just one goddamn thing,” she cried miserably. Her eye began to swim in tears when she said, “I told you I couldn’t live with feeling like an outsider. Do you remember that?” I did. “That’s all I asked of you, and the first time you’re put
to the test, you didn’t trust me.” Roselyn straightened her spine. “Well, even though I’ve had a dick in my mouth and in my pussy at the same time, I’m still better than that.”

  Fuck what she said. I grabbed her by her arm and yanked her to me. “Stop it,” I fumed. “Don’t talk about yourself like that. That’s not what this is about.”

  “You made this all about that the second you decided to be cruel about what you did,” she snapped. “You could have just broken up with me, Liam. You didn’t have to be brutal about it!”

  “I had to make it believable!” I yelled.

  “Well, you did,” she yelled back, “because we are over, Liam! I will never trust you ever again.”

  “Bullshit! We are not over. We will never be over,” I argued.

  She pushed at my chest. “I don’t want you!” she screamed. “I don’t want a guy who doesn’t trust me. I don’t want a guy who…who…I matter, goddamn it! I fucking matter, Liam!”

  I stepped back and dropped her arm out of shock. I shook my head trying to clear my thoughts. “What?” I mumbled. “Of course, you matter, Roz. What the fuck?”

  Roselyn looked at me like I still didn’t get it. And then I watched as she turned to face Emerson and Emerson immediately tossed her car keys at her. Roselyn caught them and turned to walk out of the house.

  “Roselyn?!”

  She took off running, and I followed, but the second Emerson stood in front of me, that was all the hindrance Roselyn needed to reach Emerson’s car and pull out of the driveway before I could get to her.

  I skated around Emerson, but by the time I reached the front yard, Emerson’s car was already on the street. I couldn’t do anything but watch Roselyn drive away.

  Chapter 33

  Roselyn~

  My life was a complete mess. Instead of finding an apartment and signing up for independent study and being goddamn productive, I was in Florida.

  After I ran out of Ramsey’s house, I had driven to the airport and bought a ticket back to Florida. Luckily, my purse had still been on my shoulder when Liam and I had our little showdown. Every second had counted in getting away from him and I was grateful for the little things that made my escape possible.