Deep (Heavy Hearts Book 2) by Sarah Duncan (reading tree txt) 📕

panicking, for some reason, I’m not. A strange calm comes over me, so I lean back against the door frame watching the scene before me like it’s a good movie, while Marcus does damage control.

“Calm the fuck down, man!” Marcus gets up in Ayden’s face forcing him to step back from Simon, who glares daggers at Ayden while he straightens his blazer.

“Why the fuck are you sleeping with her? That wasn’t part of the fucking agreement!” Ayden glares at Simon, and then Garrett and Shaun. My ears perk up.

“What agreement?” Suddenly I don’t feel so calm anymore.

“I thought you said this wasn’t a reverse harem?” Rhys asks, coming to stand beside me.

“It’s not!” I snap, not taking my eyes off a very guilty looking Marcus.

“If you’re like, sleeping with all of them, then girl, you have yourself a harem.”

“Jesus, Rhys,” I turn to her, needing her to stop talking about this in front of Ayden, “I’m not fucking them. I’m not doing anything remotely sexual with them. There is no fucking harem!”

“What the fuck is she talking about?” Ayden asks, but I ignore him.

“What agreement, Marcus?” I ask Marcus because I don’t want to speak to Ayden.

“Nothing,” Marcus adds and turns his attention back to a still fuming Ayden. “I wouldn’t have told you about Lexi’s stuff going missing if I knew you would come back here and pick shit at everyone.”

“You know what. Fuck you all! Get out of my house!” I yell, my patience snapping. No one is telling me the truth. I’m sick of being lied to. “Get the fuck out!”

No one makes a move to leave, so I turn to Rhys.

“You should go.”

“Um, no. I’m not leaving you here to deal with these douchecanoes on your own.” Rhys frowns at me, looking more serious than I’ve ever seen her.

“Douchecan-what?” Shaun asks.

Rhys turns to him, “Douchecanoes. Google it.”

“Rhys, seriously. It’s okay. I’m used to these boys invading my space.”

Rhys steps up to me, putting her hand on my shoulder. “I’m staying the night, Lexi. You can shut me out tomorrow, but I’m not leaving.”

I can see her genuine concern, and my heart pangs a little. I nod, and she pecks me on the cheek before moving across the space to sit on the couch.

The room goes quiet, with a thousand unanswered questions still hanging over our heads.

“Ha! Douchecanoes. It’s actually a word! An obnoxious or contemptible person, typically a man.” Chuckles float around the room when Shaun reads out the meaning. “Hey, wait a minute. We’re not douchecanoes.”

“Aren’t you?” I raise my brow in question, leaving Shaun with confusion twisting his handsome Latino face.

“Is anything missing today Lex?” Ayden asks, and I ignore him, not wanting to even look at his beautiful blue caring eyes.

“Come on, let’s go have a look.” Jared steps up to me, and I happily let him lead me out of the room by my wrist. I don’t miss the glare Ayden throws him or the way Ayden hones in on where Jared is holding me.

We look in each room on both floors, but I don’t notice anything out of place, so Jared relays that to the boys before making their plans for babysitting duty tonight. Marcus, of all people, gets the job, and I’m a little annoyed because he’s the last person I want to be with since he’s clearly been keeping secrets from me.

We have pizza once again, although I struggle to get through half a slice. There are attempts at doing homework, but it seems as though no one can concentrate. Just before the sun goes down, the boys say their goodbyes for the night and leave, but Ayden hovers and follows me out to the garage invading my sacred space.

“Lex, can we talk?” His voice sends chills, of the good kind, all over my skin, and I fight hard not to let him see my body’s reaction.

I not so subtly turn the volume up on the Bluetooth speaker and start pounding the shit out of the bag, letting myself fall into the zone where all that exists is my anger. I punch, kick, and throw my shoulders into the bag over and over, letting the sweat drench my body until I’m exhausted.

When I come up for air, I find myself alone in the garage. That’s when I finally let myself go, collapsing to the cold concrete floor to cry.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Another sleepless night equals another grumpy Lexi. Part of me, and I must say, it’s a very stupid part, wanted Ayden to still be in my house when I dragged myself in from the garage last night. Thankfully, Marcus didn’t notice my disappointment, but Rhys did. Nothing seems to get past that girl.

Marcus and Rhys were doing homework together when I came in, which kind of blew my mind. I never imagined them getting along so well, but my judgement doesn’t mean shit these days. By 10pm, Rhys insisted we watch Stranger Things on Netflix. I didn’t think I would like it, but what can I say? Now I’m hooked. By midnight I went to my mum’s room to get changed for bed, still happy that I found my Slipknot t-shirt earlier where I left it on the bed that morning. I went through the motions of brushing my teeth and then went to take my birth control pill, however, when I went to get the packet out of my toilet bag I keep in my mum’s bathroom now, it wasn’t there.

That’s why sleep evades me once again. Knowing my pill had been there the night before, and is now missing, turns me into an even bigger nutcase than I already was. I toss and turn on the couch for hours, waiting for sleep to come, but eventually give up, worried that I’ll disturb Marcus and Rhys, who had taken the makeshift bed on the floor. I did point out to them that there was a second couch in the room for one of