The rain is really picking up and I’m just hoping we don’t get hail. The last thing I need is to deal with my insurance company and my hefty deductible right now.

Waving at the security guard as he opens the gate I fake the smile I give him. My nerves are strung tight and my mind is racing right now. Rhett wasn’t there tonight, but what if he was? What if Jaden comes back tomorrow or the next day or the next day after that? Fuck! How did I get myself in this mess?

Once in my garage, I sit as the rain pounds, and I get lost in thought as the sound begins to calm me. It’s beautiful, the storm outside is beautiful. It hits me…I don’t deserve beautiful. Rhett calls me beautiful, he’s beautiful. Resting my head against my steering wheel, I let the tears come. I’ve been fighting them since Jaden drove me back to my car three days ago in complete silence. I’ve fought them after I hung up the phone after talking to Rhett for hours. I’ve fought them when the guilt hit me so strong I thought I was going to vomit. I just can’t fight them anymore. Rhett’s admission that he hasn’t taken our physical relationship further because he’s scared to move too fast, too early haunts me.

A lough crack of lightning has me bolting upright and the scream leaves my lips before I can stop it when I see Jaden standing in the rain behind my car through the rearview mirror.

Getting out of my car, I slam the door. “How did you get in here?” I yell.

“Told the guard I was following you but lost you on the highway,” he says as he stalks closer.

Some fucking security. “Get out! You are not welcome here, asshole!”

And…he smiles, he actually smiles. “Haven’t been called that in a few days, I missed it.” He shakes his head and rainwater drips from the ends of his hair. “I’ve missed you.” His eyes never leave mine as he leans in and kisses me with a force that’s downright painful.

Pushing him away, I scream again. “Get out!”

Jaden gives me a sinister smile and kisses me again. Pulling me against him, he holds tighter when I attempt to pull away from him. His hips press against mine and I feel his arousal against me. Memories of him fucking me until I scream on his desk start to replay in my head.

Rhett. I think of Rhett. “Leave,” I whisper, hoping he hears the desperation in my voice. “Please, leave me alone.” I can hardly get it out.

Jaden’s hands drop to his side and he steps back a single step while looking at me as if he really sees me for the first time. Clearing his throat, he rubs his hand over his jaw that is now covered in a dark five o’clock shadow, and I notice that the always-primped meticulously good-looking Jaden is gone. In his place is a man that looks exhausted, desperate, and ticked.

I don’t even get a chance to process the visual in front of me; Jaden is flying backward and slamming up against the wall in my garage. The sound of Rhett’s fist hitting him in the face breaks the brief silence.

**Rhett**

I pull up and see a Mercedes parked in Skye’s driveway and wonder who it is. Probably one of the girls from the club, I imagine. Walking up her driveway, I stop dead in my tracks when I see some man with his lips pressed against hers. My heart stops—just fucking stops. I stand there like a dumbass just watching as the woman I’m falling for kisses another man until I see her whisper something to him and he takes a step back. I instantly see his arousal and everything just goes red. Complete. Fucking. Red.

Before I even realize what happened, I have him pinned and my fist meets with his face more than once before he lands a hit on my right temple. Fucking southpaws get me every damn time. It’s enough that he knocks me off balance and soon enough we’re fighting with each other like some goddamn MMA fighters in the driveway as we’re getting doused with rain.

“Rhett!” I hear Skye scream. “Jaden, stop!” His name is Jaden? “Stop!” Suddenly, I see one red Chuck Taylor fly past my head and hit this punk’s chin, snapping his head backward and knocking his body off me. Sitting up, I see blood dripping from the guy’s mouth before Skye is helping me up, mumbling incoherently.

Grabbing her arm none too softly, I bark at her. “Who the fuck is this, Skye?” I expect her to say—no, I pray she says that she doesn’t know, that he attacked her, that he’s a crazy ex that she can’t stand. But she says none of those things. Barely audible, she says, “Jaden.”

“Yeah, I heard his name. Who the fuck is JADEN?” I yell, my temper quickly rising and rising.

She says nothing for what feels like forever, and I see her struggling with some internal battle.

“The truth, Skye!” When she jumps at my volume, I realize I don’t care.

“Better question, brother, is who the fuck are you?” With blood dripping from his mouth, I see his face for the first time.

“Don’t I know you?” I ask as I study his face, then, it hits me. “The gym on Forrester, right?”

He nods. “Yeah, that’s me.”

Looking from Skye with her eyes wide and jaw slack, I also see fear looking back at me. “You wanna tell me why the hell you had your mouth on my girlfriend?” I ask him, but I never take my eyes from her face.

“Your girlfriend?”

“Yeah, MY girlfriend.”

“Girlfriend?” Skye whispers, looking confused. What the hell did she think she was?

For some reason, I know what’s coming before he says anything.

He laughs and I watch as he smears the blood from his mouth onto the front hem of his shirt. “Well, I’ve been fucking YOUR girlfriend, I guess.”

Yep, I didn’t expect those words, but either way, same outcome. I want to punch his face in. I want to crush his fucking skull but most of all? I want the pain deep within my chest to stop. I’ve never felt anything like this before. Still not breaking eye contact with Skye, I watch as the tears stream down her face and I don’t have the slightest inclination to wipe them away. Good, I hope they fucking burn. I hope her chest feels like mine, only worse.

Finally, I have to look away when she starts repeating over and over again how sorry she is. She’s sorry, all right.

“It was a mistake, Rhett! I want you, not him, I don’t even like him!” she cries.

This time, I laughed. None of this is funny, but come the fuck on. “You don’t even like him?”

Skye shakes her head.

“You don’t like him but you’re fucking him?”

Those green eyes have a cloud over them and shine nowhere near as bright as they normally do, and for the briefest second I almost feel sorry for her.

“It was only twice—”

“Well, I fucked you on my desk but then, I fingered you against—”

“Shut up!” she screams shoving the jerk-wad back.

Rubbing my hands over my rain soaked face doesn’t bring me any comfort. Knowing that this man has had his cock, his fingers, inside of my Skye, kills me; it’s fucking killing me.

“While I was going to fucking family therapy with my alcoholic brother you were here fucking this douchebag?”

“No! No, no,no! This was before, I swear it.”

“I haven’t fucked her in three days, dude.”

I feel my stomach churning. “I left four days ago.” I whisper, closing my eyes. I can’t believe this. I. Just. Can’t.

“It was the last time, I swear. I-I…”

When she stops and stares off over my shoulder, I try like hell not to let her quivering chin get to me or those pouty lips that I’ve come to love so much. I can’t believe we’re here, I can’t believe she did this to us and before we even had a chance to start.

Still, she says nothing, and I can’t stand it. “You fucking what Skye?”

When her eyes meet mine once more, I see that there’s hurt and confusion in place of the fear that scarred those brown eyes earlier. “I didn’t know if you even wanted me,” she whispered. After a sob breaks free, she yells, “I didn’t know!”