When Rivals Fall (Bayshore Rivals 1)

“You want to know what’s wrong? I want you, I want all three of you, even after everything, I want you, and trust me, I know I shouldn’t, I know it’s wrong and it will never, ever work, and I know you’re back to hating me. But, at least I admit how I feel.” A moment of silence settles between us as he lets the words sink in while continuing to stroke my cheeks with such softness it takes everything in me not to sink into his touch.

I can see the turmoil in his chocolate gaze, “You’re right, it won’t work and it’s all kinds of wrong…” I wait for the unspoken but, but it never comes. I don’t miss the pain and want in his eyes though. I’m too familiar with both not to notice it. “We all want something that we can never have, and you, Harlow, are the one thing my brothers and I can never have.”

I swear my heart breaks a little more inside my chest when he leans forward and presses a soft kiss to my temple. His lips burn into my skin and my whole body starts to tremble.

When he starts to pull away, I say, “I didn’t call them, my parents. I don’t know who did, but I didn’t, and I didn’t tell them that it was you or your brothers that pushed me off that boat. Someone set me up.”

Oliver nods, taking a step back, while exhaling a breath. He looks so conflicted when he says, “It doesn’t change anything. We were born rivals and we’ll remain rivals. Your family’s damaged mine and I can’t betray my parents by loving the enemy.”

Love? I watch his Adam’s apple bob up and down as he swallows. He turns to walk away, and I anchor my feet into the ground to stop myself from going after him.

“You love me?” I croak, unable to stop the question coming out.

Oliver blinks, his long lashes fanning against his cheek, “Don’t waste your love on somebody who doesn’t value it,” he says before giving me his toned back and walking away. He’s speaking in riddles, does he mean I don’t value his love? Or they don’t value mine?

My head is a cluster fuck, my emotions sprawled out across the concrete like my clothes were a short while ago. Someone is out to hurt me, to destroy me and I can’t tell if it’s the three men I’m falling for or someone else.

I turn and take one step before I come to a sudden halt yet again. Standing a few feet away from me with her arms crossed over her chest is Shelby.

“What the hell are you doing, Harlow? Haven’t they done enough?” She scolds me.

“It’s complicated, I…” I start but can’t come up with any further explanation. “You don’t understand.”

“You’re perfectly right, I don’t understand. I don’t understand how you can be so naive and keep letting them play you like this. Haven’t they proven over and over again that they are out to get you? They don’t love you, they don’t even like you. You let them do this to you, you let them break you and then I’m the one you go to in order to pick up the pieces.”

Her words slice into me like a dull knife. They hurt incredibly bad, especially because on some level I know she is right. I let them close, I let them touch me and kiss me, because I wanted them to, no matter the consequences. They wanted to hurt me, and I let them, but the way Oliver just looked at me, the words he spoke. He said love, he said he loved me and deep in my heart I feel that he wasn’t lying. He loves me and I love him.

“I’m sorry you feel that way, Shelby. But I can’t help the way I feel, and I think deep down they feel the same about me.”

“Then you are stupid. They don’t care about you and I’m done watching this train wreck. I can’t stand seeing you like this, with them,” she spits, and I don’t miss the hateful tone in her voice.

She turns on her heels and before I can say another word, I watch my best friend walk away. The only person who has stuck with me throughout the years is walking away from me, and there is nothing I can do to stop it.

With my head hung in shame and my heart a bleeding mess I walk back up to my dorm, of course there is a group of girls snickering in the hallway. All three of them give me the stink eye as I pass, but I don’t care. I don’t know if it’s them that massacred my clothes, or Tiffany maybe? Maybe it’s even the brothers, I don’t know.