Every Sweet Regret (Orchid Valley 2)

My phone buzzes, and it’s complete faith in how fucked my life has become that lets me know it’s Kace before I even look. He’s texted. Probably about tonight. Probably something sexy, because . . . that’s all I am.

I can’t bring myself to open it.

“Smithy, promise me you won’t say anything to Kace until I figure this out.”

“You have to tell him,” he says solemnly.

He’s right. The girls all know about the avatar now, so obviously I can’t keep this a secret forever. I just need a minute to deal with this ache in my chest.

I’ve always loved Kace, but I knew I couldn’t have more. I knew I wasn’t allowed to want more, so I was happy to settle for what he offered—the scraps of attention, the hot, lusty looks, and that one night in the pool house, the physical. But our conversations on Random changed everything. I got a taste of what it was like to have Kace see me—the real me, not just my bubbly surface personality, not just the sexpot party girl who liked to tease him. I got to know what it was like to have him crave my mind as much as my body, and now I don’t know how I’m supposed to settle for less.

I’ve been talking to Kace. Falling for Kace. But he has no idea he’s been talking to me. And when my online self told him her biggest secret, he didn’t want anything to do with her anymore.Chapter Twenty-OneStellaI don’t even remember the drive to Dean’s. But I’m here, sitting in the middle of his living room floor in a puddle of my own tears.

I should’ve driven straight to Kace. I could’ve told him immediately. Ripped off the proverbial Band-Aid. Maybe he would’ve laughed about it. Maybe he would’ve gotten angry and walked away. But at least it wouldn’t be this awful secret, and he’d know I never intended to trick him.

Instead, I drove to my brother’s and word-vomited all my nonsense heartbreak the second he asked what was wrong. And Dean? He’s wearing a path in the carpet with his pacing, and I’m pretty sure he wishes he didn’t know any of this. Not that I’m “Jessica Rabbit,” not that I’m in love with Kace, and definitely not that he has to keep this all a secret.

The doorbell rings, and his shoulders sag in relief. He rushes to open it, and Savannah barges in. “Thank you,” he says. “She said you were the only one I was allowed to call.”

“What’s wrong?” Savvy asks, coming straight toward me. “What happened? Why’d you leave the bar? Abbi feels so bad about the avatar.”

“She’s Itsy,” Dean says.

Savvy scrunches up her face in confusion. “She’s itchy?”

“No. She’s ItsyBitsy, Jessica Rabbit, whatever—the girl Kace has been talking to on Random. The one he rejected after she told him some secret. Only, he just told Stella he was rejecting her and didn’t tell online Stella, and now she doesn’t want him to know who she is.” He gasps and looks at me. “I don’t understand it all, but the long and short of it is apparently my best friend is a fucking idiot, and I’m going to kill him.”

Savvy looks my brother up and down, shakes her head, and points to his kitchen. “Go find yourself a drink. You need to chill.” Then she crosses the living room and sinks to her haunches to look me in the eye. “Honey, don’t panic. You can just tell him. You two have something now, right?”

That’s not true, and it guts me. Even when I was curled into his side after we slept together for the first time, when he opened up to me about his marriage—it was about sex. Not about love or a future together. The only time he’s connected with me on an emotional level was online. I was stupid enough to think he was opening up to me, but the awful truth is that those conversations never would’ve happened if he’d known he was talking to Stella. Either he wouldn’t have hit me up at all or it would’ve been sexual banter—but at least if it’d been that, I wouldn’t have ever hung so much hope on having more. “It’s never been more than sex.”

“The fuck?” Dean says. “You’re sleeping with Matthews?”

I try to breathe, but my lungs are fucking trash and won’t take the air I need. “I thought we had something because of our conversations on Random, but it was never more than physical. He doesn’t even know I’m her, and now if I tell him, he won’t want me because he knows too much about her and doesn’t want her anymore.”

Dean rubs his temples. “I’m so confused. Her who?”

Another sob rips through me. “He doesn’t want me anymore.”

“She is Itsy; Itsy is Stella. Kace rejected Itsy but doesn’t want anything emotional with Stella.” Savvy scowls at Dean. “Try to keep up.”