Avenging Angel (Pounding Hearts 5)

Once I’m no longer seeing red, I look at the post again. Really look at it.

He didn’t make that post out of stupidity. No, as much as I dislike Tristan, he’s not just a pretty face, he’s also as cunning as a fucking fox.

Still, even knowing that, something about it really bothers me. The only way he’d have the balls to make that post is if he’s supremely confident that I won’t be able to dump his ass.

Has he already spoken to my father? Dammit.

The post is up to a few thousand likes and there’s a few dozen comments from our circle of friends.

Even Ashley commented how much she’s going to miss me.

Bitch.

Scrolling down, I rush past the photos of everyone’s lunch and vacations until I reach Ashley’s post.

Copying Tristan, she’s posted a picture of the two of us, like we’re still best friends.

I click off my phone, not bothering to read the comments. If I do, I just might have a rage aneurism.

But I’m not mad that she slept with my boyfriend. No, that’s just her nature. I can’t blame her for that any more than I could blame a cat for eating a canary or a lion for hunting the gazelle.

What I’m mad about is that she betrayed me and won’t let me go, just like Tristan. For whatever reason, she’s joining him in trying to keep me tied to their existence.

Every vengeful, wrathful bone in my body wants me to make a post calling them out. To scream from the rooftops what happened.

To show the world their true faces.

But would the effort, energy, and fallout be worth it?

Knowing my circle of ‘friends’, they’ve probably known about this for a while now. Given that I’m only now finding this out, there’s no doubt that Tristan and Ashley have had help to carry on behind my back.

If I make a peep of this, I’ll only look sad and pathetic. I know because I’ve seen this kind of thing go down before.

Four years ago it came out that one of the guys in our group of friends, Spencer, was cheating on his girlfriend. I can’t even remember her name, but I remember the sympathy I felt for her when she came to confront him with mascara tears running down her face at one of the basketball team’s after-parties.

I also remember the jab Ashley gave me in the ribs to keep me from standing up and comforting her as she sobbed her heart out.

She was the wronged party, but to the group it didn’t matter. She instantly became the one in the wrong for making a fuss and creating drama. Everyone stood by Spencer and ostracized her to the point that she ended up transferring schools.

Even now I feel guilty for not reaching out to her. At the time, though, my position in the circle was still new, and I was so afraid of losing the friends I had finally made.

Perhaps it’s karma that I’m now going through exactly the same thing.

And I deserve it.

If I would have stood up for her, I probably would have been kicked out of the group and been saved from this massive headache.

But then again, our situations aren’t exactly the same…

After all, I’m not heartbroken over Tristan. No, I now realize that I fell out of love with him a long time ago. I think the only reason I was still with him was because it was expected.

Expected by my father and our social circle.

Now, all I care about is getting stuck with him.

Staring at the black surface of my phone, I try to think of what I could possibly do to keep a small shred of my dignity and send them a message in the process.

Then it suddenly hits me.