Chapter 439 - Who He Chooses II

Chapter 439: Chapter 439 - Who He Chooses II

"You’re a fucking asshole."

A tear slipped from the corner of her eye and she wiped it away angrily.

Dylan rubbed his jaw and looked aside. "I know Zac loves you. I’m not trying to take him from you."

"That wasn’t what I asked, and you kissed him."

Dylan flinched.

Roxie was too tired to soften anything for him now. "I’m asking you for some distance because you obviously still have feelings for him and you already crossed the line once. I don’t think that’s unreasonable."

The embarrassment in Dylan’s face slowly hardened into anger. "I made one mistake during probably the worst fucking night of my life. He rejected me. I accepted that. I apologized to him and I’m apologizing to you. But now you want me to lose my best friend too."

"I said for a while."

"And how long is a while, Roxie? A week? A month? Until you decide I’m safe enough to be around him again?" Dylan leaned forward, lowering his voice. "You’re asking me to walk away from the only person who stayed when my own family basically threw me out, and you can’t even tell me when I’m allowed back."

The guilt came again, sharper this time, but Roxie was beginning to resent how easily everyone’s pain became something she was expected to carry.

"I’m tired, Dylan. I’m tired of understanding everybody. I understand why you kissed him because you were destroyed. I understand why Zac stayed because you needed someone. I understand why you need him now because your family is a mess. I understand all of it, and somehow I’m still sitting here wondering if asking for some fucking space makes me the bad person."

Dylan’s expression shifted, some of the anger loosening for a moment. "I never said you were the bad person."

"Then give me some space."

He looked away.

That was when Roxie knew.

Whatever guilt Dylan carried about the kiss, he wasn’t willing to give up Zac for it.

When he finally looked back at her, there was more defiance than shame in his face. "I can’t do that."

"You can. You just don’t want to."

Dylan stared at her for another moment before his mouth tightened. "Fine. I don’t want to. Zac is my best friend. He was my best friend before any of this happened. I screwed up, but I’m not disappearing from his life because you’re scared I might do it again."

Roxie felt her jaw tighten. "I’m scared because you still love him."

"And he loves you."

The answer came quickly enough to stop her.

There was no uncertainty in his face when he said it.

Dylan knew Zac loved her.

That should have made the whole argument easier.

"So what exactly are we fighting about?" Roxie asked, exhaustion creeping into her voice. "You know he loves me. You know he rejected you. You know what you did was wrong. I’m asking for some fucking space."

Dylan stared at her for a long moment.

Then something in his expression changed.

The guilt disappeared from his eyes and his face hardened in a way that immediately made Roxie uneasy.

"You keep talking like I’m the one always chasing him."

Her stomach tightened.

She knew before he continued that the conversation had changed.

"Don’t start twisting this because you don’t like what I’m asking."

"I’m not twisting anything." Dylan leaned back and held her gaze. "I’m saying Zac comes to me too. All those nights you two fought and he ended up at my place, I didn’t call him and beg him to come over. He came to me. We trained, we talked, and sometimes he slept there because he didn’t want to go home pissed at you."

Roxie stared at him.

He looked like a wounded animal finally deciding to claw back.

"You’re his friend. Of course he came to you."

"Exactly. So why are you acting like our entire relationship is something you can just turn off because I fucked up once?"

"Because you kissed him."

Dylan’s jaw tightened.

"And he still stayed."

The words landed exactly where he wanted them to.

Roxie felt the heat drain from her face, but she forced herself to keep looking at him.

"He stayed because your father had just publicly destroyed you."

Dylan held her gaze for another second, then gave the smallest shrug. "Maybe that’s all."

The guilt Roxie had been carrying for him disappeared.

"You fucking asshole."

Dylan didn’t take it back.

Roxie leaned forward, anger finally stronger than the fear twisting inside her. "You know exactly what happened. You sat there and told me Zac pushed you away. You told me he got angry and told you never to do it again. Now because I asked you to stay away from him, you’re trying to make me think he wanted you anyway."

"I never said he wanted me."

"You don’t have to. You’re trying to make me hear it without saying it."

Dylan looked away for a moment, and Roxie knew she had caught him.

That should have been enough to make everything he said meaningless.

It wasn’t.

Because Dylan didn’t have to invent anything.

Zac had stayed at his place after fights. He had slept there. They trained together constantly. Zac trusted him enough to go to him when things between Roxie and Zac were bad, and even after Dylan kissed him, Zac stayed.

Every one of those things had an explanation Roxie already knew.

Dylan was simply putting them beside each other and letting her imagination do the rest.

When he looked back at her, his voice was quieter but the anger remained. "You want to pretend I’m some random guy waiting around for Zac to suddenly pick me, fine. But I matter to him too. When things go bad with you, he comes to me. When he needs someone, he calls me. Those nights he slept beside me, he chose to be there. I’m not making any of that up."

Roxie’s stomach tightened.

She refused to let him see how badly he had gotten under her skin.

"You know what else you aren’t making up? He rejected you."

Dylan’s face changed before he could hide it.

Roxie saw the hurt and kept going because he had stopped caring whether he hurt her. "You kissed him and he pushed you away. You can list every night he ever stayed at your place and every conversation you ever had with him, but when you tried to make it something else, he rejected you. Both of us know who Zac wants."

For a moment Dylan looked almost embarrassed again.

Then his expression hardened.

"I know he wants you."

Roxie swallowed.

There was the truth both of them knew.

Zac loved her.

Dylan knew it too.

Roxie pushed her chair back and reached for her bag. "Then stop trying to turn this into some competition."

Dylan watched her stand. "You’re the one asking me to disappear."

"Because you crossed a fucking line. I asked you for one thing after you kissed my boyfriend, and instead of giving me any fucking reassurance, you started trying to poison everything between me and Zac because you don’t want to lose him."

Dylan’s eyes narrowed.

Roxie could see she had finally hit the fear underneath all his anger.

His father had rejected him. His family was falling apart. Zac had stayed.

Now Roxie was asking him to step away from that one person.

She understood why he was scared.

She was simply done letting understanding erase what he had done.

"I’m sorry about what happened with your family," Roxie said, quieter now. "I mean that. I wouldn’t wish that shit on anyone. But what happened to you doesn’t give you the right to kiss Zac and then make me feel crazy for wanting distance afterward."

Dylan stared at her for several seconds before answering. "I already told you it won’t happen again."

"That isn’t enough when you’re sitting here telling me you still love him."

His mouth tightened. "So what do you want me to do, Roxie? Stop feeling something because you asked?"

"I want you to stop feeding it."

That finally shut him up.

For a moment the anger in Dylan’s face cracked, and Roxie saw something raw underneath it. He knew exactly what she meant. Being around Zac constantly wasn’t helping. Sleeping beside him wasn’t helping. Turning to him every time his life fell apart wasn’t helping.

Roxie didn’t need him to admit it.

She slipped her bag over her shoulder.

"I’m done. I trusted you, Dylan. I never thought it would come to this."

Something ugly moved across his face.

Maybe shame.

Maybe anger.

Whatever it was, it made him sit straighter and look at her with a bitterness Roxie had never seen from him before.

"You really think because you’re his girlfriend everybody else is supposed to disappear the second you tell us?"

Roxie stared at him, almost unable to believe the words coming out of his mouth.

"That’s seriously what you got from everything I just said?"

"I’ve been there for Zac for years, Roxie. Every time his family left him out, every time things went bad, every time he needed somewhere to go, who was there?" Dylan tapped his own chest. "Me. When he got kicked out, I was there. When you broke up with him, I was there. You think all of that disappears because now you decided I’m a problem?"

Roxie gritted her teeth.

Years.

That was what he wanted her to hear.

Dylan had years.

Roxie had months.

She knew exactly what he was trying to put underneath the words.

"Zac loves me," she said. "You know that better than anyone."

Dylan held her gaze.

Then slowly, the corner of his mouth lifted into a small smirk.

"Then ask him to stay away from me."

Roxie stared at him.

Dylan held her gaze.

"See what he says."