Chapter Twenty-Nine

A/N: If you've already read this, READ IT AGAIN. It got cut off and was only a page long. <.< I was so mad. I did not write over 3,000 words for nothing! So sorry!

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Better Than Revenge

Chapter 29

It was a good thing no one was around to witness my reaction after I heard that voicemail. Well, I most likely would have internalized all of my true feelings, faking a cool exterior, but this way, I could panic freely.

First, I saved the voicemail. Then I listened to it over. And over. And over. And over.

I honestly lost track of how many times I listened to it.

I was torn. I was absolutely torn. I didn’t even know what to think, what to feel. I didn’t know anything. I was beyond confused. I didn’t know what to do. He was going to be expecting an answer for sure, and I just didn’t know what to say to him. I would have to avoid him until I got this straightened out.

I listened to the last part to exhaustion, specifically.

“Basically… I’ll make saying yes worth your while, Soph. I… I… Iloveyou. Okaybye!”

It was honestly beyond cute.

I just didn’t know if it was true or not. It just didn’t make sense. None of this made sense! He had to have been acting. He had to. This just wasn’t possible. He was Christian Ryder. He could have any girl he wanted. He could have a freaking Victoria’s Secret Model, for Christ’s sake! And let me tell you, I was no Victoria’s Secret Model. I didn’t think I was ugly, of course, but I also didn’t delude myself into thinking I was model material.

Why would he choose me? I was barely even famous. I was almost your average girl. Why would he want me?

And even if I could accept the fact that he wanted me, why would he be this nervous around me? There was absolutely no reason! What happened to his charm? The confidence that made so many girls swoon and throw themselves at his feet? It didn’t make sense that Christian Ryder would be nervous about saying this to a girl. I was sure he had said “I love you,” to many girls before me, and I was sure he had lied to all of them, too.

I desperately needed someone to talk to about this, but I couldn’t think of anyone besides Tori. I wasn’t sure if this was the best idea, however. I knew how she would react, and I would need some Aspirin afterwards.

There really was no one else, though, so finally, with a loud sigh, I decided to head home to tell Tori about the voicemail.

I opened the stall and poked my head out slightly, making sure there was no one there. I was almost sure there was no one, but I had to be positive. Once I was satisfied that the coast was clear, I ran for it. I sprinted all the way to my car.

I was clearly not sneaky-detective material. If this place hadn’t already been deserted, I would’ve been caught.

Thankfully, I made it back to my apartment safely.

“There you are!” Tori exclaimed, jumping up from her seat on the couch. “Finally!”

“The fact that you were just sitting there, doing absolutely nothing as you waited for me is actually really creepy.”

She grinned widely. “I know. I was going for a sort of parent, Godfather kind of thingy. Pretty good, right?”

“Uh huh,” I said slowly, honestly questioning my friendship with her. Sometimes, she just made me wonder. She really did.

“Did Ryder talk to you, by any chance?” Tori asked slowly, making a circle with her feet as she glanced up at me mischievously.

“Kind of,” I said, walking into the living room and throwing my bag on the couch.

“What do you mean kind of?” she demanded. “I told that buffoon to wait by the bathroom door until you came out! Well, I also told him to—heh, never mind! You don’t need to hear that part!”

I gave her a weird look. No wonder Christian was scared of her… she must have terrified the poor guy.

Ohmygod, what was I doing? Feeling… feeling sorry for Christian? I should’ve been encouraging Tori’s behavior, since clearly it made him uncomfortable! Yet I wasn’t.

The world must have been coming to an end. There was no other way to put it. Hell was surely also freezing over.

“You talked to him, didn’t you?” I asked, already knowing the answer. “You told him I didn’t believe the little speech you gave me, so you gave him the idea.”

Tori grinned roguishly. “The idea? Whatever do you mean?”

I rolled my eyes. “You know what I mean! I got a… a pretty interesting voicemail from Christian.”

“Aww, he left you a voicemail?” she asked, placing a hand over her heart. “That’s even cuter than I thought, because then he wouldn’t have any response of yours to go with! He would just have to, like, wing it and hope he wasn’t making a total fool of himself! Aww!”

I had never thought of it that way. He really was putting himself out on a limb there.

Then again, I had already humiliated him so many times, what was one more to the list? It wasn’t a very big deal.

When I didn’t reply, Tori spoke again. “Can I hear it? Please, please, please, please, please? I want to hear it!”

“Geez,” I muttered. “Fine! Here.” I threw her my phone and she squealed loudly.

She called my voicemail and tapped her foot impatient, nearly jumping around from the excitement. Seeing her, you would have thought he had left the voicemail for her.

Tori’s reactions as she listened to the voicemail were actually pretty similar to mine… they were just exaggerated tenfold. At the moments I smiled, she grinned widely. It was actually kind of scary. At the moments I kind of went, “Aww,” Tori screamed, “AWWWWWWWWW!” At the moments I laughed, Tori laughed loudly and rambunctiously.

I could see exactly what Christian was talking about. Tori was rather frightening.

Once she was finished, Tori ran into my arms, squealing and squeezing me to death. “Ohmygod, Soph! That was the cutest thing ever! If you don’t say yes, I will! No… if you don’t marry him, I will!” she pulled away and stomped her feet. “Why can’t I find a guy who will do that for me? You are so lucky! I would kill to have a guy leave me a voicemail like that!”

“Uh huh.”

“He loves you!” she screamed at the top of her lungs.

“Shh,” I hissed, covering her mouth with my hand. “There are elderly people in this building sleeping! Shut up!”

“Sorry!” she exclaimed, her eyes widening. “I’m just so excited!”

“I’m going to go take a shower,” I muttered, taking a few steps back and turning towards the bathroom.

“No way!” Tori cried, grabbing hold of my arm. “That’s so rude! Even if you’re going to say no, you should still go give him your answer!”

“What difference would it make if I went now or tomorrow if I was going to say no?”

“Wait, you said ‘if’,” Tori said slowly. “So… you’re thinking about it?! OHMYGOD!”

“Shh!” I hissed again, slapping her arm. “Stop being so loud!”

“Sorry! But Soph, you know I have a point! He deserves an answer!”

Tori was pushy, rude and obnoxious… but she was my best friend and she did have a point here. He did deserve an answer, after that voicemail of his.

“I guess you’re right,” I said finally. “Can I please take a shower first? I’m going to get sick, thanks to that stupid rain!”

Tori was about to protest when this gave her an idea. “Yes! Go shower! I’ll pick out your outfit meanwhile!”

“I don’t need an outfit picked out for this!”

“Yes, you do!” she insisted, shoving me towards the bathroom. “Just leave it all to me!”

***

In the end, I didn’t go with Tori’s outfit choice, as was expected, of course. The outfit she chose was beyond slutty. Seriously. I felt like my boobs were going to pop out at any second.

“Hey, if you got it, flaunt it!” Tori protested when I yelled at her for this. “I would kill for C cups! A cups are lame!”

I rolled my eyes. “This isn’t happening.”

I took off the slutty top—hers, naturally—and picked a top of my own.

“You’re so boring,” she complained with a pout.

Her disappointment greatly amused me, so to anger her even more, I wore a tank top and sweatpants instead of the cute top and jeans I had originally planned to wear.

“Soph, no!” Tori whined, shaking me violently. “Why would you do this to me?! Why?!”

I snickered. “If he ‘loves’ me so much, he won’t care. Hey, think of this as a... a test! Yeah! Of his love.” I was just making this up as I went, honestly. I felt bad about making her feel this bad, so I was trying to fix things a little.

Tori raised an eyebrow at this.

“He says he loves me, right? Well, if he really loves me, he won’t care that I’m wearing a tank top and sweatpants with my hair up and no make-up on. Besides, he’s already seen me first thing in the morning, and that didn’t scare him off, so that’s got to mean something, right?”

Tori’s eyes lit up. “Yeah! You’re totally right! Soph, you’re a total genius! Yeah, this is good! Okay! Go! Go!”

I am so good, I thought with a smirk.

“I’ll be back in a bit,” I said, exiting my room and grabbing my car keys on the way to the door.

“If you don’t come back tonight, I’ll know why,” Tori said, winking suggestively at me.

I walked all the way back to where she was standing just to hit her. Shaking my head in annoyance, I walked away from her.

“Don’t forget to use protection!” she called out just as I opened the door. “Don’t want little Ryder babies running around too soon!”

“Tori, shut the hell up!” I screamed before slamming the door behind me. I just heard her laugh obnoxiously from behind the door.

I shook my head as I made my way out of our apartment building. It didn’t take me very long to get to Christian’s house, and it didn’t take me very long to get inside his house, either, like last time. The gates were already open.

Did he have company? Eh, it was probably Blake. That guy practically lived at Christian’s house. I didn’t blame him. Christian’s house was pretty amazing.

I parked outside of the gates, not wanting to alert Christian of my presence yet. I kind of hadn’t made my decision yet. It was a hard decision. It meant either breaking his heart—if he was telling the truth, of course, or going against everything I stood for.

I was basically just going along with Tori’s suggestions. She did have a point about Christian deserving an answer, but I shouldn’t have left so premeditatedly. Or I should have pondered it while I showered, at least, instead of complaining to myself that my favorite shampoo had run out.

I heard voices and, being the nosy creeper I was, I decided to follow them. I was stopped in my tracks, however, by a large hand on my shoulder. I jumped a mile and saw a guy in a black suit staring at me with a raised eyebrow. I assumed he was one of Christian’s bodyguards.

I smiled slowly. I would have to charm my way out of this, clearly. “Hey! I don’t think we’ve met. I’m Sophia. Sophia Hasting,” I said quietly, sticking my hand out.

“I know who you are,” the guy said with a chuckle.

“Really? Oh, right.” I almost forgot. I was famous now. Plus, I was kind of a big part of Christian’s life by now, whether we liked it or not. “Um, just here to see Christian! Obviously.”

“He has company at the moment,” the guy said, nodding towards the source of the voices I heard.

“Yup,” I said, nodding slowly. “Er, I’ll just wait it out. You know? Yeah. If it’s not a problem.”

The bodyguard shrugged. “As long as you’re not planning on killing Mr. Ryder, I’m okay with that.”

“Nah, I don’t want to kill him anymore,” I said, shaking my head.

The bodyguard gave me a look of surprise.

Oh, really?! Even Christian’s bodyguard, who I had never even met, thought this was strange coming from me? Was my annoyance with Christian really so well known?

“I just want to leave him in a coma now.”

He just laughed and patted my back roughly, letting me go ahead.

I forced a laugh because that actually really hurt. I gave him the thumbs up sign and followed the voices until I found the source. My curiosity mostly stemmed from the feminism of the first voice I had heard. I found Christian arguing with Cassandra in front of his house. I was lucky he lived in a mansion with a huge pathway leading to the house and gates that were far away from the front door. That was the only reason he didn’t see me or notice that there was another guest. I was also lucky the bodyguard and I had been speaking quietly.

Also, it was beyond dark, so that helped, as well. I quickly hid behind a fountain so I could listen in. I was not going to miss this.

“Chris, don’t do this!” Cassandra screamed angrily. “How could you just forget everythin’ we had?”

“What are you talking about?” Christian shook his head. “What we had? What we had wasn’t much, and it ended a while ago, anyway!”

“Don’t lie!” she shrieked. “If it weren’t for those dumb whores and then that stupid, slutty whore, you would still be mine!”

“Don’t call her that!” he hissed. “She’s not stupid or a whore. She’s ten times better than you, clearly.”

Wait. Was he talking about me? No… that couldn’t possibly be true. He was been bluffing in the voicemail, right? This didn’t make sense. He wouldn’t say this to Cassandra, who could spill the beans to the entire world. He couldn’t possibly want anyone to know of his “feelings” for me if he was just planning on playing me again.

Unless he wasn’t bluffing or planning on playing on me… what if he was telling me the truth?

“She is one,” she hissed right back. “A dirty, lying whore! Only reason you’re even interested in her is ’cause she’s puttin’ out, I’ll bet! You like takin’ her to bed. Is she better than me? Does she remind you of me?”

“My private life is none of your business, but I’m not going to let you talk about her like that. She hasn’t been “putting out”. She doesn’t need to. Unlike you, she’s got so many things going for her, she doesn’t need to put herself out there like that.”

Cassandra let out an angry huff. “Why are you doing this, Chris? Why?”

“Because I love her,” he said simply.

I had to cover my mouth to stop myself from doing something or saying something or making some sort of squeaky noise that might alert them to my presence.

“No, no, no!” she screamed. “You don’t! You love me, Chris! Me! And only me! You can’t do this to me!”

“I don’t love you,” Christian replied. “And honestly? I never did. Not really. This is the first time I’ve felt like this. This is the first time I’ve actually been in love.”

“No, Chris, no! You love me! I know you do! I’ll prove it to you!”

It was dark, but not dark enough for me to miss when she lunged towards him and threw herself into his arm, sloppily kissing him.

And no, I wasn’t close enough to see that the kiss was sloppy. I just… I just knew!

I don’t know why I did it. I really don’t. I normally don’t have many impulsive moments, but Christian seemed to bring out a few of those in me, clearly. When I saw that he was trying to pry her off of him, I stalked over to them and said, “Don’t you see he’s not into it? Have some dignity!”

She jumped away from him in surprise. “What? What are you doin’ here? This is private!”

“Oh, thank God,” Christian muttered.

I couldn’t help but snicker.

“Get out of here!” she screamed at me. “You have no right!”

“Why don’t you get out of here?” I shot back. “Obviously, your presence isn’t wanted here!”

“What does it matter to you? This is none of your business!”

“Really, I’m doing you a favor,” I said, nodding once. “I’m giving you the chance to gather up the small shred of dignity you have left—which, I’m sure, isn’t much—and leave.”

She glared at me. “How did you even get here?”

“How did you get here? Did someone leave your cage open?”

I thought Christian was going to die laughing.

“Look who’s talkin’! Look what I’m wearin’. And look what you’re wearin’.”

“I think she looks beautiful,” Christian said, smiling at me.

I fought a smile, instead smirking at Cassandra.

She gave me a hateful look before turning towards Christian. “You’re goin’ to regret this, Chris. Every day of your life! I gave you the best days of your life!”

“No,” Christian said, and he wasn’t even looking at Cassandra as he spoke. He was looking at me. “After today… I think I’ll be having even better days.”

Finally, she realized she had lost and left angrily, her insanely painful looking high heels clacking away.

It wasn’t until after she left that I realized how this looked. I had been crouching behind a fountain… listening in on his conversation with his ex girlfriend… and when she kissed him… I stalked out in annoyance and practically stopped her.

This wasn’t looking good for me, was it?

***

You guys are lucky.

This originally would've been the last chapter, but I keep getting ideas and adding to the story. So there's still a few more chapters left. :D

Anyhoo.

I love Tori. I know some of you find her annoying... but I think she's awesome. :D

And I love Christian.

He just keeps on proving himself more and more each day. Aww. (And yes, I realize he is a fictional character that I created and that I sound a bit bonkers saying this. But I don't care!)

So...

What do you guys think of Sophia's actions?