Deer in Headlights (Hearts and Arrows 1) (Good god series) (30 page)

Perry sat sideways on Dita’s couch with a pint of ice cream, making out with her spoon.

Dita paced her apartment to the sound of her speakers blaring house music, which was her best and most favorite thinking music.
 

She looked over at Perry, who bobbed her head. “Wan thum?” she asked with a spoon in her mouth.

“That’s all you.”

Perry wiggled in her seat, couch dancing. “What are you going to do?”

“I don’t know, but I have to do something. I can’t stand them hurting like this.”
 

“Who knew Lex’s fatal flaw would be superstition? Of all the stupid things.”

Dita snorted. “Put
that
in the record book.”

She turned on the plush carpet to walk back across her apartment, Bisoux at her heels.
 

Think, Dita.

“So,” Dita said, half to Perry, half to herself, “Apollo’s prophecy said Dean would be unfaithful, or at least that’s what the cards implied. And that if Lex pushed the tower down, she would avoid some of the pain because she took control instead of letting fate push it over for her. The tower must be her and Dean’s relationship, and the truth inside is his true nature.”

Perry dug her spoon in the carton. “Well, she pushed the tower down all right.”

“I mean, if we’re just talking about Lex, the tower would be around her heart …” Dita turned again, and Bisoux hopped over her foot. She stopped dead in the middle of the room. “Oh my gods, Perry. What if that’s not it at all?”

“Huh?”

“What if the prophecy isn’t about Dean? What if it’s about Travis?”

She thought back over the cards. What if …

“Okay, so the infidelity … what if I could make it about Travis instead of Dean?”

“I’m not following, Dita.”

“What if the moon, the deceit, was the reading? And what if the lovers, the breakup … what if that’s Travis? What if
he
is the one who’s unfaithful? And that the truth in the tower was Lex’s truth, that she’s built a wall to protect her feelings for Dean?”

“Do you think you can pull that off?”

“Hell yes, I can.” Dita dance-paced for a minute, and the two goddesses giggled.
 

“Gods, Dita. You must do the sexiest robot in the history of the world.”

Dita paused to pop and lock, and Perry laughed from the couch as Dita moonwalked over. She flopped down next to Perry, giddy as she looked down into the city.
 

“Watch this,” she said with a grin.

Dita found the bus stop at the subway entrance by Travis’ apartment with an ad of a magnificent, life-sized model on one wall. Dita closed her eyes, and the wind began to blow past the glass walls as rose petals spun in the air.
 

A newspaper flew into the face of a bum asleep on the bus stop bench. He sat up, his eyes bugging when the supermodel in the ad blinked. She pulled away from the flat surface, taking shape as she stepped out, and her stilettos hit the sidewalk with a click. She stood motionless and looked down in wonderment at her arms before she ran her hands down her tight, black dress to shimmy it down her thighs. Her chin lifted as she strutted with purpose toward the subway entrance with her short, dark hair bouncing in time to the clip of her high, high heels.

Travis walked out of the subway entrance by his apartment and plowed into a terminally beautiful woman in a tiny black dress. She grabbed his chest as she fell into him, and he leaned back from the force, grabbing her waist to hang on to her.

“Oh gods,” she said, “I’m so sorry! These shoes are killing me.”

“Are you okay?”

He looked down at the top of her head. The big curls of her short hair shielded her face from him as she bent down, still hanging on to his shoulder with one hand while she popped her heels off. She wiggled her toes on the sidewalk, then tilted her face up to the sky with her eyes closed. “Ahh, that feels amazing. I’ve had those shoes on forever.”

She opened her eyes, and he was unwilling and unable to stop himself as he dropped his lips to hers. The moment they touched was the moment when he forgot everything, his mind in a fog as he lost himself in her.

THE PHONE BLARED IN Lex’s ear, snapping her from sleep. She rolled over and slit her eyes against the morning sun as she picked up her phone. Travis’ picture smiled at her from the screen, and her stomach flipped when she hit the accept button.
 

“Hey, Travis.”

“Sorry, did I wake you?”

“It’s okay. Everything all right?”

“No. Lex, I need you to come home. We need to talk.”

She pushed herself up on an elbow, suddenly very much awake. “All right, yeah. Yeah. I’ll be home in a few hours.” Lex hung up and lay back down.
 

Kara yawned. “What’s going on?”

“Travis wants to talk. Do you think … do you think he knows about Dean?”

Kara rolled over to face Lex, her eyes clear and blue in the morning light. “I don’t know. Are you going to tell him if he doesn’t know?”

“If I’m not going to be with Dean, does it matter? Would I be hurting him to clear my own conscience?”

“I don’t know, Lexie. I just don’t know.”

“Me neither. I just have to see how it goes. If it feels right, I’ll tell him. Either way, this is it.”

Kara watched her for a moment. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” Lex answered, knowing it was true. “It’s time.”

A few hours later, Lex opened the door to find Travis sitting on the couch with his hands clasped in front of him, his expression unreadable. She dropped her keys in the bowl and closed the door quietly as she set her bag down, then moved to sit next to him, twisting her fingers together in her lap as they sat in silence.
 

“Travis I—”

“Hang on, me first.” His eyes were on his hands, and he paused to take a deep breath before he began. “I don’t even know how to tell you this, Lex. I’ve loved being with you, and you’ve become my best friend. But I’m not in love with you, and I think you feel the same way about me. Am I right?”

Her heart ached, and she nodded. “I …”

“It’s okay, Lex.”

“Where did this come from?” she asked, dreading his response.

“I …” He turned to face her. “I met someone last night and brought her home with me.”
 

Her face fell, only slightly hurt. After what she’d almost done with Dean, she didn’t have any room to judge, or to be upset. At least he cared enough to be honest with her. Guilt welled up inside her.

“Lex, things have been crazy around here. You’re not talking to me. You’ve been going through something and keeping it from me. And I must be checked out of the relationship if I brought someone to the place where we live together. I think … I think it’s over.”

Her mind raced.
Now,
she thought.
Tell him now
. But she couldn’t bring herself to say the words. Instead, she weighed it out again, should she tell him or not?
 

How hurt and angry would Travis be that she’d lied to him about her date with Dean? If he knew what she’d done? She wasn’t sure anymore, not after his confession that he’d cheated on her. But, then again, she was going to break up with him anyway. Not that she had any right to be angry, even though Travis didn’t know their breakup was coming before he screwed someone else.

What happened between her and Dean was so much worse than Travis’ cheating. Dean was a part of Travis’ life, of his success. Travis may not go on a rampage if he found out, but could he go through every day at practice knowing she had been with Dean? Because it was cheating on her end too, even though she and Dean hadn’t gone all the way. In fact, she felt like out of the two of them, she was the criminal because she hadn’t planned on it being a fling. She’d planned on it being much, much more.

But she wasn’t going to be with Dean, not anymore. Was it worth hurting Travis and potentially damaging his career for nothing? Because exactly nothing came out of her and Dean but pain.

There was enough hurt going around without putting any more on Travis. If she and Dean had ended up together, well … that would have been different.
 

It was in that moment that she wondered if the tarot reading had been about Travis. Infidelity, the breakups, the deception, the sun, the fool … they all made sense. But it was all realized distantly, because the truth was that Dean wasn’t someone she could put her faith in or give her heart to. She had already ripped off the band aid, and there was no point in putting it back on, not for someone that she was convinced would hurt her.

“Travis, it’s okay. I’m not angry. I care about you, too … so much, but it’s never been love for me, either.” She paused as she took in the guilt on his face, feeling it mirrored on her own. “I’ll get my stuff together and go to Kara’s.”

“Lex, I don’t want to put you out with nowhere to go. You can stay until you figure things out. I’ll crash on the couch. All your stuff is here. It would be a huge pain in the ass to drag it all to Kara’s and then to another apartment. Just stay … unless you don’t want to. But don’t leave because you think that’s what I want. You’re my best friend, Lexie. I want to keep that.”

She looked at Travis long, then looked away. “Me too,” she said as she leaned over to lay her head on his shoulder. He moved his arm around her as they sat in the silent room, together and apart.

“Oh my gods, I fucking did it.” Dita’s cheeks hurt from smiling, and Perry grinned at her.

“Brilliant. I can’t believe you turned the prophecy around. I mean, I can believe it because you’re smart as fuck, but that really was genius. What are you going to do now?”

Dita’s smile fell a smidge, and her eyes dropped. “I don’t know, exactly. She’s not going to run straight to Dean, not as sure as she is that he’s wrong for her.”

“Well, you’ve got eleven days to figure it out. I have faith in you.”

“I just want them to be happy.” Dita said quietly. “There’s so much hate and hurt in the world and so much unnecessary pain for Lex and Dean right now. They need each other. She can heal him, and he deserves something real and true and good in his life. He deserves to find home.”

Perry’s eyes were wet. “Stop it, you big softy. You’re gonna make me cry.”

“Don’t worry. I’m going to do whatever I have to do to make it happen for them. I just hope I can pull it off.”

“Well, if anyone can, it’s you.”