Filed To Story: The Trap Of Ace Book PDF Free
“You need some more tea?”
I shook my head, not looking at her.
“Are you okay, honey?”
she asked, hesitating.
This time I did glance at her, plastering a small smile on my face.
“Yeah, why do you ask?”
Her turquoise eyes observed me.
“You’re looking… tired.
Didn’t get any sleep last night?”
I knew what she was indicating.
The dark circles, the puffy eyes.
Nothing goes missing from Mother’s eyes, does it?
A squeeze in my chest made me take a deep breath.
I wish I could tell her.
“Nothing like that, Mom.
I did sleep last night.
Just having a headache since the morning.
It’ll get better, don’t worry.”
“So that’s why you didn’t go to the office today?”
Concern etched on her features.
“Why didn’t you tell me?
Did you take medicine?”
I nodded.
“Yes, I did.
I’ve also informed Caleb about it.
I took a leave today.”
“Good.
Take some rest.
You’re taking too much work stress nowadays.”
Work wasn’t the issue.
They barely gave me any actual work to do to be stressed.
Smiling at her, I looked back at the newspaper.
The newspaper I’d been sitting with for the last half an hour.
Not reading, just staring.
The clicking of heels against the tiled floor reached my ears.
My fists clenched.
“Tess?”
Mom exclaimed.
“What’re you doing here?
I thought you had an appointment for cake tasting today.
Are you done with it already?”
“I cancelled it, Mom.
I had to go to a conference with Caleb this morning.”
Placing her designer bag on the countertop, she sat beside me.
“Hi, Em.”
I gritted my teeth, not reciprocating.
My eyes glued to the big bold headlines.
Mom’s silence indicated that she noticed the tension lurking around us.
“I made some tea for Em.
You need some?”
“Sure,” Tess said, staring at me.
After giving her a cup of steamy tea, Mom excused herself to talk to Dad regarding something and left us alone.
Not wanting to sit with her alone in the kitchen, I got up from my seat.
That’s when her voice stopped me.
“Why aren’t you answering Achilles’s phone or messages?
You didn’t even go to the office today.
He’s a mess right now, Em.
That guy was outside of our house the entire night, and you didn’t even let him explain anything!”
My head snapped to her, staring at her in disbelief.
She was accusing me being the cause of his misery when she was the one who should be apologizing to me?
She knew!
She freaking knew everything and joined hands with him in his absurd plan to display me some ridiculous show!
To hurt me.
To push me away from him.
She was aware of everything but didn’t even try to tell me once in these years.
And here she dared to question me?
“Are you even hearing yourself?
After what he did, what you did, you’re telling me to give him a chance to explain?”
I shook my head in exasperation.
She pinched the bridge of her nose, letting out a sigh.
“I know, Em.
And I’m extremely sorry for that.
You don’t know how guilty I’ve been feeling for hurting you.
But Em, you have to understand.
Whatever we did, yes, it wasn’t the best way to do it, but it was for your own good.
Trust me.”
I snorted.
“My own good?
What was good in there, Tess?
I don’t see any good in my living with a broken heart for seven years.
I don’t see anything good in my suffering for the last damn seven years!”
My voice rose as I spoke.
With my heart beating fast in my chest, my breathing was harsh as hot lava ran through my veins.
“I know the pain in love.
I’ve experienced it.
And I also know we shouldn’t have done it.
But at that moment, we were young, Em.
We didn’t know how to handle this matter.
The phase Achilles was going through…”
She closed her eyes for a moment before opening them back, as if not wanting to remember the memories.
“Maybe he told you about his condition back then, but he didn’t tell you of the severity of it.
He was going through a living hell.
And Caleb, Tobias, and I saw it.
We saw him writhing in pain in his bed when he didn’t get his dose.
We heard his screams from his nightmares.
No matter how much he tried to get over it, he couldn’t.
And no one in their sane mind would want the girl they loved to see them in that state.”
I stopped breathing at her revelation.
Imagining him in that situation shook me to my core.
An urge to reach out to him rose in me, but I suppressed it.
“After knowing how important he was for you, he couldn’t let you dream of him anymore.
Even we didn’t think he’d be able to get out of his addiction ever.
And when I told him about your plan to confess to him that night, he sought my help.
And as his best friend, and thinking of your well-being, I agreed.
Please forgive us, Em.
Whatever we did, we did for you.”
She added, moisture sparkled in her eyes.
“This doesn’t justify anything.
I wasn’t that young that you guys couldn’t tell me.
But I was young enough for the scene you guys created to have me shattered completely,” I said.
My jaw clenched.
“Anyway, I don’t want to talk about it anymore.
You did whatever you thought was right.
And now I’ll do whatever I think is right.”
With my chin high, I turned around to leave.
“Em, please.
If you don’t want to talk to me, then don’t.
I understand.
But at least let him explain.
Listen to him once.
Don’t just shut him off like that,” she almost pleaded.
“You don’t know what you mean to him, Em.
That man is nothing without his Rosebud.”
My heart clenched.
Gulping the thickness in my throat, I walked out of the kitchen without another word.
The warm water
trickled down every curve of my body, soaking me into its heat, relaxing the knots of my shoulders.
But it couldn’t soothe me, the pain in my chest.
Though it washed away the tears that fell down my cheeks relentlessly.
It hurt.
It pained so fucking much!
As if someone was physically churning a dagger into my heart again and again.
A choked sob left my mouth.
Clutching the place over my heart, I slid down the glass wall of the shower and hugged my legs to my chest.
“Why did you do it?
Why?”
I whispered, letting the tears free.
It felt like the wound I got that night had been scratched anew.
I felt the same agony I endured years ago.
And the irony was, the incident I’ve suffered for so long for wasn’t even real.
It was all a sham.
A joke.
A cruel joke life had thrown at me.
Not life—my sister and the boy I loved.
They say they did it for my own good.
To save me from getting hurt.
But did they really save me from getting hurt?
No, they only threw me into the ocean of tears I’d flown every night in silence after that night.
They had thrown me to the disgust I’d felt dating so many guys who I didn’t even feel any connection to.
The kisses I’d shared, even if it hurt my own heart.
The?man who was always there for me, I’d hurt him in the process.
I could never return his love.
And all of this happened because he thought it’d be good for me by pushing me away, breaking my heart.
To push you away from me.
It’d felt like I’d been struck by thousands of arrows the moment he said those words.