Chapter Eighteen

Better Than Revenge

Chapter 18

All of the aerobics and yoga in the world couldn’t have gotten me away from Christian. Sure, they kept me in shape, but clearly they weren’t very helpful when it came to a situation like this. They didn’t keep me in well enough shape to run away from Christian Ryder for very long. He was in much better shape than I was and he caught me pretty easily.

I gave him a run for his money, though. That was only because of the multiple turns I took and the places I could crawl through, but still. It counted for something. I managed to avoid him for around five minutes before he finally caught me.

I was just about to crawl into a small space when he grabbed onto me. “Oh, no you don’t,” he said, stopping me in my tracks.

I tried to wriggle out of his grip but I failed miserably. “Let go of me, Christian! Or I’ll scream rape.”

Instead of at least loosening his grip, he had the nerve to tighten it. “Not until we talk.”

“We have nothing to talk about.” I knew this was a total lie but I didn’t feel like discussing this with him. I had a feeling it wasn’t going to be very pleasant.

He pulled me up on my feet, never loosening his grip on me. “You know that’s not true.”

I rolled my eyes and sighed. “Fine. Talk.”

“First, I have a question for you,” he announced, dragging me over to his trailer.

“That counts as talking, smart one.” I dragged my feet and resisted, making his job harder.

Finally, he got tired of it and just stopped walking.

“Do you still think I was exaggerating?” he demanded angrily, getting right down to business. “Do you still think I was overreacting? Do you realize what you did?”

“Well…” I trailed off momentarily. “I do still think you were being a little too dramatic. I know it’s the drama geek in you, but come on. It felt like I was in a bad teen movie and you were the annoying blonde cheerleader.”

“I wasn’t being dramatic,” he snapped, and his grip tightened slightly.

“You kind of were.”

“So you still think what you didn’t wasn’t that bad?” he asked incredulously.

“Of course I do,” I replied calmly. I decided I had had enough of his stupid death grip and used my twisting maneuver on him. I caught him off guard, which was probably the only reason it worked. Christian was ten times stronger than Frank. I had gotten lucky.

“Godammit,” he cursed, rubbing his arm. “Don’t do that!”

“Don’t grab onto me like that, then,” I shot back.

“There was no other way to get you to stop running,” he snapped angrily, “and I needed to talk to you.”

“Well, I’m talking to you now, aren’t I?”

“Yeah,” he replied darkly. “I can’t say I’m really happy about it, though.”

I rolled my eyes. “Whatever. What is it that you wanted to hear from me, anyway? Do you want to know where I stand concerning this whole little situation?”

Christian waved a hand at me with a sigh. “Sure.”

“Then fine,” I said, giving him the evil eye. “I don’t feel bad about this at all and I don’t think that what I did was as awful as you’re making it out to be. And you want to know why?”

“No, but you’re going to tell me anyway.”

He had a point there. Even if he had said no, I still would’ve told him. I was enjoying this part of our little discussion far too much not to tell him. “The reason I don’t feel bad about this is because you deserve everything that’s happening to you.”

“I deserve this?” he repeated incredulously.

“Of course you do,” I said, giving him a look. Was he really asking me that? He had to be kidding me. “How could you think you don’t deserve this? You made your own bed. Now you have to lie in it. You were the one who lied to all of these girls, after all. What did you think was going to happen? That you would get away with it forever and no one would ever find out? Really.”

“Of course not,” he snapped in irritation. “I wasn’t going to stay with them for very long.”

“You are such an asshole,” I said in disbelief, shaking my head. I knew he was a horrible person, but it still made me backtrack when he said things like this. “You act like these girls didn’t have feelings! They were head over heels in love with you and you treated them like they were some androids or something, like their feelings didn’t matter, like they didn’t matter.”

“It’s not my fault they got too attached,” he exclaimed in his defense. “They knew this was a possibility.”

“I doubt they knew that you were going to cheat on them with dozens of girls,” I pointed out. “And no, it is your fault. If you act all charming and lie to a girl the way you did, she’s going to fall!”

“You haven’t fallen,” he pointed out suddenly.

I gave him a weird look. “Because I hate you and you haven’t acted the least bit charming towards me, anyway.”

“I would have if you’d acted nice to me,” he said, trying to make me look like the bad guy.

“Oh, bullshit!” I cried immediately. “You went off on me when I accidentally ran into you!”

“You spilled my coffee!” he said in his defense.

“So? That’s no reason to go off on someone!”

He shot me a disbelieving look. “So you’re telling me you would’ve been nice to me if I hadn’t done that?”

“Of course I wouldn’t have. I hated you back then, too.”

“Then how can you blame this on me?” he demanded, shaking his head at me.

“Because you didn’t know that I hated you when you ran into me,” I stated simply. “Yet you were still rude to me. Now what does that say about you?”

“Whatever,” he snapped. “This has nothing to do with what we were talking about! My point is, what you did, it caused a disaster. And it’s not even over yet.”

I rolled my eyes. “You are such a drama queen. Get over it. Your little secret got out. Boo hoo. It was going to get out eventually. I just sped up the process.”

He scoffed in disbelief. “You are unbelievable.”

I nodded shortly. “Mmm-hmm. Is that all? I have better things to do than waste my time talking to you.”

“Yeah, that’s all,” he said, an annoyed expression on his face. “Things aren’t going to stay this way, though. You’re not going to get away with this so easily.”

I raised an eyebrow. “If it’s a war you’re trying to start, then you can go ahead and proceed at your own risk.”

He laughed, shaking his head in amusement. “Proceed at my own risk? Oh, you make me laugh, Soph.”

I shot him an annoyed look. “Don’t call me that.”

“You don’t like it, Soph?” he continued; clearly only doing it to annoy me.

“No, I like the nickname,” I stated, shrugging. “I just don’t like you. I don’t like it when random creepers give me nicknames.”

“Too bad, then, Soph.”

I let out a loud breath in irritation, deciding to ignore him. “I’m going to warn you again. You’re doing this at your own risk. Being in a war like this with me isn’t something you want, I can assure you.”

“I thought we were already at war,” he pointed out smugly.

“Mmm, yes,” I allowed slowly, “but that was just little league stuff. I have a feeling this is going to turn into the big-leagues very, very soon. Well, it’ll turn into the big-leagues if you make good on your little threat.”

He rolled his eyes. “I’m so scared.”

“You will be.” I knew he wasn’t going to pay much notice to what I said, and actually, that was fine with me. That meant he would be dumb enough to try to start a war with me, a war that he would never win. “You’ll see.”

***

The next day, Christian acted like nothing was wrong, but I knew that he was secretly plotting something. And when I heard him giggling like a little schoolgirl with Blake during lunch, I knew I was right. He hadn’t heeded my warning. He was going to strike.

I was wary of him for the next couple of days, just waiting for the moment when he would strike. I didn’t let my guard down once. I had no idea what he was going to do. I didn’t know his antics very well. It could’ve been anything. All I knew was that I would make sure whatever I did to get back at him was three times worse.

I was watching Hollywood Tonight with Tori, as usual, when Christian’s revenge was finally made clear to me. I had kind of taken a liking to that show, mostly because of the drama that was featured on there that I had caused.

That day, however, I wasn’t happy with what I saw.

I didn’t know who I was going to kill first, Blake or Christian.

The paparazzi was bothering Christian, as usual. They asked him a few questions about the movie, about the scandals his many girlfriends had caused, and finally, they asked him about me. “How are things with your co-star?”

“Well, Soph and I are doing pretty well,” he replied, putting emphasis on the nickname. That sick bastard knew I would be watching… why, I ought to…

“How is your relationship?” another reporter asked.

“It’s doing better. We’re trying to get along a little better,” Christian said with a smirk. This was a total lie, of course. If anything, we were doing even worse than usual, thanks to this little war that was brewing between us. “In fact, I’ve even talked to some of the people in Sophia’s life. I’m just trying to understand her better, you know? She can be pretty confusing.”

He talked to some of the people in my life? He was kidding, right? Dear God…

“Who have you talked to?” a female reporter asked loudly.

“I actually talked to one of her exes,” he said with a nod. “One of the exes she remained friends with, of course. We became friends pretty quickly, although I could’ve done without some of the things he told me.”

He talked to one of my exes? What was wrong with him? Why would he do that? And how did he even find a way to contact any of my exes, anyways?

A ton of the reporters asked Christian what it was that my ex told him. I was kind of scared to hear his answer.

“He said a lot of things,” Christian said vaguely. “He told me a few stories about her when she was younger, some things about her personality that I should probably know if I want to get along with her, the fact that he had to break things off with Soph when he found out she had herpes, some of her favorite things—”

My mouth dropped all the way down to the floor, practically, when I heard this. My eyes widened and my face turned either red or purple. I couldn’t tell.

Tori, who had been completely silent until then, looked over at me in alarm. She sensed that I was going to blow. She knew me too well.

He was cut off by dozens of reporters asking jumbled questions simultaneously. Christian tried to make it look like his comment was made accidentally, but I recognized that look in his eye. It was the look of pure evil. He did it on purpose. This was his revenge.

“Soph…” Tori began nervously. “Take a few deep breaths… in… out…”

Her attempts to calm me didn’t help. I think it did the opposite, actually. I blew up and started screeching.

“I’m going to fucking kill him!” I shrieked furiously.

He had absolutely no idea what he just started. This was full on war. He was going to regret ever messing with me.

***

Like I said... this is where the games begin. ;D

These next few chapters are probably my favorites. They're definitely going to be fun to write!

Anyways, I updated today, as promised! (I'm so proud of myself. xD)

I hope you guys enjoyed!

HAPPY THANKSGIVING GUYS!! To all of you who celebrate it, that is. To all of you who don't.... HAPPY THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 24th, 2011!

:D

VOTE.COMMENT.FAN.