Taylor           My pity party lasted until the following Thursday. By then Blakely was fed up and while I was sitting on the couch eating candy bars she used her key to let herself in.            “Ugh, you look so damn needy. This doesn’t work for me,” she said as she took her coat off.            “Screw you. Let yourself back out,” I said.            “Come on, we’re going out,” she informed me as she stood in front of the TV.            She was wearing a sexy little red dress that hugged her curves nicely. Her dark caramel complexion made red look gorgeous on her. Too bad she wasted an outfit. &ldqu

Taylor Forget him. This wasn’t about him. This was about me. Me being too caring, too willing. Me being too available…too damned stupid. I made the water hotter and tried to block her out, but this was Blakely we were dealing with. You could only ignore her if she wanted you to. She opened the door to the shower and stood there with her hands on her hips. “Don’t mind me, I’m just naked,” I said without looking at her. She reached into the shower and turned the water off before throwing a towel at me. “Get out of the shower, Taylor,” she commanded. I wanted to tell her to get out of my house, but it would be pointless. She’d leave only when she was ready. I threw on some tights and a t-shirt and got in my bed. “Covering your head doesn’t keep you from hearing me,” she said as she lay next to me. No, but it kept her from seeing if I cried again, which I hoped I wouldn’t do. She tried to pull the blanket from ove

Damon             The door wasn’t locked and the house was dark and quiet. Blakely called me and said she needed me. It sounded like she was crying, but she hung up and wouldn’t answer when I called her back. I checked every room downstairs before heading upstairs. A soft sniffle and the glow of a light led me to the room at the far end of the hall. I spotted Blakely sitting against a wall. She aimed the gun at me when she saw me, but quickly lowered it when realization set in. I jumped as the gun clattered to the floor. Getting shot, no bueno.             “Dame, I’m sorry. I didn’t know who else to call. He hit me and I got the gun,” she said as she fell into my arms.             I held her at arm’s length to see her face. Her eyes were swollen and bruised. Bloo

Taylor“Sure,” Julian replied with reluctance. “I’ll go ahead and pay the bill and have them bring the car around.”            I gave him a smile and watched as he sulked away.            “How can I put this…Izza has a lot of layers, like an onion, maybe even a double or triple onion. However, once you get through all those layers, you find this really amazing and wonderful, loyal to no end, go through hell and back for you, give you the world kind of guy. And getting through those layers takes for-freaking-ever, but you, you came out of nowhere and it was instant, he was automatically open to you.”            “Oh, is that what you’d call it? Because we must not be talking about the same person. Isaac has

Mimi It'd been two days since I'd seen Taylor out with Julian. For the life of me, I couldn't see what she saw in him. I mean, sure, he had that whole tall, dark, and handsome thing going on, but he just didn't fit her. The only conclusion I came to was that she was just hurt. Izza and Aaron had pushed her to this by constantly abusing her emotions. "If you're going to keep sulking over this, you might as well tell him," Ricco said. "What are you talking about? I'm not sulking over anything," I scowled as I looked at him. He sat at the kitchen table, reading the newspaper and waiting for me to finish cooking. Michel and Gigi sat with him, eating cereal because they were too impatient to wait for food. Brats. "Mom, something's on your mind, or you wouldn't be burning the bacon and ruining the eggs," Michel said. "Shit!" I frowned down at the charred slices of bacon. Bastards were fine two seconds ago. "Mom