Forward, Without Him Chapter 05

Forward, Without Him Chapter 05

Lexi didn’t hear back from Taylor and didn’t think much of it.
She figured Taylor was just too jealous to respond.
Which honestly made sense. Lexi had spent the last year living her best college life, using Taylor’s parents’ card, going everywhere with Taylor’s boyfriend.
And Taylor? Still home, hunched over essays.
The thought made her laugh out loud.
Her main priority now was locking Ethan down for good.
She was dying to rub all of it in Taylor’s face.
But the timing wasn’t right yet.
For one thing, Ethan still felt guilty about Taylor.
He’d been enjoying what she’d essentially handed him. But Lexi could tell — in the back of his mind, Ethan still saw Taylor as the right kind of girl. The one you actually end up with.
If she pushed him into a confrontation with Taylor now, there was a real chance Ethan would panic and drop her to try to fix things.
That was not the ending she was going for.
Her plan was to replace Taylor in his head slowly. Step by step. Until Ethan was the one who called it.
That moment hadn’t come yet.
And for another thing, she still needed Taylor’s parents to cover the rest of her tuition. She could not blow this up too early.
Although — Ethan’s family had money. Real money. Once she had him fully, tuition would be the least of her problems.
She was still running through the fantasy when Ethan walked out of the bathroom, toweling off his hair.
“Who are you texting?”
Lexi instinctively flipped her phone face-down on the bed.
“Nobody.”
Then she looked up at him.
“Ethan… for the next two months, can you stop talking to Taylor? I want you completely to myself~”
That worshipful, clingy thing she did worked on him every time.
He didn’t mind giving her that. It was a small ask.
She only had two months of being his anyway, officially. After that, he and Taylor had all the time in the world.
He texted Taylor.
“The volunteer program here is really demanding. There are strict rules around phone use. I’ll be hard to reach for a while — slow to respond. Don’t worry.”
“I’ll pick you up from the airport on move-in day.”
Lexi watched him send it and broke into a slow smile. She looped her arms around his neck.
“You’re the best~”
I got that text sitting at my kitchen table eating barbecue.
My mom leaned over and read the screen.
“This little — he’s still lying to you? Right now??”
“Block him. Block both of them. So disgusting.”
I looked at my mom, more fired up than I was, and I actually laughed.
“Done. All blocked. Those two are never touching my life again.”