"You took advantage of me. I was in a very vulnerable place."

"What?! You were trying to get me drunk!" Elijah retaliated, unsure of how to react the morning after the deed.

"So? I was already drunk. You should've known better." Kylie responded calmly; absent-mindedly even. This certainly wasn't the most outrageous thing to ever happen to her. She'd had plenty of one night stands; enough to ensure she would be able to pull off an Oscar worthy performance to Jess. She turned her back to Elijah and continued beating the eggs in the bowl in front of her.

"You're unbelievable, we both knew what we were doing." He grabbed her arm, forcing her to stop. He couldn't ever deny the fact that he loved Jess, but he was also struggling to deny that he'd felt something with Kylie the night before. He wasn't sure what he'd felt, but it was definitely there.

"Just forget it okay? Nothing happened, nothing that mattered anyway." She sighed.

"This is all so easy for you, isn't it?" He knew forgetting the events of his night with Kylie would be one of the hardest thing he had to do. She'd awoken something inside of him; something that had been present when he'd first dated Jess but had long since died inside him.

"Yeah, it is." She responded, returning to her cold-hearted stance.

"I found this in the lounge, did you get lucky again last night, Kylie?" Elijah and Kylie were both alarmed by Jess's voice in the doorway. Elijah immediately withdrew from his position near Kylie, tactfully moving a few steps back from her.

Jess stood at the door, presenting a lacy red-coloured bra that both Kylie and Elijah recognised from last night.

"Yeah, something like that." She laughed a rather empty laugh, reclaiming the remains of her night with Elijah. She averted her gaze to Elijah quick enough to notice the light flush appearing on his cheeks.

As soon as Kylie had woken up with a throbbing headache, her naked body draped around Elijah's, with shot glasses placed randomly all over the floor and a nearly empty vodka bottle lying between them, she'd known a huge mistake had been made.

And later, when she'd spent the morning with her head above the toilet seat attempting to alleviate her hangover by preparing for the surge of vomit to emerge, and she'd had to deal with a very panicked Elijah, she'd known this had to be one of the biggest mistakes she'd ever made. She'd quickly discovered that Elijah was a fucking saint who struggled greatly to lie, making this whole ordeal even more painful.

"Hey baby." Jess wrapped her hands around Elijah's waist, leaning up to peck his lips lightly. He couldn't help but notice for the first time the significant difference in height between the two girls. Of course, he'd always been aware that Jess was taller but he'd never quite realised how short Kylie truly was. Jess barely needed to tip-toe to reach his lips whereas he'd needed to lean down in addition to Kylie tip-toeing to kiss her. He struggled to shake the thought, and frankly he wasn't sure why it even mattered. But it did.

"I was thinking, I finish early from work today so maybe the three of us could do something later, maybe go out for dinner?" She leaned her head against Elijah's shoulder, facing Kylie and looking hopeful.

"Yeah, sure." Kylie responded, forcing the smile that appeared upon her lips, hoping it looked as natural as possible. Truth was, anything and everything sounded better than having to spend another minute in the same room as Elijah who dripped guilt with every word.

She twirled her body around facing the kitchen countertop. She clamped down on her bottom lip, breaking the delicate layers of skin and drawing some blood. Seeing Jess's face was enough to muster up extreme feelings of guilt. Jess was her best friend; her soulmate, as the two would joke when they were in high school.

"I'll see you guys later then, yeah?" She grabbed an apple from the fruit bowl, before pecking Kylie's forehead and leaving the kitchen humming happily, completely oblivious.

"How are you doing this? How can you just pretend?"

"I have a fucking headache, and if you don't get out of my face, I will throw these eggs at you. I'm warning you." She turned around, grabbing an egg to show him how serious she was.

Elijah rolled his eyes at Kylie and left the room, remembering the time in high school when her and Jess had pelted one of their exes with eggs and not wanting to be on the receiving end of Kylie's wrath today.

Kylie exhaled audibly as soon as he left, "Kylie, why are you so stupid?"

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Later on that day, Kylie laid across her bed, her limbs completely sprawled out. Grabbing her phone, she slotted her earphones into the designated slot and played some music.

It's a Lana kind of day.

She squeezed her eyes shut and attempted to lose herself in the music. When she opened her eyes a couple of minutes later, Elijah stood above her as her head dangled off of the side of the bed.

"Have you become my fucking shadow today?" She pulled the earphones aggressively from her ears, and sat up.

"I've never done anything like this before. It's hard to just act like nothing has happened." He responded honestly, shrugging his shoulders.

"Why aren't you at work, Elijah?" She sighed, crossing her legs.

"I'm still at University, and I barely have lectures. It's my last year."

"Really? Jess never said you were still studying." She adjusted her posture in surprise. She'd pretty much thought that Elijah was a bit like her, living on Jess's family's earnings.

"Why would she?" He chuckled lightly, the disappointment slightly evident but Kylie failed to recognise it.

"So, what are you studying?"

"Computer Science." He shrugged lightly.

"Shut up! You're telling me you're smart?!" Kylie responded, her mouth visibly forming an 'O' shape in surprise.

"Not smart, hard-working. I want to achieve something big. I don't want to be known as the Elijah who married Jess for the money and the easy life, you know?"

"Yeah, I know." Kylie smiled gently, she could relate. Hardly anybody knew about her home life, but they were so quick to compare her to Jess.

Oh, that Jess she's in property developing and remember her friend Kylie? Yeah, we all knew she was never going anywhere.

"Have you never had ambitions?" Elijah interrupted her thoughts, sitting beside her on the bed. She could tell from his tone of voice that he was actually interested, not like the rest who asked.

"When I was younger, I wanted to be a pilot." She giggled lightly at the thought, realising how stupid that dream had been.

"Really? I can see you as an air hostess, maybe not a pilot though." He responded, laughing along with her.

"There are five exits on this aircraft, with two in the front of the aircraft and two located in the rear." She mimicked a posher accent and moved her hands to either side of her, mimicking the actions of an air hostess as she laughed.

"Can we talk about it now? Properly?" Elijah inquired, adopting a more serious facial expression.

"Okay."

"You asked me about our first time. Do you remember?" He asked gently.

She inhaled deeply, closing her eyes wondering why this was relevant.

"No, I don't because I was so drunk, okay?" She responded, standing up and moving towards the window. She remembered every word that had been spoken yesterday but she wished she could erase the memory engraved in her mind.

"You asked if I wanted you." He whispered.

"Elijah, stop. I'm sorry, okay? It was a mistake, and it was my mistake. I know that."

"We both knew what we were doing. We both could've stopped it, but we chose not to." He sat down on the bed as she spun around to face him, their eyes meeting finally for the first time since yesterday.

He'd noticed for the first time how she had a light beauty spot on the side of her nose, and he was now discovering how much he liked the little black mark that looked like it had been an afterthought when she had been created. Just like Kylie had only just noticed the deep dimples imprinted on either side of his mouth; the tiny little dents which made his stretched out smile look mischievous but she knew Elijah was anything but.

"I know. Do you regret it?" Kylie hated herself for the answer she wanted to hear from Elijah's lips. She hated herself for stabbing Jess in the back with the same knife that belonged to Jess herself. She hated herself for always wanting what belonged to Jess when she was a child and then carrying that habit into adulthood.

"I wish I did. But I loved every moment." His eyes met hers again, and both of them tried to resist the temptation to let their lips meet again but to no avail. As their lips danced against each other, the dimly lit burgundy room reflected red upon both of their skin; making them appear as though they were drenched in blood.

The colour of sin. Kylie was Eve and she was tempting her Adam; and there was no way this could ever end well.

"What am I doing?" Elijah pushed Kylie away from him, hard enough for her to topple against the bedside table and for the frame with the prom picture to fall to the floor with a screeching shattering sound.

"I'm supposed to be marrying Jess in five months, what the hell am I doing?" He whispered more to himself than to Kylie, an almost bewildered expression plastered across his face. He ran his fingers frantically through his curls, before rushing out of the room.

She gingerly leaned down to pick up the broken frame as he left.

Tiny cracks covered the whole frame; blurring the clarity of the faces underneath. Kylie used her large acrylic nail to trace the largest crack on the photo frame. The largest crack ran straight from Jess's head down to her feet, splitting her body into two halves.

Kylie closed her eyes as she teased her finger along the cracks of the frame; covertly enjoying the feeling of the cracks that were not quite sharp enough to break through the taut skin on her finger.

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Authors Note: I hope you guys enjoyed this chapter, I tried to do something a little bit different with it and set the scene for later events in this book! It is slightly shorter, but I didn't want to drag it out unnecessarily and I hope you guys will still enjoy it!

Also, I've been asked this a few times so I thought I would clear it up, Jess is a main character along with Kylie and Elijah and we will see a lot more of her in later chapters.

I hope you guys will enjoy this one, and maybe things will become a little clearer! Please comment and let me know what you think of Kylie and Elijah and where you think the story is going, I love to hear from you guys and please vote if you enjoyed!