She’s quiet. There are a million things I want to ask her. I want to know what happened after I left. I want to know about Yale, about New York. If she still paints.
I want to know if she thought about me, like I did about her.
If her heart still aches too.
Lily stops, turning to me completely. A tear glistens on her cheek. The sight stops me cold in my tracks. If seeing her limp hurts me, her sadness and anger shames me.
“How could you leave without saying goodbye, Hayden? I loved you, you know. And you just left. How could you?”
I swallow at her anger. It’s well-deserved. “I had to,” I say. “I hate goodbyes. The thought of telling you bye, knowing you’d try to convince me to stay… It was more than I could handle. I’m not sure I would do the same today. It was a coward’s way out, and I’m sorry.”
It’s the truth. If she would have asked me to stay, begged me, I don’t know if I would’ve been strong enough to leave anyway.
And we would have had to live with the consequences of me staying, and I’m sure that would have been so much worse. There’s more I want her to know. About my crushing guilt, about conversations in the dark, about one-way tickets and her father’s voice. It’s time for you to leave, son.
But there’s no way I can make her see—there’s no way to ask for her forgiveness. I know I don’t deserve it.
Lily wipes away a tear. I can see it, the way she puts steel in her spine and straightens her shoulders. She doesn’t want my excuses.
Her voice is furious when she speaks. “All right, then. Thanks for your wonderful explanation. I always wondered.”
“I can imagine,” I murmur. Because I can. Because I would have gone out of my mind if she had suddenly left me.
Her eyes are still angry, and her tone is too, despite the overly kind words. “It wouldn’t be fair for a teenage crush to hold you back from a great opportunity, of course. You clearly made the right decision, Hayden.”
The angry description slices through me. Teenage crush. I don’t know what hurts the most—that she sees me that way, or that she thinks I saw her like that.
“All right,” I say. “Thanks.”
Her eyes narrow. The tears, brief and heartbreaking, have stopped. She’s the steely girl I remember, turned into a strong-willed young woman. “How could you not have left anything as an explanation? A text. A letter. Something.
I frown. “I wrote you a letter, Lils. I left it in the mailbox.”
“No, you didn’t. There was nothing.”
“I did,” I say quietly, remembering the scribbled words I’d penned, right before heading to the bus stop. It had felt like cutting out my own heart.
“I didn’t get a letter,” Lily says. Her voice is less forceful now—more uncertain. I can see it in her eyes as she thinks back, running through the events of a decade ago.
“Damn. I’m sorry. I thought you’d… I always thought you read it.” I run my hand through my hair and watch as Lily wraps her sweater tighter around herself. She looks as miserable as I feel.
I want to hold her—to warm her against my chest, to smooth my fingers down her back and tell her everything’s going to be all right.
That I’m sorry and I’m back now and that I have never, not for one second, stopped caring about her.
But she doesn’t want me to. She knows me better than anyone else, and still, the three feet between us might as well be worlds apart.
“Someone must have taken it,” she says. “The letter. And I’m pretty sure I know who.”
“Who? Lily, I… I’m sorry. What can I do? I know I’ve been gone for a long time, and I have no right to ask for your friendship back. But I have to ask anyway. You know I do.”
Lily starts to back away from me. There’s urgency in her body now, the kind I remember well. She’s about to start running.
I take a step to follow, but she shakes her head.
“Friends. I’ll think about it, Hayden. But for now… I have to find out what happened to that letter.”
I watch as she takes off at a run down the beach. She disappears on the boardwalk up to the road, back to her house, the girl I’ve loved and lost and maybe, just maybe, found again.
She never got my letter. Had never known I’d written one.
It doesn’t excuse anything, of course. But for a moment, the relief I feel is so heady, it makes me lightheaded.
I might still stand a chance.
11
Lily
Lily, 17
Jamie grins at me from her seat in my reading nook. “You’re really going all out.”
I smooth a hand over the miniskirt. “Yeah. Is it too much?”
“Not at all! It’s not every day you get invited to a senior party.” She puts on another coat of lip gloss. “Are you sure we’re invited, though?”
“Of course.” Truth is, I’m not sure at all. I’d only met Turner when he came by to hang out with Parker, and we weren’t exactly friends. But he wouldn’t turn away his best friend’s little sister, would he?
I hope not. Not if my plan is to work, anyway.
“You never straighten your hair. It looks good.”
I unplug the iron and look at myself in the mirror. My hair is really, really long when the waves are straightened. My legs are on full display and I’d put on a pair of white sneakers. Heels are still beyond me.
“I do look pretty good.”
She laughs and comes up behind me. With her spiky hair and glossed lips, she looks like a cute pixie. Jamie has never followed the rules, of fashion or otherwise.
“You do. Now, we stick together at this party, right?”
“Yeah. And we’re not going to be home late.”
“And no accepting drinks from strangers.”
We nod at each other in the mirror. The senior parties at Paradise Shores are legendary. I’ve never been interested in going—mostly because I know I wouldn’t really fit in. My last name gives me certain cred in these circles—thanks to my brothers’ actions before me—but I wasn't the person people wanted at parties, usually.
“Then let’s go.”
I didn’t lie to Jamie about my reasons, either. I do want to see what the parties are like, and I’m tired of sitting at home in the evenings, pen in hand. But more than that, I want to stop being seen as someone’s little sister. In the eyes of everyone… yes. But particularly in Hayden’s eyes
Jamie’s mom—who has always been cooler than my parents—drops us off outside of Turner’s and tells us to have fun and call her if we need her. I open my mouth to tell Jamie how lucky she is, but she just rolls her eyes at me.
“I know, I know,” she says.
“She’s just so cool.”
“Let’s go, dork.”
We shouldn’t have been nervous—no one checks us by the door. The bass is so loud it can be heard a mile away. Jamie grabs my hand and pulls me into Turner’s kitchen. Guys in board shorts are standing around the keg, laughing loudly as someone attempts to do a keg stand. I don’t recognize any of them. How many guests had Turner invited?
I pour myself a glass and raise it high with Jamie.
“To staying out late,” I say.
She grins. “To being where we’re not supposed to be.”
“Let’s go have a look around.”
“You’ve been here before, right?”
“Once, for a thing with our parents.”
“Show the way.”
We pass two teenagers making out so furiously against a wall that the painting above slips and hangs crookedly. It looks terrible—all tongues and teeth. Was that what they had done at parties like this? My brothers?
Hayden?
“Ew,” Jamie whispers in my ear. “Get a room.”
Turner’s living room is as massive as I remember. An L-shaped sofa stands in the middle, wrapped around an expensive-looking coffee table. Empty cans of beer are stacked in the fireplace.
My eyes find the occupants of the
couch right away.
Parker, his arms moving animatedly as he speaks to a brunette, Turner next to him. I can tell he’s drunk even from this distance.
Hayden sits next to him.
He’s tucked a cigarette behind his ear and his arm is draped over the back of the couch, behind a blonde girl with a deep-necked dress.
Blair Davids.
Parker spots us first. He flies up from his spot on the couch mid-sentence. It would have been comical, if his friends didn’t all fall quiet. Ten heads all turn my way.
I try out a little wave. “Umm, hey.”
“What are you doing here?”
“I’m here to have fun.”
Parker shakes his head as if to clear it. “Do Mom and Dad know you’re here?”
“Yeah, I called them beforehand to inform them of our underage drinking. Don’t worry, I mentioned you too.”
“You did what?”
Jamie chuckles. “Honestly, Parker, don’t believe everything you hear.”
His bloodshot eyes flick to her. “Stay out of this, Moraine.”
“Bite me.”
I roll my eyes at them both. “There’s no reason why I can’t be here, Parker.”
“Because I say so, that’s why.” I can see the decision in his eyes—it’s already made: he’s going to send me home. I can’t bear it, not in front of his friends. In front of Hayden.
“You partied when you were my age.”
“Doesn’t matter. I’m gonna drive you home.”
Behind him, Hayden extricates himself from Blair’s tentacle-like arm. He puts a hand on Parker’s shoulder, dark eyes meeting mine. For the first time, I can’t decipher what I see in them.
“I’m driving her home,” Parker says.
“You’ve had too much to drink.”
“Fuck. Right. Well, I’ll call a cab then.”
Hayden’s eyes slide back to mine. “You should have told us you were coming.”
“Why, because I owe you two my itinerary?”
His jaw clenches. It’s a slight movement, but I see it. He isn’t happy I’m here either.
My heart sinks.
I feel silly. The elaborate eyeliner, the short skirt I’d bought for this occasion. Straightening my hair. I feel small.
And I don’t know if Hayden sees that in my eyes, sees what my own brother can’t, but he gives a short nod. “She should stay, Parker. Let her have some fun.”
“Shit. I don’t… Fine. But Mom and Dad can’t know about this.”
“I’m not an imbecile, you jerk.”
“Yeah.” He runs a hand through his hair. “And… don’t tell Henry, either.”
“It’s not like I have a chance to.”
“Stay with Jamie or me. Or Hayden.”
“Yes, yes, yes, I know, behave myself, etcetera.”
“We’re not children,” Jamie says, her voice sharp.
“I know,” Parker says. “Come on, have a seat.”
The people on the couch part like the Red Sea when we return, Parker leading the way. I knew that the guys had sway in the school, surrounded by adoring fans, but I’ve never seen it this clearly before.
Blair shoots me an annoyed glance as Hayden takes a seat next to me. He smells like smoke and soap.
Parker peers into my cup. “Did you at least get something good to drink?”
“Beer.”
“From the keg?”
“Yeah.”
He shoots me a sideways grin and reaches over, grabbing a bottle of whiskey from the coffee table. I recognize the expensive label. “If you want the good stuff, you come to me.”
“I will. What’s up with the cans in the fireplace?”
“A game. Think you can hit them?”
“What do I get if I get them all down?”
“Everyone has to do a shot. Want to try?” He hands me a tightly coiled ball of tinfoil, the same mischievous grin on his face that I remember from childhood.
I nod.
“All right. Shut up, everyone! My little sister is going to have a go. Get ready to drink, you miserable motherfuckers.”
Parker’s back on my side. There was nothing quite like having his burly, good-for-nothing grin in your life.
I aim and throw. Half of the cans topple.
“Damn.”
“No worries, no worries. You get to choose who has to take a shot.”
“One person?”
“Yeah.”
I slide my gaze from Turner’s smug appearance, to the proud gleam in Jamie’s, to Parker’s laughing eyes—to Hayden’s impassivity. He hasn’t said another word to me since I arrived.
“Hayden.”
Parker grins. “Drink up, brother.”
Hayden reaches for the whiskey. Not taking his eyes off of mine, he takes a long sip straight from the bottle. His hand grips it tight—long, broad fingers, tan from time spent in the sun. I’ve never noticed them before. Somewhere along the line, they'd become a man's hands.
He puts the bottle down with a sharp sound. His eyes say one thing. Happy?
I spend the next hour laughing with Parker and flirting with Turner. My short skirt must have worked better than I thought, because I see Turner looking at my legs more than once.
And maybe it’s the beer, or the two shots I’ve done, but I’m enjoying myself—despite Hayden’s sullen silence by my side. I hear Blair try to talk to him, but he barely says a word, and she disappears in a huff.
Parker challenges Jamie to beer pong. Turner asks me to join, and I start to rise, but a glance back at Hayden stops me. He looks… well. I know that look.
“I’ll sit this one out,” I tell Turner.
“You sure?”
“Yeah. I’ll join the next one, though.”
Hayden has one leg over the other, eyes only on me. We’re alone on the couch now. I see as part of his defenses come down, slowly. He isn’t entirely the Hayden he is when it’s just me around, but the mask he’d worn with the others is gone.
“Don’t stop on my account,” he says. “If you want to go with Turner.”
“What's up with you?”
His eyes narrow. “Nothing.”
“Right.” I tap my fingers against the back of the sofa and feel far braver than I should. “You don't want me here.”
“Not true.”
I inch closer, made braver by drink and attention. “Did I ruin your game with the blonde?”
He’s annoyed, but he’s surprised, too. “Don’t be ridiculous.”
It’s been ages since he’s been this standoffish with me. It used to be more often, when we were younger. When I pried too much or I got too close. But it hasn’t happened in a long while.
“Good God,” I say, letting my hand trail closer to where his rests on the couch between us. “Not even Parker was this hard to charm.”
“Of course not. You have your brothers wrapped around your little finger.”
I glance back at him. He looks exasperated, his amber eyes glittering.
“But not you?”
“No,” he says. “I like to think I have a bit more willpower.”
“An illusion,” I tease.
“Most likely.”
His eyes fall to my hair. It’s a curtain of dark red silk around me, none of the usual waves and bobs it carries.
“You don’t look like you,” he says. A hand reaches up and traces a long strand of my sleek hair.
“Do you like it?”
“No.” A long pause. “Yes.”
“I’m still me,” I say. “And you’re still you. Even if we’re at a party.”
His eyes find mine again, his hand still lost in my hair. I watch as they shutter. Slowly, he withdraws his hand. “Yeah. Why did you come, Lily?"
"I wanted to party."
"You've never been interested before."
"I'm not allowed to change my mind?"
"Of course you are." He takes a sip of his beer and looks out over the crowd. "But you’re too good for this
sort of thing. For Turner.”
Oh, not this. "Don't."
"What?"
“I'm tired of being put on some pedestal. I can take it from my brothers, but not from you.”
His eyes slide back to mine. “But not from me?”
“No.” Maybe it's the drink, or the tight dress I'm wearing, or the way he's looking at me—but I feel brave. "I don't want you to see me as a little girl in need of protecting."
Hayden's eyes darken, and for just a moment, I can read them clear as day. He's my Hayden again. “I don't see you that way. You know I don’t, Lils.”
"Good."
He glances away, out over the crowd of people. I can see his jaw working, clenching and unclenching. Whatever is eating at him, it's deep.
His voice is low when he finally speaks. "But… maybe I should."
Whatever hope I'd harbored before is now a flame, a wildfire, and I can barely get the words out. "Why?” I breathe. “We can be whatever we want to be."
"We?"
I meet his gaze head-on. He’s being evasive, and we both know it. There’s been a we since we were eleven and twelve, with bruised knees and dirt under our fingernails.
"Yes,” I repeat. “We.”
An odd emotion flickers through his eyes. It looks like regret and longing and something else, something soft and fragile that I’ve never seen before.
But when he speaks, his voice is hard like a whip. “We’ll never be a we.”
Fine.
I know when I’m not wanted—and I can’t handle any more humiliation doled out by Hayden Cole. I’ve reached my limit.
Grabbing the bottle of whiskey, I brush my straightened hair back and get up from the couch. I should find Jamie and make sure she’s all right.
“Suit yourself,” I tell him.
Hayden’s hand reaches out and grabs my wrist, quick as a snake. “Where are you going?”
I shake off his touch. “To dance. To drink. Isn’t that what you do at these parties?”
He runs a hand through his hair. I don’t see the Hayden I used to know—not here in this smoke-filled house. “Fuck, Lily, do you have to be here? Can’t you just go home? I get if you don’t want to do it for Parker, but would you do it for me?”
Rogue: A Paradise Shores Novel Page 7
