Last Good Thing (The Fallout Series Book 1)

by Heather Young-Nichols

  “Well, I better go get Dylan.” She glanced at the clock on the wall and stood up. “Yup, almost dinner time.” She moved toward to door.

  “I’m sure Zac doesn’t care.” He seemed like such an involved dad, what little I’d seen of him with his son. I wanted to get a better look because him being a dad was surprisingly sexy as hell.

  “He doesn’t, but I don’t like to take advantage.”

  I walked her out onto the porch, where we found Zac and Dylan playing in his front yard. Maddie approached them as Zac lifted his son in the air. The tiny giggles were music in the air. That was a happy kid, even though he’d been brought into this world by two teenagers in a poor neighborhood. It warmed my heart to see.

  Zac’s head snapped up to me. I was leaning on my forearms on the porch railing, watching the little family they’d created. Once again, my emotions were torn.

  I was happy they were somehow making their crazy situation work but sad because it once again reminded me of everything I’d missed out on and that Zac was a teenage crush and nothing more. This time I couldn’t stop the tears from pooling in my eyes and had to swipe a finger under each eye so they wouldn’t trail down my face. Zac’s gaze narrowed on me, so I gave him a brief smile, then went back inside.

  On Saturday evening, the weather was so nice outside that I didn’t want to stay holed up in the house. At least not for a little while. I’d been back two weeks, had made no progress on anything except maybe a friendship with Maddie, and decided it was time to lose myself in the slightly erotic romance novel that Rhian had forced me to take when I stayed the night there on my way here.

  The thick plastic chair on the front porch was more comfortable than it looked as I hunkered down and immersed myself in the hero and his woman. And man, was that hero a dirty talker.

  “Hey, Laney.” Zac’s voice came out of nowhere.

  My head snapped up as if he’d know what I was reading merely because I was looking at it. He jogged by the house, giving me a quick glimpse of the tattoos he hadn’t had the last time I’d seem him without a shirt. One in the middle of his back, one on his chest, and of course the one that liked to peek out the arm of his shirt. I also didn’t know he’d become a runner. But just as quickly as he appeared, he was gone again and I submerged back into the dirty talking alpha.

  Minutes passed until I heard, “Hey, Laney.”

  This time I was ready for it. “Hey,” I called back, not looking up.

  Then again five minutes later. “Hey, Laney.”

  When I looked up from my book this time, he was running slowly backward while smirking at me in all his sweaty sexiness. There were some things about Zac that had changed since I’d moved away because I was pretty sure he had not been the owner of that chest and abdomen when we were teenagers. Maybe it was the influence of the dirty talking alpha, but things got tingly all over.

  “Turn around before you fall, you fucking weirdo.” I may have called out a bit louder than I’d intended, but I wanted him to hear me. Mrs. Johnson across the street gasped, then went inside her house. Hadn’t realized she was out there. Oops. For my effort, I was rewarded with a deep chuckle I heard even after he turned the corner.

  It stayed with me and maybe I smiled a little.

  His next time around, the sound of his feet hitting the pavement softened and slowed, which made me look up from my book. He was walking toward my house with his hands on his hips as he tried to catch his breath, his chest rising and falling rapidly, all of his tanned skin on display.

  “Hey, Laney.”

  Smirking, I shook my head. “I think I’ve heard that once or twice today.”

  He smiled widely at me. His hair was a mess and his entire body glistened. It did something to my girl parts.

  “Yeah.” He draped his arms over the railing, tall enough to see over the damn thing when I barely could. “How’d it go with Maddie today?”

  “She didn’t tell you?”

  “Ha, no.” He shook his head. “She wouldn’t.”

  Their relationship perplexed me. They were parenting a child together but didn’t appear to talk about anything personal. At all. As curious as I was, no way in hell was I going to ask.

  “Pretty good, I think. We got a lot of things off our chests.”

  “That’s good.” He stared at me for a full minute until I raised an eyebrow as a challenge. Him watching me made me uncomfortable. “Do I get a chance?” he asked.

  “To do what?”

  “Apologize. Explain. Try to make you my friend again.”

  He had a point, I supposed. If I was going to try to forgive her, then he should get the same chance. Especially after the other night on my back porch. He’d said he didn’t want me to be lonely and truth be told, my old friends were the only people who could help with that right now. I was a little lost and a lot lonely being back home. I could call Rhian, she’d head right over without me having to ask, but she still wouldn’t understand what it was like being back.

  “I suppose.” I shrugged, like it wasn’t a big deal, even though my heart was pounding so hard against my chest that I thought he might be able to hear it.

  “Want to get something to eat?” Shit he didn’t waste any time.

  “Tonight?” I wasn’t sure if I hoped he’d want to do it tonight or another night. Tonight was so immediate.

  “Unless you already ate, I’d like to go tonight. That way you can’t change your mind about going.”

  “I haven’t.” I answered a little too quickly, making that little grin reappear on his face. “Eaten. I haven’t eaten.”

  “Give me twenty?”

  I nodded, wishing he had said thirty because I wasn’t ready at all.

  Chapter Seven

  Twenty minutes later, Zac knocked on my front door. Luckily, I was still a low-maintenance kind of girl, meaning I was somehow able to pull myself together in those twenty minutes. A quick finger brush of the hair with a few added curls, sweeping my bangs to the side, a couple of dashes of makeup and a soft pink summer dress, and I was ready. But I did grab a jacket because I didn’t know where we were going or how chilly it would get. Before I opened the door, I took in a long, deep breath. This was Zac. The same guy he’d been before for the most part and yet I was nervous to spend time with him.

  Butterflies in the stomach and everything.

  Part of me just wanted to get it over with and forgive him so things could be somewhat normal. The other part hoped I never did.

  I’d forgotten how much I liked looking at him since any pictures that included him or Maddie had been shoved into a box and thrown into Mom’s basement long ago. But man, did I like looking at him. And there was that whole being lonely thing. I didn’t like that at all.

  “Hey.” He smiled.

  I stepped through the screen door, making sure to remember to lock the deadbolt behind me.

  “So, where we going?” I asked as we walked toward his old Nova. He’d had the same car since before he’d gotten his license. It needed work then but looked fantastic now. Zac and Porter spent more time than I could count tinkering then eventually fixing the car up.

  “I thought we’d grab some food and head over to the pond.”

  The pond. Hangout spot for everyone in high school. It had been an illicit place to go years ago, but before I moved, the city bought it and turned it into a public place for swimming since there wasn’t another one for miles. They had lifeguards during the summer because the thing was big and deep. But there was no swimming after dark, which meant it’d be pretty vacant for us.

  “Sounds good.” I’d agree to wherever he wanted to go and didn’t like that fact one bit. This teetering between wanting to pull him closer and push him away was tearing me up inside.

  We made the drive without talking much except about what we should take with us to eat. He’d suggested Diego’s and I bounced in my seat with excitement. Diego made the best Mexican food I’d ever eaten. That was a no-brainer. I waited in the car whil
e Zac grabbed tacos. He insisted that if I went in and Diego saw me, we’d never get out of there, so I stayed put.

  We drove the rest of the way with the windows down to enjoy the night air before Zac pulled into the lot and shifted into park. I hadn’t been here in years so I followed his lead. He stopped when we approached a picnic table not far from the swimming area, where a trio of lifeguards were finishing up their nightly duties.

  The three guys were still clearly in high school and they were laughing at something one of them said before coming over toward us.

  “Remember no swimming after seven,” the blond one said over his shoulder as they walked away.

  Zac nodded as an answer as I took the first bite of my taco. I wasn’t swimming either way.

  “Oh, how I missed Diego’s tacos.” I moaned with my eyes closed.

  They were so delicious. I was pretty sure it was a recipe that had come down like a hundred generations. Slight exaggeration. It was like a Mexican party in my mouth that I couldn’t get back home.

  “Like the tacos, do you?” Zac asked with humor in his voice.

  “Yes. I wish there was something like this near campus.”

  “How is school?” He took a huge bite of his own dinner.

  “Fine. Like I said at the bar, it’s hard. That last year of high school was really tough. Roosevelt was a decent school, but my new high school was insane.” Our high school may have been named after a president, but I was pretty sure they weren’t educating a future one, no matter what they said. “But things have been going well. I just have to figure out what I want to do after next year now.”

  “Teach, right?”

  “Yeah, but where?” I asked. His dark eyes settled on me while he slowly chewed another bite. “My original plan might not be the best one anymore. When I decided that I wanted to come back here to teach I just assumed Dad would be here and I could be close to him again. Now… ” I shrugged.

  As we ate, we talked about that last year of high school, though I was careful to avoid mentioning how he and Maddie had impacted that year for me. That talk would come.

  He hadn’t gone to Homecoming or prom because it wouldn’t have been fair to go while Maddie stayed home with the baby, he said. Truth be told, I didn’t think any of us had thought we’d ever go to prom anyway. The kids from the other side of town, the rich side of town, would have monopolized the night. I’d only gone because Rhian had insisted and Greg had asked.

  “OK,” he said, balling up the paper that had once held his last taco and stuffing it back in the bag. We each took a long drink from our bottles of water before I pulled a breath mint out of my small red purse. I didn’t want to have taco breath. Zac reached across for one as well. “Now that you’ve been fed it’s time for the heavy stuff.” I couldn’t help but snort at him remembering how grumpy I got when hungry. “Laney, you might not believe this, but I didn’t want to stop talking to you at all. I hate that I hadn’t heard your voice in almost four years until you showed up here.”

  I wanted to believe him but there was still work to do on that front. “Then why did you?”

  He sighed, crossing his arms on the table in front of him. “I didn’t want to tell you about Maddie and I’m incredibly stupid. I thought if you didn’t know, then you couldn’t hate me.”

  “Why would you think I’d hate you? I knew you’d been with Maddie and I didn’t hate that.” Liar. I’d hated it all right, but I hadn’t hated him for it. If I’d never told him how I’d felt, how could I get mad at how he lived his life?

  “Yeah, but this was different. This was life-changing.” Zac took a long drink and I tried to ignore the way his throat moved as he swallowed. “I love that little guy, but everything changed when he came along. I kept telling myself I’d call you when things slowed down to explain, but they didn’t slow down for a long fucking time. By then, I figured you wouldn’t want to hear from me because I’d waited so fucking long.”

  Thinking about what it would’ve been like if Zac had called me years later, I decided that I would’ve hung up on him without hearing him out. Being hurt the way I had been made me a little mean for a while.

  “How’d she get pregnant?” I asked. He narrowed his eyes and cocked his head to the side. “Don’t be an idiot.” I smacked his arm. “I thought you were always careful.”

  “We were. Nothing’s a hundred percent, apparently.” He bit on that plump bottom lip for a minute. “I’ve missed you,” he said quietly. “And I’m so sorry for not manning up back then. For being such a fucking pussy. I didn’t want to disappoint you.”

  “You did that anyway.”

  He nodded and swallowed hard as if he was swallowing back all of his emotions. “I know. I hope that’s something you’ll forgive me for because I was being completely fucking serious about not wanting to go back. I’ve missed you every damn day. I hope you missed me a little too.”

  This was the moment. The point that I needed to decide just how honest I wanted to be with him. My mom’s voice played over in my head and I knew the ball was in my court. These had been my people most of my life. I wanted them back. Had always wanted them back. In whatever capacity I could get them. But they’d frozen me out.

  “Maybe a little,” I admitted. He started to smile, so I had to drop him back down a peg. Couldn’t have him getting cocky. “A teeny tiny bit after I imagined all the ways I could cut your balls off.”

  A low laugh rumbled from his chest. “You were thinking about my balls.”

  I scowled at him. “Don’t push it.”

  “So what was your favorite?”

  I pretended to think about that for a minute, tapping my finger against my chin before saying, “Lawnmower and weed whacker were tied.”

  Zac cringed. “Ouch. I’ll try to never piss you off again.”

  His words got me to smile, an actual full one that I meant. It was the first time that being with him felt like it had before I moved.

  Just like with Maddie, I wasn’t all the way there, but I was going to try to claim my friends again. However, if they ever did anything like this to me me again after everything I’d been through, I was heading to the nearest home improvement store for a weed whacker. I’d figure out a way to use it on Maddie.

  “Can I ask you something?” I asked. He nodded. I figured while those two were trying to make amends, I could get the answer to every question I’d ever asked myself. “Why’d you hook up with Maddie in the first place?” His eyes narrowed again. “I’m just saying,” I continued, unabated. “The three of us hung out together most. Well, you and I hung out the most, but next would be her, then the rest of the guys. What if I hadn’t moved? Wouldn’t it have been weird?” All these questions fell from my mouth before I could stop them.

  “Yeah.” He ran a hand through his hair, stopping to wrench at the back of his neck as he searched for whatever words he was trying to find. Maybe whatever words that would make me understand. “This is such a dick answer, but I’m not going to lie to you, Laney. She was there. I was pissed off that you were leaving, even though I knew you would be eventually. It just seemed too soon, and I couldn’t imagine senior year without you. And it’d been a while if I’m being honest. I just… wanted to let off some steam, I guess. Please tell me that doesn’t piss you off.”

  Well, yeah it does. A little.

  She’d been there, that was true, but I’d been there, too.

  I must’ve been an even better actress than I’d thought if neither Maddie nor Zac, the two people who probably knew me better than anyone, were so easily convinced that I looked at him as a friend only. Maddie had asked me many times over the years if there was something between him and me, If I had feeling for him, and I’d always insisted there’d been nothing more than friendship. Her mistake was trusting that I’d been telling the truth.

  Because I’d been lying through my teeth for so long it felt like the truth.

  “Not pissed,” I said instead. “Just curious. Every guy wanted her,
but she never seemed your type.”

  “Trust me. She wasn’t.”

  Pushing up from the table, I headed down the path because I couldn’t sit there any longer with him looking the way he was. Like I’d been time-warped back four years and was looking at the boy I’d fallen for at fourteen years old.

  I wasn’t that girl anymore. That girl hadn’t had friends drop out of her life. That girl’s father was still alive. I’d grown. Matured. And yet …

  “Hey, wait up,” he called after me.

  The air off the water had just enough chill in it that I had to pull my hoodie on. It felt nice being out there in the dark with the moon sparkling off the water. I had no idea how long we’d been here, but the sun was gone.

  “So, tell me.” He fell in step beside me. “Who was your first serious boyfriend?”

  “You really want to know about that?” I had the sneaking suspicion he was talking about sex because in the old days I would have told him about it without hesitating. Now there was so much hesitation.

  “We’re friends, right?”

  I glanced over at him and said, “Eh.” He’d have to keep guessing if we were friends or not.

  He chuckled then said, “Laney.”

  “Well, if we’re just talking boyfriend, as in a guy I dated, I’d have to say Greg Wilcox. Went to prom together senior year.”

  His jaw tightened and he shoved his fists into his front pants pocket. “How long did that last?”

  “I started dating him around Halloween and broke up just before college, so ten months,” I said matter-of-factly. He nudged my arm with his elbow. Oh, he was so talking about sex. “Stop that. I didn’t sleep with him.” I fought the small mischievous smile that threatened to give me away. “I’m still a virgin, Zac.”

  Chapter Eight

  Zac made a noise in his throat as his steps didn’t falter, they stopped. He came to a dead stop in the middle of the sidewalk as I kept walking. I got pretty far ahead of him, trying to hold my laughter in before I heard the slap of his shoes as he ran to catch up.