Settling beside me, he nudged his shoulder into mine. “Not my style, Liss. Not that I wouldn't want to,” he broke off and cleared his throat. “I've got five sisters, though. Two older, three younger. One goes here, too. And I swear I can feel them breathing down my neck constantly, making sure I’m not being a dick.”
“Ah.” My chin bobbed in silent understanding.
Trust me to stumble across the last remaining guy on campus attuned to a woman's feelings, and with a finely tuned moral compass to boot. Or maybe it was just the fact that he had five women ready to kick his ass if he disrespected someone from the sisterhood. Either way, I could tell he was a good guy.
“So, what'd he do? I've heard it all. Guys are idiots.”
My eyes clung to the wall opposite. What did Leon do?
Nothing.
Except somehow claim a part of me without even trying, which might have been the worst thing he could have done.
“He made me feel,” I murmured.
Evan gave his head a light shake. “That’s a bad thing?”
The worst. “It’s one-sided.”
Evan was quiet for a beat before he said, “Well, the guy’s an idiot.”
I gave a light snort. “I’m not a good person, Evan.”
“I don’t believe that.” His response was immediate, but he didn’t know me.
He didn’t know I was cold. That I ran from my problems. That I left my family when they needed me most because I was selfish and scared.
I portrayed the persona of someone tough, but I was a coward.
Leaving was the easy option. I saw that now. Leaving meant I didn’t have to face the pain that threatened to derail me. So much of the life I left back in Claremont had the power to hurt me, and I just… I didn’t want to hurt.
But ignoring everything wasn’t fucking working, either. Guilt clawed at me from the inside, gnawing away at my soul until it was all I could think about. The pain didn’t ease with distance. It didn’t ebb. It merely festered.
My gaze drifted out through the narrow window pane where a handful of twinkling stars lit a cloudless, indigo sky, and I only wished I could see anything so clearly.
Someone had swiped a hand through the still-wet canvas of my life.
Strangled words scraped up my throat. “Have you ever tried to leave something behind that wouldn’t let you go?”
“What are you trying to leave behind?” Evan’s quiet murmur echoed like a church bell, a resounding clang that played on repeat.
Everything.
Because none of it made sense anymore, and it all fucking hurt, and when something hurt me, when I didn’t want to face something, I did what I did best, and I cut it out.
“You would never let your family down, would you?” I asked softly, turning to face the guy who’d shown me nothing but compassion when he could have just ignored the evidence of my pain and fucked me against a door in a random dorm room. “If they needed you, you'd be there, even if it hurt?”
My phone vibrated before he could answer, and I glanced down with a sigh.
“Hey, Liv.”
“Are you okay?” she almost yelled down the line. “I've been calling. I looked everywhere for you.”
Scrubbing my fingernails against my forehead, I said, “Yeah, I'm fine. I'm home. Just wasn't feeling it tonight.”
Evan placed a warm hand flat on my knee before giving it a light squeeze and rising to his feet.
Olivia's sigh of relief felt like a punch to the stomach. My actions and choices, they didn’t just impact me.
“You want me to come back there?” Liv asked.
“No. Don't let me spoil your night. I'm just going to watch Netflix or something.”
“Okay.” She sighed, sounding unsure. “Call if you need anything?”
“Yep.”
Standing, I ended the call and looked up at Evan. I clenched a fist and sunk my knuckles into his slim bicep with a wan smile. “Thanks for being a gentleman, Ev. Your sisters are lucky to have you.”
Unlike mine. My smile faltered.
Evan’s eyes dropped to my hand when my phone buzzed for a second time.
Rolling my eyes, I lifted it to my ear without checking the screen. “Liv, I told you I'm fine.”
“Lissy?”
My heart crashed into my lungs like waves battering a cliff face when my sister's trembling voice sounded through the phone. The last time my little hard ass sister sounded scared was back before she could recite the alphabet in full and hearing it sent a blast of panic racing through me.
“Bella?” I demanded, trying to regulate my breathing. “Are you okay? Is Mom okay?”
“Yeah, I'm—” She broke off on a small sob.
“Bells?” I gripped the phone until the bones in my hand ached. “Bells?”
“She forgot me.”
My baby sister's tiny voice spoke my biggest fear, and black filled my vision. “What?” I choked.
Could it have happened that fast? If I went back now, would my mom recognize me? Would she be gone already? Was I too fucking late?
“We went to the cinema. Mom and me. When we were leaving, I needed to go to the bathroom. There was a line, so it took a really long time. When I came back out, she was just gone. She forgot me. There were so many people, and I couldn’t find her, Lissy. She just left me there.”
When I swayed on my feet, a firm hand steadied me, lowering me to the edge of the bed.
“Where are you?” My head pounded, and I closed my eyes, my fingers going to my temple. “Are you still at the cinema? Are you alone?”
“No. Aunt Bree came to get me. But they told me about Mom, Liss. She was really upset, and... I'm scared, Lissy.”
My lids cracked open, heart tearing right down the center.
She needed me. My little sister needed me.
My mom needed me.
They were more important than my need to keep my emotions from suffocating me. In the end, they would anyway, whether I was there or here. If these past few months had taught me anything, it was that I couldn’t outrun my feelings. Not when the people I was running from were so deeply ingrained in my heart.
They needed me… and I needed them.
“I'm coming home, Bella.” My lids drifted closed as I took a shaky breath. “I'm coming home.”
TWENTY-ONE
LEON
“Liquid courage?”
Ren looked up, then down to the near empty whiskey glass in his hand. “Something like that.”
I perched on the edge of Danny’s couch, elbows braced on my knees, clasped hands dangling loosely between them, and turned to face Ren. “Think she’ll be there?”
His jaw ticked as he rolled his neck. “Don’t know.”
He was half desperate to see Riley again, half scared out of his fucking mind. My words; not his. He’d never admit that.
I clapped a hand around his shoulder. “No matter what happens, don’t fucking forget how far you’ve come, Ren. Your whole life blew apart. You could’ve let that shit bury you, but you didn’t. You’re here, you’re trying to put things right, and I’m damn proud of you, brother.”
He turned slowly, inclining his head with a slight dip before clearing his throat. “Means a lot, man.”
I nodded once, inhaling as I let go of his shoulder and rose to my feet. “What the fuck you waiting for, then?”
Ren dropped his head back to the seat cushion, giving it a shake. “Damn, you’re a pushy motherfucker. You haven’t been off my case for this entire fucking year.”
“You’re lucky I was willing to put up with your miserable ass.”
His lips twitched. “That’s one word for it. Not the one I’d use.” He stood and drained the last inch of liquid from the glass before turning to me with a half smirk. “You realize if Ri’s there, Liss will be, too?”
Always fucking tit-for-tat with this guy. “And?” I muttered, wondering why the fuck my hand was empty.
“Not an issue, huh?”
My eyes narrow
ed. Where the fuck were my real friends when I needed them? Jack, Johnny, fucking Jim? “Why would there be?”
“You ran her out of town with your dick, Le.”
I glared at him for a beat then strode away from him with a muttered, “You’re not fucking getting in my truck, asshole.”
A low chuckle sounded as he followed behind me. “You talk to her since she used you for sex, then ghosted your ass?”
Had the snow queen answered any of my calls, texts, fucking DMs? Nope. Not fucking one. She’d taken off and crossed two state lines before I’d opened my eyes and realized she’d gone. Then she’d fallen off the face of the earth and blocked my number. Girl had a gaping fucking hole where her heart should be. Not that I was bitter about it.
“You know she hasn’t, dickhead. And you better not have spread that shit around. I only told you because I figured you needed a laugh.”
“Your secret’s safe with me, dude.” Ren’s big palm cracked against my back, before he walked around me and headed out the door.
“Dan?” I called up the stairs. “You fucking coming, or what?”
“Yeah, be there in a sec.”
Ren’s knee bounced up and down the entire drive over, his fingers tapping a constant beat on his thigh. I felt for the guy, and his nervous energy rubbed off on me the closer we got to the cornfields. I pulled into a space, guiding the tires over the gravel, and shifting into park.
Ren made no move to get out of the truck, staring into space and rubbing his palms over his thighs instead. Danny leaned forward from the backseat and gripped his shoulders. “Get your ass out there.”
Ren swallowed, cracked his neck, then shoved the door open. The second we passed through the tree line, he stopped dead and palmed his chest. I followed his sightline, and my gaze found the person who’d stolen his attention.
But it was the girl standing next to her who demanded every bit of mine.
Snow Queen.
Fuck me. I locked my knees in place to the sound of my pulse pounding in my temple, somehow muting the noise of a few dozen rowdy teenagers.
Florida had a lot to fucking answer for. Miles upon miles of sun-kissed skin I couldn’t pull away from. My eyes drank her in, inch by gorgeous goddamn inch, and my mouth went dry, tongue sticking to the roof like a lump of clay.
Lissa looked like fucking summer sex on a stick in her denim short shorts with her white-blonde hair falling to her shoulders like a homing beacon. Gorgeous didn’t cover it. She was a level of hot that bordered on dangerous.
And I would fucking know.
An image of her beneath me—lips parted, cheeks flushed—flashed through my head, and I had to reach down to adjust myself. The shit she pulled might have pissed me off, and yeah, I’d admit it had, but not so much that the memory of sliding into her tight pussy didn’t get me hard.
When I turned to Ren and murmured, “Ready?” I wasn’t sure who the fuck I was asking.
He said nothing for a few seconds. “Give me a minute, yeah?”
I dipped my head. “You got it.”
As the words left my mouth, Riley’s head drifted our way, and a smile broke out over my face. I passed Ren a quick look before breaking into a jog and crossing the field, swooping Ri up in a bear hug.
I wouldn’t say I purposely snubbed the skin covered ice sculpture standing next to her.
Wouldn’t say I didn’t either.
“Missed you, Riley-baby,” I said through a grin, lowering her to her feet as I swept my eyes over her and noted the changes a year had made. She’d always been beautiful, and that hadn’t changed, but there was a quiet strength there now that amplified it and helped quell any lingering worry I’d had that she wouldn’t come out the other side of the heartache.
I grinned down at her upturned face. “How’s life been treating you, Ri? You look good.”
My eyes took another slow dip, knowing it would make her blush. And maybe to delay acknowledging the female glowering in my peripheral. I wasn’t petty on a normal day, but what kind of chick completely fucking blew off a guy after a night of hot sex and then acted like he didn’t fucking exist? Especially when the guy in question thought it might have fucking meant something. I took her fucking virginity that night for christ’s sake. She seemed to give exactly zero fucks about that fact. But every time I fucking thought about it, a rush of something primal blasted through me.
I hadn’t expected her to be a virgin. Lissa radiated the kind of confidence that usually came with experience. But thinking back, I probably should have known. She didn’t date, rarely gave any of the guys at Claremont the time of day. Who would she have fucked? Not that it mattered now, but I felt a strange fucking sense of pride knowing I was the first person inside her.
Lissa cleared her throat loudly beside me.
She was ready to talk. Five fucking months later. And apparently, I held some resentment. Who the fuck knew?
I took a slow step back and rammed my hands in the pockets of my jeans before sliding my gaze to Lissa. She shuffled on her feet, eyes darting around in an obvious show of discomfort.
So, she was capable of some fucking emotion, then.
“Liss,” I muttered, my eyes zoning in on hers.
The intention was to force her to face me after the disappearing act she’d pulled, but I hadn’t anticipated the fuck ton of feeling that dumped on me the second our eyes locked, or the riot of emotion swirling in hers, totally at odds with her stiff posture and defensive stance. The girl was a living contradiction. Her breath hitched, and I swallowed hard as tension thickened the air around us while I battled to find my fucking voice.
“How have you been?” I eventually murmured, voice gruff, then I ground my jaw.
How have you fucking been? You fucking kidding me with that shit? Could you sound anymore like Mary fucking Poppins?
“Good.” She nodded stiffly, redirecting her gaze around the field with another shaky intake of breath. “You?”
I narrowed my eyes as I watched her try to avoid looking at me, but her gaze kept flicking back, as if she had no control over it.
Then understanding hit home like a hard crack to the back of my skull.
Lissa hadn’t run because she felt nothing… she’d run because she felt too much of something.
And given the chance, she’d keep fucking running.
“You had sex!” Riley’s sputtered declaration dropped like a bomb.
Lissa’s head snapped to her best friend, eyes wide, nails sinking into Riley’s arm.
She wouldn’t make it easy, but it was time to cut the bullshit. Starting with me. I’d told myself Lissa leaving in the middle of the night and cutting me off didn’t bother me. I was a lying son of a bitch.
It bothered the fuck out of me. Had for months.
And looking at her now, I knew I wasn’t the only one.
She was just as affected by that night as I was, and now that there wasn’t a state between us, I wasn’t about to stand back and let her ignore that fact. She’d melted under my body, moaned my fucking name. Damned if I was gonna let her pretend like it never happened. I wasn’t prepared to let her run again, not without an explanation, because I knew it then and I still knew it now… one night wasn’t enough.
I wanted her back in my bed, and if that wasn’t what she wanted, she’d have to tell me that shit to my face this time.
I wouldn’t push it tonight—a gamble, given that the girl was a known fucking flight risk—but there was only so far she could run from me in Claremont. And if she left the state again, I’d chase her ass and haul her right fucking back.
“I need a drink,” I murmured, then stalked off in the direction of the alcohol, wagging my head.
Nothing about my snow queen was ever fucking easy, but I was suddenly buoyed, my body lighter than it had been in months as a slow smile worked its way over my face…
Because that might just be what I liked most about her.
***
“Wanna keep the fucking n
oise down?” I groaned from my position, bent over the tabletop in Beat’s Burgers. I had my arms crossed over my head, trying to drown out the noisy bastards around me.
The incessant droning ceased for all of two seconds before Danny said, “Fuck no, we don’t. Your hungover ass wasn’t even supposed to be drinking last night. Fucked up our travel arrangements, jackass. Have some of this.”
My eyes squeezed closed, arms pulling tighter when he started banging cutlery off the table like a fucking kindergartener.
“I fucking hate you,” I mumbled, every clang splitting my head open.
When he didn’t quit, I jerked up and snatched the spoon from his hand, smacking him with it.
He grinned, tossing the fork to the table. “Nice of you to join us, sleeping beauty.”
Grabbing a handful of fries, I launched them at his face, then leaned back and scrubbed both hands over my cheeks. I diverted my attention to Jason, who was ramming a burger the size of my face down his throat and kicked his calf under the table. When his head popped up, I met his stare with an inquisitive one of my own.
“Did you and the stepsister ever get your shit together?”
“Christ, don’t fucking bring up the stepsister.”
Jason’s eyes narrowed, his head twisting to Dan as he muttered around a mouthful of burger, “Fuck you, asshole.”
“He fucked it up.”
Jase dropped the burger onto his plate and used his free hand to sink a fist into Danny’s arm.
Danny sniggered.
“The fuck did you do?” I murmured, eyes on Jase.
He dragged a hand through his light hair, then shook it out with a sigh. “It’s a long story. But yeah… I fucked it up.”
I scratched at the scruff coating my jaw. “She home this summer?”
“Not likely,” he muttered, turning his attention back to the burger. He planted his elbows down on the table, his food suspended in front of his mouth as his unfocused eyes locked out the window. Then he gave himself a shake and took a bite.
Didn’t look like he was even a little bit over it.
“Mack away all summer, too?” I leaned forward, grabbing the soda, and taking a swig.
“Yeah, he got an internship. Said he’s gonna try to get back for a weekend, but he met some girl and he’s fifty shades of whipped, so we’ll probably never see his ass again.”
Unthinkable: (Unstoppable - Book 2) (The Unstoppable Series) Page 14
