“Twenty-four. Leave it alone,” he begs, and I decide to do just that. I could go on and on with this, but I have other things to focus on anyway.
“I’m going to move to Seattle.” I feel sort of almost giddy as I blurt out the news. Sort of.
“What?” He leans in, a little too surprised.
“Yeah, I’m going to see what Ken can do about helping me finish the semester through distance learning, and I’m going to get an apartment in Seattle for Tessa and me. I already dropped my grad packet, so it shouldn’t be too big of a deal.”
“What?” Landon’s eyes dart away from mine.
Did he not just hear what I said? “I’m not repeating myself. I know you heard me.”
“Why now? You and Tessa aren’t together and she—”
“We will be; she just needs a little time to think it through, but she’ll forgive me. She always does. You’ll see.”
As the words leave my mouth, I look up to see Tessa standing in the doorway, a deep frown etched onto her beautiful face.
A beautiful face that instantly disappears as she turns on her heel and walks back into the kitchen without a word.
“Fuck.” I close my eyes and lay my head against the couch cushion, cursing at myself for my awful timing.
chapter forty-two
TESSA
New York is the best city in the world, Tessa—it’s incredible. I’ve lived there for five years now, and I still haven’t seen all of it. I bet that even in a lifetime you never could,” Sophia says while scrubbing at a baking pan that I burned a batch of dough in.
I hadn’t been paying attention. I was too lost in my own mind after hearing Hardin’s arrogant, uncaring words to notice the smoke coming from the oven. Only when Sophia and Karen came rushing into the kitchen from the pantry was my attention brought to the burnt dough. Neither of them chastised me, though, and Sophia just sprayed it under cold water to cool it down and then started scrubbing.
“Seattle is the largest city I’ve been to, but I’m ready for New York. I need to get away from here,” I tell them. Hardin’s face just won’t disappear from my mind as I say the words.
Karen gives me a smile as she pours each of us a glass of milk. “Well, I live close to NYU, so I can show you around if you want me to. It’s always good to know someone, especially in such a big city.”
“Thank you,” I tell her, meaning it. Landon will be there, but he will be just as lost as I will surely be, so we could both use a friend out there. The thought of living in New York City is so intimidating, it’s almost overwhelming, but I’m sure everyone feels like that before moving across the country. If Hardin were coming along . . .
I shake my head to rid it of the useless thoughts. I couldn’t even convince Hardin to move to Seattle for me—he would laugh in my face at New York. And he takes my plans, what I want, so for granted that he thinks I’ll forgive him just because I have in the past.
“Well”—Karen smiles, lifting her glass of milk to mine—“here’s to New York and new adventures!” She beams. Sophia raises her glass, and I can’t help but play Hardin’s words in my head as we toast.
“She’ll forgive me, she always does. You’ll see,” he told Landon.
The fear of moving across the country lessens with each word of his as they play on a loop through my thoughts, each syllable a smack in the face to the tiny scrap of dignity I have left.
chapter forty-three
TESSA
To say that I’ve been avoiding Hardin would be an understatement. As the days have passed—only two of them, though it feels like forty—I have avoided him at all costs. I know he’s here in this house, but I can’t bring myself to see him. He’s knocked on my door a few times but was met with a weak excuse from me on why I’m not answering.
I just wasn’t ready.
However, I’ve put off what I need to tell him too long now, and Karen is bound to get restless, I know it. She is bursting at the seams with happiness, and I know she doesn’t want to keep the addition to their family a secret for long. She shouldn’t have to; she should be happy and proud and excited. I can’t ruin that for her by being a coward.
So when I hear those heavy boots outside my door, I wait silently, pathetically, both hoping for a knock and wishing for him to go away. I’m still waiting for the day when my mind clears, when my thoughts go back to making sense. The more time that passes, the more I begin to question how clear my thoughts have ever been. Have I always been this confused, this unsure of myself and my decisions?
I wait on my bed, eyes closed and lip throbbing between my teeth, for him to leave before knocking. I’m disappointed, yet relieved, when I hear his door slam across the hall.
Gathering all my strength and my phone in my hand, I check my reflection in the mirror one last time and then cross the hall. Just as I lift my hand to knock, the door opens, and there stands Hardin, shirtless and looking down at me.
“What’s wrong?” he immediately asks.
“Nothing, I—” I ignore the twist in my stomach as his brows pull together in worry. His hands touch me, thumbs gently pressing into my cheeks, and I just stand in the doorway, blinking up at him, not a coherent thought within reach.
“I need to talk to you about something,” I finally say. The words come out muffled, and he’s looking down at me with confusion clouding his brilliant green eyes.
“I don’t like the sound of that,” he remarks somberly and drops his hands from my face.
Going to sit on the edge of the bed, he beckons for me to join him. I don’t trust the lack of distance between us, and even the thick air in the stuffy room seems to be taunting me.
“So? What is it?” Hardin spreads his hands out behind his head and leans back into them. His athletic shorts are tight; the waistband of them hangs so low that I can tell he is not wearing boxers underneath.
“Hardin, I’m sorry that I’ve been so distant from you. You know I just need some time to figure everything out,” I say by way of a preamble. That wasn’t what I had planned to talk to him about, but my mouth apparently has different plans than my head.
“It’s okay. I’m glad you came to me because we both know that I’m shit at giving you space, and it’s been driving me fucking crazy.” He seems relieved now that the words are between us. His eyes rest on mine, and I can’t look away from the intensity behind them.
“I know.” I can’t deny the control he has seemed to gain over his own actions during the past week. I like that he’s become a little less unpredictable, but the shield that I’ve built is still present, still lurking in the background, waiting for him to turn on me, the way he always does.
“Have you talked to Christian?” I ask, needing to move back to the topic at hand before I’m too far lost in the endless mess of us.
Immediately he tenses, scoffing, “No.” He squints at me.
This isn’t going well. “I’m sorry, I don’t mean to be insensitive. I just want to see where your head is right now.”
He doesn’t respond for a few moments, and the silence stretches between us like a never-ending road.
chapter forty-four
HARDIN
Tessa’s eyes are on me. The worry in them builds a gnawing worry in me in return. She’s been through so much, a lot of which was at my hand, so worrying about me is the last thing she should be doing. I want her to focus on herself, on being herself again and not putting any more effort into fretting over me. I love the way her compassion for others, especially me, overrides her own troubles.
“You aren’t being insensitive. I’m lucky you’re even speaking to me.” It’s the truth, but whatever’s supposed to come next in this conversation, I’m unsure of.
Tessa nods slowly. And pauses before gently asking the question that I’m sure was her main reason for coming in here. “So, do you plan on telling Ken about everything from London?”
I lie back on the bed with my eyes closed and think about her question before answering. I h
ave been thinking over this a lot the last few days, going back and forth between telling him in a rushed confession or doing the opposite and keeping the information to myself. Does Ken need to know? And if I tell him, am I willing to accept the changes that will come from this? Will there be any changes, or am I just being a bitch about it? It seems fitting that the moment I start to tolerate and possibly forgive the man, I find out he’s not my father to forgive after all.
I open my eyes and sit up. “I’m still deciding. Actually, I sort of wanted to get your opinion on that.”
My girl’s blue-gray eyes aren’t shining the way I’ve become so used to, but they hold more life today than the last time I saw her. It was pure fucking torture being under the same roof with her without being near her, not in the way I need to be.
Everything has seemed to shift in an ironic twist of fate, and I’m now the one begging for attention, begging for simply anything that she will offer me. Even now, the thoughtful expression in her eyes is enough to soothe the constant ache that I refuse to learn to live with no matter how far she pushes herself away from me.
“Would you like to have a relationship with Christian?” she asks softly, her small fingers tracing the frayed stitching on the comforter.
“No,” I quickly respond. “Hell, I don’t know,” I backtrack. “I need you to tell me what I should do.”
She nods, and her eyes meet mine. “Well, I think you should only tell Ken if you think it will help you deal with some of the pain from your childhood. I don’t think you should tell him if your only reason to do so is out of spite or anger; and as far as Christian goes, I think you have a little bit of time to make that decision. Just see where things go, you know?” she suggests in that understanding tone she has.
“How is it that you do that?”
She tilts her chin, confused. “Do what?”
“Always say the right thing.”
“I don’t.” A soft laugh falls between us. “I don’t say the right things.”
“You do.” I reach my hand out for her, but she pulls away. “You do say the right things; you always have. I just couldn’t hear you before.”
Tessa looks away from me, but that’s okay. It will take some time for her to get used to hearing these things from me, but she will get used to it. I’ve made a vow to tell her how I feel and to stop being selfish and expecting her to decipher my every word and intention.
The vibration of her cell phone breaks the stillness, and she pulls it from the pocket of her oversize sweatshirt. I force myself to pretend that she bought the WCU sweatshirt and that she’s not wearing Landon’s clothing. I have been subjected to wearing every embroidered piece of WCU merchandise known to man, but I hate the idea of his clothes touching her skin. It’s irrational and fucking stupid, but I can’t stop the thoughts from entering and taking root in my mind.
She swipes her thumb across the screen, and it takes a moment for me to realize what I’m seeing.
I snatch the phone from her hands before she can stop me. “An iPhone? You’re shitting me!” I stare down at the new phone in my hands. “This is yours?”
“Yeah.” Her cheeks flush, and she reaches for the phone, but I stretch my arms above my head, out of her reach.
“Oh, so now you get an iPhone, but when I wanted you to, you absolutely refused!” I tease. Her eyes are wide, and she takes a nervous breath. “Why the change of heart?” I smile at her, easing her discomfort.
“I don’t know. It was time, I guess.” She shrugs her shoulders, still nervous.
I don’t like how she looks unsettled, but I’m hoping that a little playfulness is all that’s needed. “What’s the pass code?” I ask while hitting the numbers that I’m guessing she’ll have used.
Ha—got it on the first try, and I’m welcomed in by her home screen.
“Hardin!” she squeals, attempting to grab the phone from me. “You can’t just go through my phone!” She leans across and grabs my bare arm with one hand and reaches for the phone with the other.
“Yes, I can.” I laugh. The simplest touch from her has me buzzing; every cell beneath my skin is alive from her skin on mine.
She smiles and holds out a demanding little hand to match that sweet little grin that I’ve missed so much. “All right. Give me yours, then.”
“Nope, sorry.” I continue to tease her while obsessively scrolling through her text messages.
“Give me the phone!” she whines and moves closer to me, but then her smile disappears. “There are probably a lot of things on your phone that I don’t want to see.” And like that, I can feel her guard sliding back into place.
“No, there isn’t. There are over a thousand pictures of you and an entire album of your bullshit music, and if you really want to see how pathetic I am, you could check the call logs and see how many times I’ve called your old number just to hear that robotic bitch voice tell me that your number is no longer in service.”
She glares at me, obviously not believing me. Not that I blame her. Her eyes soften but only momentarily before she says, “None of Janine?” Her voice is so low that I barely catch the accusation.
“What? No! Go on, look at it. It’s on the dresser.”
“I’d rather not.”
I lean up onto my knees and press my shoulder into hers. “Tessa, she’s nothing to me. Never will be.”
Tessa’s trying hard not to care. She’s fighting within herself to show me that she has moved on from me, but I know her better than that. I know that she’s stewing over the idea of me with another woman.
“I need to go.” She stands to leave, and I reach for her. My fingers gently grab her arm, softly asking for her to come back to me. She hesitates at first, and I don’t force her. I wait for her, my fingers rubbing small circles into the soft skin above her wrist.
“I know what you think happened, but you’re wrong,” I try to convince her.
“No, I know what I saw. I saw her in your shirt,” she snaps. She pulls her hand away from me but stands closer.
“I was out of my mind, Tessa, but I didn’t fuck her.” I wouldn’t have. Having her touch me was bad enough. For a moment I wonder if I should tell Tessa the way I couldn’t stand Janine’s cigarette-flavored lips on mine, but that seems like it would only set her off.
“Sure.” She rolls her eyes defiantly.
“I miss you and your attitude.” I try to lighten the mood, but she only rolls her eyes again. “I love you.”
That gains her attention, and she pushes at my chest to put some space between our bodies. “Stop doing that! You can’t just decide you want me now and expect me to come running back to you.”
I want to tell her that she’s going to come back to me because she belongs with me, that I will never stop trying to convince her of this. But instead I smile at her and shake my head. “Let’s change the subject. I just wanted you to know that I miss you, okay?”
“Okay.” She sighs. She brings her fingers to her lips and pinches them, making me forget what I was going to change the subject to.
“An iPhone.” I turn her phone in my hand again. “I can’t believe you got an iPhone and weren’t going to tell me.” I glance over and watch as her frown turns into a half smile.
“It’s not a big deal. It helps a lot with my schedule, and Landon is going to show me how to download music and movies.” Landon’s offer as we were leaving the cell-phone store seems so long ago. So much has happened in such a short time.
“I can help you.”
“It’s okay, really,” she says, trying to dismiss me.
“I will help you. I can show you now.” I pull up the iTunes Store.
We spend an hour this way, me going through the catalog choosing all of her favorite music and showing her how to download those cheesy Tom Hanks romantic comedies that she seems to love. Tessa is nearly silent the entire time, only a few Thank yous and No, not that songs are given, and I try not to push her for conversation.
I did this to her,
I turned her into the quiet, unsure woman before me, and it’s my fault that she doesn’t know how to act right now. It’s my fault that every time I lean into her, she pulls away, taking a piece of me with her each time.
It seems impossible that I would have anything left to give her, that she doesn’t already consume and own every single part of me, but somehow, when she smiles at me, my body comes up with a little more of myself to let her steal away. It’s all for her, and it will always be that way.
“Do you need me to show you how to download the best porn, too?” I joke, and I’m awarded another flush of her cheeks.
“Oh, I’m sure you know all about that,” she teases back. I love this. I love being able to tease her the way I used to, and I fucking love that she’s letting me.
“Not really, actually, I have plenty of images up here.” I tap at my forehead with my cast, and she grimaces. “Only of you.”
Her frown doesn’t waver, but I refuse to allow her to think this way. It’s insane thinking—that I would be interested in anyone but her. I’m starting to think she’s as crazy as I am. Maybe that would explain why she stayed with me as long as she did.
“I mean it. I only think of you. It’s always you.” My tone is serious now, too fucking serious, but I don’t care enough to change it. I’ve tried the joking, friendly shit, and I hurt her feelings.
She surprises me by asking, “What types of things do you think about me?”
I bring my bottom lip between my teeth as images of her flash through my mind. “You don’t want me to answer that.”
Tessa spread out on the bed, her thighs pushed apart and her fingers clawing at the sheets as she comes against my tongue.
Tessa’s hips moving in slow, torturing circles as she rides my cock, her moans filling the room.
Tessa kneeling in front of me, her full lips parting as she takes me into her warm mouth.
Tessa leaning forward, her naked skin glowing in the soft light of the room. She’s in front of me, facing away from me as she lowers her body onto me. I fill her as she gasps my name . . .