Total pages in book: 120
Estimated words: 113464 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 567(@200wpm)___ 454(@250wpm)___ 378(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 113464 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 567(@200wpm)___ 454(@250wpm)___ 378(@300wpm)
“I’m sorry. I really am. You’re not mad at me, are you?”
“I’ve known for years you had a crush on him.” She laughs at my gasp. “Please. He’d walk into the room, and your face would go bright red, and you’d start looking anywhere but at him. That’s a crush. And I mean, I guess I can’t blame you, even if it’s a little weird. But I’m not mad. I want you to be happy.”
She pauses, and it’s a heavy sort of pause. “Are you happy?”
Am I? She deserves an honest answer, not something I fire off without thinking. It isn’t easy admitting to myself how rocky things have been, but I believe things are going to get better. Because at the heart of all of this is one fact I can’t get around or talk myself out of—he’s what I want. I can’t get him out of my soul and don’t want to. So there just has to be a way for everything to work out and for us to be happy without all these roadblocks and problems.
“I think I will be,” I decide. “I mean, honestly, worrying about how you would take it was a lot of the reason I was nervous and questioning myself. Now that I have you out of the way, yeah, I think there’s a lot more room to be happy.”
“Now that you have me out of the way,” she mutters. “Boy, you have a way with words.”
“You know what I mean. I couldn’t let myself be happy because I was so worried about what it might do to us.”
“I get it, and you have nothing to worry about from me. Just don’t ask me to take sides if you guys get into a fight. I don’t have it in me to get into that drama.”
“Understood.”
“I’m still coming home. I’ll have Dad arrange for the jet, and I’ll let you know, so you’re not, you know, humping each other when I get there.”
“And I’m the one who has a way with words?” It’s so nice to laugh with her for the first time in weeks. I feel a weight lifting off my heart.
A soft knock at the door gets my attention a moment before Callum appears. His brows draw together, but I shake my head with a smile to ease his mind.
“I better let you go so you can rest,” she says. “I’ll see you soon. Love you.”
“Love you, too.” And once the call is over, I rest my head against the mountain of pillows at my back and release a deep breath. With it goes all the guilt and worries that have weighed me down for weeks.
“Everything all right? I figured she would call you right away once I told her.” Callum sits beside me on the bed and takes the hand resting at my side. I love the way his calloused fingers feel against my skin.
“You didn’t tell me she knew about us.”
He looks almost sheepish, which I didn’t know was possible. Not for him. “It slipped my mind. I had other things to worry about, like your health. How are you feeling?”
“Better, now that I know I didn’t lose my best friend.”
“You have no idea how glad that makes me.”
But he doesn’t sound so glad. In fact, his voice is heavy, almost like he’s in pain.
“What’s wrong?” I turn my hand over so I can wind my fingers through his. He looks worried, with deep lines etched across his forehead and over the bridge of his nose.
The corners of his mouth tug downward. “You should get some rest. We’ll talk about it later.”
His dismissal only makes me sit up. “Here’s one thing you need to know about me. There is no chance of me getting any rest after hearing you say that. Besides, I’ve been resting for days.”
It was supposed to be a joke to make him laugh, or at least smile. But all he does is grimace, and his worry lines deepen. “I’ve been wrestling with myself, deciding whether to tell you.”
“Tell me what? Did something terrible happen? I already know Tatum’s okay because I talked to her.” I can’t imagine what else it might be.
“I’m telling you this because I know the way you think, and I know you would hate to find out after the fact.”
Is it my imagination, or is it suddenly colder in here? That must be where the goosebumps are coming from. “Find out what?” And why am I so full of dread now? You don’t start off a story the way he just did unless there’s something ugly coming.
“It has to do with the accident.”
Yup, there it is. The pit in my stomach right on schedule. Now I wish I had never asked if there was something wrong.
But I’m not a child. And I can’t run away from what happened.