Total pages in book: 116
Estimated words: 112249 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 561(@200wpm)___ 449(@250wpm)___ 374(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 112249 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 561(@200wpm)___ 449(@250wpm)___ 374(@300wpm)
Gracen sighed and willed the irritation swimming under the surface of her skin to just relax. She wouldn’t continue to hand over her power—even if it was just the control of her emotions. “Sure, but let’s start with not doing that—got it?” Sonny opened his mouth, probably to question her request, but she beat him to the punch. “That, Sonny,” she said, pointing at him. “We’re not going to bring up the past or remember better times or pretend like any of it mattered at all. In the end, it didn’t, and that’s all the two of us really need to know. One of us said things and meant those things. The other one didn’t. We both know which one was me.”
Her accusations had to hurt.
Hell, it almost killed her once, and despite thinking for a long time that Sonny was heartless for the way he left her, that didn’t mean he was a total monster. Or maybe that was all false hope because she was the one with the heart between them and that kept her looking for the good in every person. Even those that hurt her.
Nonetheless, Sonny took the brunt of Gracen’s anger like a champ. “If you’re going to keep hurling shit at me, could we at least take a walk while you do it?”
At the same time, a question floated out to the floor from the back.
Delaney.
“Everything good out there?”
Fuck the entire day.
This was not how Gracen wanted to end her week.
Chapter 24
Gracen refused to walk to the bridge—and had no intentions of going into the market for a bag of candy like old times—with Sonny, so the two compromised. They could talk. Hell, even walk while they did it. But she chose the route.
Sonny didn’t complain.
Not far from the salon, one could turn onto a backstreet with a beaten path at the far end that led to the town’s other walking trail. Stretching from the backstreet to the elementary and high school at the end of town, it didn’t see a lot of use other than a random ATV or the smokers trying to get out of the teachers’ view because it wasn’t a long walk.
Gracen and Sonny made it halfway to their old high school before either of them broke the silence. Both had been content to walk along without acting as if the other one existed even though they walked in step. Sonny kept his hands loose in his slack pockets while Gracen clutched the strap of her bag over her shoulder, and her eyes on the path ahead.
“Delaney’s Jeep isn’t going to show up roaring down here, right?” Sonny asked.
Half serious.
Gracen, in the mood, shrugged. “It’s hard to say.”
She didn’t try to joke.
For a second, Sonny couldn’t tell. “Oh, come on.”
Gracen laughed. The loudest sound on the path next to the rustle of the summer breeze through the trees and bushes lining either side. She had to take in the wooded path a second time. Not being much of a smoker in high school, her crowd didn’t use the trail much, so she’d not appreciated it before.
At least, it offered privacy.
And pretty scenery for good measure, too.
Gracen never broke stride, nor did Sonny. One final bend a good sixty yards or so ahead, and the end of the trail that connected onto the road leading up the hill could be seen. As well as the back side of the high school where the trees and bushes started to clear a bit.
“That kind of hurts,” Sonny muttered.
“Poor you,” Gracen deadpanned.
She didn’t even try to be kind.
That was when he glanced sideways at her. His look lingered—she felt his eyes on her, actually. Watching and gauging. Testing for himself if he thought she really meant her harsh words, or not. In a way, Gracen did, and she wouldn’t apologize for it. Another part of her was over what they once had, but that didn’t change the fact it happened and it ended, and she hurt because of it.
“I always figured—knew, really,” he corrected with a nod at her. “I knew that you were mad at me. I guess I never thought you hated me, too.”
All at once, Gracen’s walk came to a stop. Sonny’s pace halted alongside hers, but while he turned toward her crossing his arms over his chest, she continued staring at the path straight ahead.
It was sad, truly.
That he believed she hated him.
How right he was, in a way.
“It’s just not that simple,” Gracen said softly.
“I’m all ears,” Sonny returned, but without the air of cocky confidence that usually set him apart in a crowd. “Try me.”
Try me.
She almost scoffed.
Wanted to, but she desperately kept it stuffed down in the growing pit that had become her stomach. Had this been five years ago and the two of them were having this conversation, perhaps she could have blown right into Sonny with every wrong misdeed by his hands that left Gracen alone, lonely, and changed.