Total pages in book: 62
Estimated words: 61953 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 310(@200wpm)___ 248(@250wpm)___ 207(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 61953 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 310(@200wpm)___ 248(@250wpm)___ 207(@300wpm)
Her eyes met mine, and I froze, the words dying on my lips. That flirty smile was gone. Whatever mask she’d been holding dropped from her face. And I saw the same desire looking back at me like a mirror.
“I spent all summer in Seattle, interning at a law firm and trying to move on. I even went on a few dates with guys that my old friends had set me up with to see if it would help,” she told me. “I hated every minute of it. Every forced interaction and stupid conversation and fumbled opportunity. And none of it fucking mattered.”
“Harley…”
“Take my name out of your mouth,” she snarled.
“Okay,” I said softly. “Okay. I apologize. You just seemed like you didn’t even care that I was here.”
“How else am I supposed to act? I wasn’t prepared to see you, but there was no other option. It’s fucking hard to pretend like I don’t want this. Is that what you want to hear?”
“No.” I shook my head. “No, I want you to be happy.”
She laughed derisively. “You don’t want that. You’ve already wrecked that.” She pushed off of the balcony railing. “Go home, Chase.”
Then, she turned and walked back inside without a backward glance.
I winced at her retreating back. I’d earned that. And she was right.
I had no right to see her. I had no right to her happiness. I had no right to her.
It was better for me to disappear, just as I had after the wedding.
Still, I watched her until she left my sight, wishing I’d made a different choice. Even though I knew this was the right one.
10
Harley
November
I jumped up and down, screaming my head off as they announced Jensen’s mayoral win. I grabbed Bailey’s hands, and we jumped together. She laughed unabashedly, her freshly dyed dark brown hair swinging around her face.
In the months since Eve’s sister had moved in with Whitt and Eve, we’d become close. She was still a senior in high school, but she was the most down-to-earth girl I’d met since moving to Lubbock. Plus, we did all the family interactions together, and she was the closest person to my age in that group.
“He did it!” Bailey called in wonder.
“Hell yeah, he did!” I said. “I need to get us drinks.”
Bailey shook her head. “No, no, no. No drinking for me. You know that.”
“Sorry. Sorry! I just got excited.”
Bailey and alcohol did not mix. Or maybe they mixed too well. She’d gone a little wild before moving to Lubbock but was on the right track now.
“You have a drink though.” Bailey pushed me toward the bar on the opposite side of the room. “Don’t let me spoil the fun.”
“You sure?”
She nodded. “Go. I’m going to hang with my volleyball girls.”
“All right,” I said, leaving Bailey to the other girls on her high school volleyball team. She was a beast, and I hoped that she’d get to still play wherever she went to college. She’d been on her way to a Division I scholarship until she had to miss her junior year of play.
I passed the rest of my boisterous family. One that I was still admiring I even had. For so long, it had just been me, West, and Whitt. Now, West was in LA with his band Cosmere, and Whitt was busy a lot with Eve. I’d discovered this whole other side of my family—barbecues and lake days and holidays. It was wonderful and overwhelming. I wished that my mom would move down here, but I knew she wouldn’t. Not while my grandma and grandpa were still in Seattle.
I ordered a glass of red from the bar and took up a spot to people-watch during Jensen’s speech. It was a good one. All about hope and shit. Not about the money and name he’d already had that led him to this position. Alas, politics.
When the speech finished, the crowd roared, and a line formed to shake his hand. And like a magnet, I saw him.
“Fuck,” I whispered, melting backward against the wall and taking a formative sip of my wine. “Oh fuck.”
Chase Sinclair was at the front of that line.
What the fuck was he doing here?
His father had humiliated Eve at the last mayoral event I attended and made an enemy of Jensen Wright. I couldn’t even believe that Chase would be seen at Jensen’s victory. I’d thought the rivalry was bad before Arnold blew it up, but now, the Sinclairs were officially public enemy number one.
He was just asking for trouble tonight.
With my eyes still trained on his blond head, I watched two of my cousins, Austin and Landon, approach Chase. Austin clapped a hand on his shoulder, and then they were all talking. Well, arguing. Then, Chase was being bodily turned around and moved toward the door. He pushed off of the guys and ran his hands down his suit before putting his hands up. Landon just crossed his arms and shook his head. The picture was pretty clear. Chase wasn’t welcome.