Текст книги "Be with Me"

Автор книги: Jennifer L. Armentrout

сообщить о нарушении

Текущая страница: 20 (всего у книги 24 страниц)

“Sure.” Hanging out with someone was better than sitting here alone feeling sorry for myself.

If Avery knew what was going on, she wisely chatted about everything and anything else while she coaxed me off the couch and helped me straighten the apartment. The place was a mess. Partly not my fault. Cam had vacuumed and dusted around the time the president was last inaugurated.

“I’ve heard that Debbie’s funeral is next Tuesday,” she said, tying her coppery hair up in a messy ponytail. “Are you okay?”

I nodded as I tossed the rag I’d used to dust off the nightstand into the little waste bin. “Calla’s dropping me off, and she’s gonna pick me up when it’s done. She doesn’t do funerals.”

“Neither do I.” She bent over, picking up a bag resting on the closet floor. “I don’t think Cam’s going, but if you want him there, I’m sure he’ll go.”

I knew he would, but I wasn’t going to force him to go to a funeral he wasn’t planning on attending.

Avery suddenly stood ramrod straight as she opened up the department store bag. Over her shoulder I saw it was full of shoes I hadn’t gotten around to unloading yet, which reminded me there was still a lot of stuff I needed to get out of the dorm.

Curious about what she was staring at, I hobbled around her. “What’s up?”

Wordlessly, she reached inside and pulled out my old pair of ballet shoes. “I haven’t held a pair of these in forever.”

Seeing them sent a pang through me. I turned and sat on the bed. “Well, we’re about the same shoe size. Probably have roughly the same fit. You can have them if you want.”

“Don’t you want to keep them?”

I shrugged. “I don’t know. You can borrow them. How about that?”

She glanced down at the satiny slippers and sighed a little. A wistful look crossed her face and my curiosity grew. “What don’t you dance anymore, Avery?”

Her gaze lifted and her cheeks reddened. “It’s just a long story that’s not really important right now. It doesn’t matter. I probably couldn’t even lift my leg now, let alone do a simple ballet move.”

“I bet you could,” I said instead of pushing her for more details.

She laughed it off, but her eyes lit up with something akin to excitement, like maybe she wanted to try. “I’d probably pull a muscle.”

“No you won’t.” My knee started to stiffen so I gingerly stretched it out. “Try it.”

The slippers dangled from her fingertips. “I’ll look like an idiot.”

“It’s only me here and I haven’t even showered today. Also, I can’t walk without a limp, so I’m pretty sure you don’t have to worry about impressing me.”

She hesitated and then crossed the room, placing the slippers on the bed beside me. “If you laugh, I might cry.”

“I won’t laugh!” But I did smile. “Come on. Just do it.”

Stepping back, Avery looked around the room, checking out the space as she toed off her shoes. She took a deep breath as she kicked a leg up. Closing her eyes, she planted her sock-clad foot on the inside of her thigh and twirled once and then twice, extending her leg out elegantly. Even on carpet, in jeans and out of commission for years, the girl had a natural-born talent that every studio-taught dancer envied.

When she completed the turn, I clapped loudly. “That was perfect!”

Her face was flushed as she straightened out her shirt. “It wasn’t. My leg—”

“Oh my God, you haven’t danced in years and you did the turn better than most of the people who haven’t stopped.” I picked up the ballet shoes. “You have to get on a stage. Even if it’s just with me at the Learning Arts Center. Just once.”

“I don’t know—”

“You have to!” I wiggled the shoes, and her gaze followed them like I was dangling something shiny in her face. I don’t know how I knew this, but I did know that getting her to dance again was important. “You need to. So I can live vicariously through you. Just once before spring semester. Please.”

Avery took a deep breath as she eyed me. “What’s in it for me?”

“What do you want?”

Her lips pursed. “I want two things. First being you help me find a gift for Cam for Christmas, because I suck at that kind of stuff.”

I chuckled. “All right, that’s totally doable. What’s the second thing?”

“You have to babysit Michelangelo and Raphael this weekend.”

“The turtles?”

She grinned as she nodded. “We’re getting this one large habitat, so, you know, they can . . . I don’t know, head bob at each other and Cam wanted to go to this movie, but I’m afraid they’re going to kill each other.”

“So you want me to be like a turtle bouncer? Break them up if one of them gets out of hand?”

Avery giggled. “Exactly.”

I laughed. “Okay. Deal.” I wiggled the shoes at her.

She snatched them up. “Oh, and I’m pretty sure Michelangelo is a girl, so try to stop them if they happen to look like they’re getting it on. Cam and I aren’t ready to be parents to a bunch of baby turtles.”

Groaning, I flopped on my back. “Oh God . . .”

Twenty-six

The sun was out, shining brightly, but it didn’t chase away the chill in the air the morning of Debbie’s funeral.

As Calla had promised, she’d dropped me at the start of the service, and once the graveside part was done, I’d text her. She’d taken me to class last week, but Cam started taking me to class this week and hadn’t taken no for an answer.

I really needed to get a car.

It helped as I stood back from the gravesite to focus on stupid, mundane things. I’d never been good at funerals. When my grandpappy passed away, I’d been too wigged out to get near the coffin. Not much had changed. The coffin hadn’t been opened, but I’d sat at the back of the packed church at the cemetery grounds.

My knee ached from the walk to the gravesite, but whatever pain was worth it. I felt like I needed to be here for Debbie, and if I hadn’t been, I would’ve regretted it.

Her parents looked like they were in a daze, huddled together along with a younger boy who looked like he’d just entered high school. I couldn’t imagine what they were going through or what they could be thinking.

Off to their right was Erik Dobbs, and he was surrounded by what appeared to be every member of his fraternity. I didn’t know if Jase was among them; the crowd of guys dressed in wrinkled suits was too thick.

It wasn’t hard to tell apart the students from the family members. We were the ones dressed in something—anything—black. I’d pulled on leggings this morning and a dark blue sweater dress. It didn’t seem like the best thing to wear to a funeral, but it was all I had handy.

As the graveside service drew to a close, I was surprised to find my lashes damp. I’d been doing so well, keeping my face relatively dry through the whole service, even when they played that one country song that was always played during sad moments. I hastily wiped at my cheeks with chilled hands as I turned.

A hand clamped down on my shoulder, spinning me around. I almost put my weight on my bad leg, but corrected myself at the last minute. Heart pounding in surprise, I lifted my gaze.

Erik stood there, his dark eyes fastened on mine. “What are you doing here?”

I shook his grip off my shoulder or at least tried to. His hand tightened for a second and then he let go, but he didn’t back up. “Don’t touch me ever again,” I said, voice low.

Something dark and ugly flashed across his face. “You shouldn’t be here. She’s dead and in that coffin because of you.”

Gaping, I jerked back from him. “Excuse me?”

“She’s dead because you filled her head with bullshit.” His voice rose, drawing the attention of those standing nearby. “If you had just minded your own business instead of trying to stir up drama, she’d be alive right now.”

Blood drained from my face as I stared into his. Was he crazy? My stomach rolled as I noticed that more people were staring—fellow students. “I wasn’t stirring up drama and you know that.”

Erik shook his head. “It’s your fault.”

“Hey man,” one of his friends said, stepping forward. “I think we need to get you home.”

“I think she needs to leave,” he sneered. “She of all people shouldn’t—”

Erik was spun away from me in the same manner he’d turned me around. I had no idea where Jase came from, but he was suddenly standing there, his hand clamped down on Erik’s shoulders, his face inches from his.

“I know you got a lot on your mind,” Jase said, voice low and dangerously calm. “But I suggest you walk away from her right now before you say anything you’re going to regret.”

He opened his mouth, but Jase shook his head. “Walk away, brother.”

For a second I didn’t think Erik was going to, but he nodded curtly. Shaking off Jase’s hand, he spun away without looking back at me, pushing through the crowd of his frat brothers. None of them went after him that I could see. If anything, they looked disgusted with his behavior.

Jase cupped my elbow as he lowered his head toward mine. “Where are your crutches?” he demanded.

I shot him a pissy look, which he ignored. “Not that it’s any of your business, but I tossed them in the garbage.”

He stared at me. “You threw them in the garbage?”

“Yeah, I did.” A little slow on the uptake, anger from what Erik had said to me flooded my system. Unfortunately for Jase, he was the one there. “And I don’t need you getting involved there. I had it under control.”

“Totally looked that way.” He started walking, and with his hand firmly around my arm, it left me little choice but to walk with him. “I’m taking you home.”

“Calla is going to take me home.”

“Text her and tell her you have a ride.” When I didn’t respond, he shot me a look. His eyes were a deep, thunderous shade of gray. “Please don’t argue with me, Tess. I just want to get you home. Okay? I just want to make sure you’re not standing around alone waiting for Calla to come get you.”

Part of me wanted to dig my heels in, but I was being stupid. The last thing I wanted to do was stand out in the cold waiting for her while Erik was slinking around, ready to point a finger at me for something I had absolutely nothing to do with.

“Okay,” I said finally, pulling out my cell. “You don’t need to hold my arm, though.”

His eyes flared in color. “What if I want to?”

I stopped, forcing him to come to a standstill. Our gazes locked. “You don’t have the right to touch me, Jase.”

He dropped his hand immediately. “Sorry.”

As we started to his Jeep, I sent Calla a quick text letting her know I had a ride. When we got inside his car, he asked again about the crutches.

“What?” I yanked the seat belt with all my power and clicked myself in. “I don’t need them forever.”

“The doctor said—”

“I needed them for a few days or a week, depending on if I was relying on them.” I hated remembering that he’d been there that day—had been there for me only to crush my heart a few days later, no matter how tragic the why behind his reasoning was. “I don’t need them.”

“You limped the whole way to the gravesite and to the car.”

“You were watching me?”

“Yeah, I was.” His gaze flicked over my face and then settled straight ahead. “I kept an eye on you almost the whole time. You didn’t seem to notice.”

I didn’t know what to think about that. “I didn’t see you.”

“I was standing in the back, by the door. I bowed out before people started walking out,” he explained. “Anyway, did Erik hurt you? He turned you around pretty quickly.”

I shook my head and then realized he wasn’t looking at me. “No.”

“I would’ve gotten there quicker, so I’m sorry about that.” He finally turned the engine on and cool air blasted out of the vent. Neither of us spoke until we were on Route 45 heading back to Shepherdstown. “He needs to stay away from you. I’m going to make sure he does—hey, I’m not going to beat on him or anything crazy, okay? He just needs to not pull any shit like that again.” He cut me a sharp look. “That was the first time he said anything to you?”

“Why?” I asked. “Why do you even care, Jase, what he says to me?”

Another razor-edged look was cast in my direction. “That’s a stupid question.”

“No, it’s not. We aren’t friends. We were two people who were a little more than friends for a very short period of time and we had sex.” My heart turned over from my own words. “That’s all we were.”

Jase clenched the steering wheel. “Is that what you think of us?”

“Isn’t that what you want?”

He didn’t answer immediately, and when he did, it was so low I wasn’t sure I heard him right. “No.”

I sucked in a sharp breath. “No?”

“That’s not what I wanted from us. God, Tess, not at all.” He propped his left arm on the driver’s window and pressed his cheek into his fist. “But I’m just . . . I told you before you didn’t want to get with me.”

A burn encompassed my chest and throat as I stared at his profile. “I know,” I whispered, and I hoped he didn’t get too upset with Cam. “I know about Kari.”

His jaw clamped down so fast and hard I wouldn’t have been surprised if he cracked his molars. A mile passed before he spoke. “I don’t even have to ask how you know.”

“Please don’t be mad at him. He thought I already knew, because I knew about Jack. You can’t get mad at him.”

“I’m not.” He sighed heavily. “So you know the whole sordid tale then.”

“I . . . I didn’t think it was sordid.” I bit my lip. I knew what Jase had said about not wanting Jack at first and now his guilt made even more sense, because what if Kari had wanted Jack down the road? “It was just sad.”

“Oh, I must not have told him everything.” He coughed out a laugh. “When Kari got pregnant, I wasn’t there for her when she told her parents. I should’ve been. I knew they would be hard on her and when they said they were going to send her to her grandparents down in southern West Virginia, I was kind of relieved, because it was like if she wasn’t there, I didn’t have to think about the fact that she was pregnant.”

He laughed again, but it was such a sad sound. “I was never there for her. You know, I was just a kid, but still . . .”

“But you were—what? Sixteen?”

He nodded. “When my parents stepped in and adopted Jack, and Kari came back, she talked about a future with all three of us. Scared the shit out of me. We got into an argument. She drove off and she died. End of story right there.”

Oh my God . . .

“You don’t blame yourself. Please tell me you don’t.”

“I did for a long time, but I know I didn’t cause the accident. We’d sort of made out before she left, but you know, the last conversation you have with someone, you don’t want it filled with shit like that.”

“I’m sorry,” I whispered. “I know that’s not a lot, but I’m sorry.”

Jase didn’t say anything again until we reached the apartment buildings. “I haven’t even visited her grave.”

I pulled myself out of my own thoughts. “Not once?”

He shook his head. “I just . . . I don’t know. I’ve moved on, but . . .”

“You haven’t moved on, Jase. If you haven’t been able to visit her grave, you haven’t moved on.”

We pulled into a parking spot in the middle of the lot. He turned off the engine and looked at me. His gaze dropped to my lips, and he seemed unable to drag his attention from them. The hand on the steering wheel tightened.

“Do you still love her?” I whispered.

Jase didn’t answer for a long moment. “I will always love Kari. She was a great person. I don’t know where we’d be right now if she had lived, but I will always care for her.” His chest rose slowly. He looked like he was about to say more, but changed his mind.

I recalled what Cam had said about him being scared. Maybe that really was it. Maybe he did love me, but it wouldn’t be enough. Some wounds, festered by silence, ran too deep. And there would be nothing I could do to change him and how he saw relationships. He had to find that in himself and he had to want to. And I hoped he did. Not just for my sake, but because, even though the wound he’d left on my heart was fresh and bleeding, he was a good man.

He just needed to sort himself out.

As I watched him work through what to say, I did what was probably the most mature thing I’d ever done in my almost nineteen years. Like earn-a-medal-or-a-box-of-cookies type of mature, because I was still hurting so badly when it came to him.

I leaned across the seat and pressed my lips against his cool cheek. Jase sucked in a sharp breath and turned a wild gaze on me as I pulled back. “I’m sorry for everything you’ve had to go through and I . . . I still love you, so I hope one day you’re able to move on, because you deserve that, Jase Winstead.”

Twenty-seven

Living in Cam’s apartment should’ve made life better. It did in a lot of ways. Staying there made it easier to avoid fixating on Debbie’s death or living somewhere that creeped the bejesus out of me. It helped with steering clear of crazy-sauce Erik. I caught rides to campus with either Avery or my brother, and since my knee rarely hurt as badly as it did in the beginning, the trek from music over to east campus wasn’t a big deal.

Not that I was eating lunch with Cam and everyone anymore. I didn’t know if Jase was. I doubted it since I was sure my brother had gone off on his friend once he realized we weren’t together any longer. But I couldn’t deal with it and pretend everything was dandy if Jase was there, so I stayed far away from the Den.

It was bad enough seeing him three times a week in music and then every so often around campus. He never spoke to me. Never once approached me to see how I was doing after the funeral. And it was stupid and pointless to allow this ache to fester and spread. Kari was a ghost. She was in the past, but Jase had loved her. They had brought a child into this world and ghost or not, I could not rid myself of the pain.

But it was more than just Jase. It seemed like it finally had sunk in—that my dream of being a professional dancer was truly over and that school was my future, which meant I had a lot of catching up on the taking-school-seriously thing, which stressed me out.

I was drained like an overeager blood donor by the time finals rolled around.

Dark shadows had bloomed under my eyes. Some days they were swollen, because late at night, when I’d wake up and there was nothing but silence, the tears would come. It was embarrassing knowing that Cam and Avery knew I’d been crying. I looked like crap. Wasn’t like I could hide it.

Over Thanksgiving, when Cam and Avery left to visit our parents, I’d gone with them to just get away. The trip had been good for me and Mom had loaded us up with baked goodies—the first apple pie of the season, two pumpkin rolls, and fresh bread. Cam had looked like he’d won the lottery, and I had checked out my ever-expanding ass and sighed. But when it had come time to return to Shepherdstown, the reprieve ended.

I hadn’t wanted to go back, because it felt like there was nothing there but sadness for me now.

Right before we’d left, I’d gone upstairs to my bedroom to grab a couple of sweaters I hadn’t taken with me in August. I’d gotten lost in staring at all the trophies lining my bookshelves, the ribbons hanging from the walls, and the sparkling crowns that had been given out during some competitions.

I’d picked up almost every trophy and tried to remember what it had felt like when my name had been called for first place or best overall, but the emotions had seemed cut off from me—a well I couldn’t access.

“You okay?”

I’d put a trophy back in its place and turned at the sound of Mom’s voice. I nodded as I wiped the tears off my cheeks with the back of my hands. When I’d started crying, I didn’t know.

A sad, sympathetic smile appeared on her lips as she’d crossed the room. Her bright blue eyes were shining in a way that made me want to cry harder. Cupping my cheeks, she’d brushed away a few tears that had lingered. “It will get easier, baby. I promise you.”

“Which part?” I’d mumbled. She’d known about Debbie, of course, and I’d told her about Jase—everything about Jase. We’d decided to keep that part from Dad if Jase ever decided to visit home with Cam. That wasn’t likely, but if Dad had known that his little princess’s heart was broken, he probably would’ve taken Jase out for hunting and had an “accident” during it.

“Everything—it will get better. I know that’s hard to believe now,” she’d said. “But eventually you’ll find something else to be passionate about and you’ll find someone who will love you like you deserve.”

“Jase deserves to love me. I mean, he’s not a bad guy,” I’d said, sniffling. “At least, I thought he did.”

Mom had pulled me into her arms and she’d smelled of pumpkin and spice, making it even harder to leave. I wanted to be that little girl again, the one who didn’t have to pull up her big girl panties and deal with the shit sandwich that was life.

“The young man has a lot on his plate.” She’d squeezed me the way I loved. “He reminds me of this guy I knew in med school. He’d been involved with this girl for years and she’d died unexpectedly over summer break. I think it was a heart issue.” Mom had pulled back, grasping my cold hands. “But it’s been how long? Decades? I still see him every so often and he’s never married and I don’t think he’s ever been in a long-term relationship. And Jase . . . well, he had a child with this girl. It’s even more difficult for us to really understand.”

Hearing that really didn’t make me feel any better. Even if Jase didn’t want me, I still wanted him to move on, to find love again and to have a life that he shared with someone. I didn’t want to think of him like Mom’s friend, spending years alone with nothing more than casual relationships and not letting anyone close.

Jase deserved better than that, because deep down, he was a good guy who was just . . . messed up in a way I couldn’t fathom.

I’d forced myself to go to sleep early the Sunday we returned, but it was like every night recently. I’d only be asleep for a few hours before I’d start to dream. Some nights I dreamed of Debbie in the dorm, of her . . . hanging in the dorm. There were nights where I was back at the funeral again and instead of Erik yelling at me, he’d push me into the open grave.

And other times, I dreamed of Jase. Of him loving me and telling me that he’d always be there for me. Those dreams weren’t bad until I woke up and realized that that’s what they were. Just dreams. Then there were dreams where we were stuck in a strange house and I’d call out his name, but he never seemed to hear as he walked through doors and I could never catch him.

Every morning I’d wake up feeling like I hadn’t slept at all and I went through the semester’s last classes in a fog. Still, I’d breezed through most of my finals. Considering I’d had a crap ton of free time on my hands, I’d done a lot of studying while I was alone in the apartment. And eating. But the studying had me more than prepared, which was great, because this was my future. Maybe not the one I’d planned, but the one I needed to accept. And teaching wouldn’t be bad. I’d enjoy it. So passing my finals was a big deal.

My muscles tensed as Calla and I entered music and took our seats. Her cheeks were ruddy from the cold, making the scar stand out. Rubbing her hands together, she huddled down in her seat.

“I can’t deal with this cold,” she said, shivering. “When I finish college, I am so moving to Florida.”

“A few months ago you were saying you couldn’t deal with the heat.” I pulled out a pen, ready to be done with this class. Like for real. “You should probably find a place that has the same kind of lukewarm temp all year-round.”

Her lips puckered up. “That’s a good idea. Now just finding a place like that. What about you?”

Graduation was so far off I couldn’t even think about it. I shrugged. “Probably stay around here, I guess.”

She sighed as she reached over, tugging on the hem of my hoodie. It was then when I realized I’d worn the same Old Navy hoodie the last three days. Wait. Did I even shower this morning? I didn’t think so. I did brush my hair before I pulled it up in a messy pony.

Nice.

“Come over to my dorm tonight?” she asked, like she’d been asking for the last two weeks. “We can get a bunch of junk food—make a run to Sheetz. You know my love of their nachos.”

I started to tell her no, but stopped myself. I needed to pull my head out of my ass. At least for a few hours. “Okay, but can you pick me up? It’s too cold to walk over the field at night.”

“Of course!” A wide smile broke out over her face—a breathtaking smile. “Yay! And I’ll get beer, because nothing like supporting underage drinking. Or I can get some of those girlie hard lemonades. Bitch, I’m gonna get you so drunk you don’t . . .” She trailed off, lips thinning.

“You’re gonna take advantage of me?” I joked, and when she didn’t laugh, I sighed. But then I felt eyes on me and I looked over. The air froze in my lungs.

Jase stood at the end of the aisle, dressed in a hoodie and worn jeans. He had that damn gray toboggan on, the one I loved so much. I wanted to rip it off his head and do something crazy, like stash it under my pillow or something.

I cringed inwardly.

Good thing I only had insanity-sauce thoughts and didn’t actually act on them.

Seeing him, just like every time I saw him, was so fucking hard. Even before we got together it had been bad, but it was so much worse now knowing what it was like to be in his arms, to feel his skin against mine, and to know his kisses. Harder yet was trying to reconcile his kindness, good humor, and protectiveness with this Jase—the same one who’d dropped me after our very first kiss.

I got that he had baggage, but I wouldn’t have run from dealing with it. I would’ve helped him once I wrapped my head around it all. I would’ve loved him nonetheless.

The pen slipped out of my fingers and rolled onto my lap. A knot formed in my chest as he shifted his weight. He looked like he wanted to say something, but I couldn’t imagine what it would be since he’d been avoiding me like I was a bad case of herpes.

“Tess,” he said. My entire body tensed at the sound of his deep voice, and I closed my eyes.

Hearing him say my name . . . I forced the tears welling up in my eyes to dry when I reopened them. It hurt, because the boy . . . the boy broke my heart.

Calla stiffened, and I knew she was seconds from going mama bear all over his ass.

And he must’ve sensed it too, because his thundercloud-colored eyes shifted to her and then back to me. Whatever he was about to say was lost to the forever and never going to happen. He gave his head a quick shake and then pivoted on his heel and walked several rows down, taking a seat.

My gaze was fixed on the back of his head, on the way the ends of his hair curled up over the edges of the toboggan.

“Forget him,” Calla said.

But I couldn’t. I couldn’t ever just forget him.

“I mean it, Teresa. You deserve a guy that doesn’t bail on you and ignore you for weeks.”

“I know,” I whispered, studying the back of his head, easily recalling what it felt like to let his hair sift through my fingers. “Doesn’t make it any easier.”

Calla didn’t say anything, because what I said was the truth.

Heart heavy and chest aching so badly I wanted to just throw myself down and cry under the chairs, I turned my attention to my music final, determined not to fail because of Jase.

And to not shed another tear because of him.

After my last final, I trekked over to West Woods. Since I wasn’t planning on hanging around in Cam’s apartment during winter break all by myself like a total loser—instead I was going home to mommy and daddy like a total loser—there were still a few things I needed to get out of my dorm since I was planning on staying in Cam’s apartment next semester.

Even though Cam said he had no problem with me staying there, I needed to get a jobbie job and contribute something to the rent. And a job would help keep me distracted. Between not being able to dance, Deb’s death and Erik, and now Jase, I needed something to focus on bad until my brain and heart moved on.

That didn’t seem like it would happen anytime soon.

Cold wind chilled my cheeks, and the scent of snow was in the air as I crossed the lawn leading up to the dorms. My knee ached a little by the time I reached the lobby of Yost. With most kids already on their way home, the main room was pretty quiet with the exception of a few people lounging on the couches.

Digging out the key card from my backpack while I waited for the elevator, I tried to ignore the tightness between my shoulder blades. I hadn’t been back to the dorm since that horrible night. I didn’t want to go in our room, but I needed to get my stuff out and Cam would be over in an hour to load up his truck.

And I needed to act like a grown adult. There was nothing wrong with the dorm, and I seriously doubted the room was haunted. Bad vibes were expected, but I could spend the next however many minutes necessary to grab my remaining stuff.

Emboldened by my pep talk, I stepped into the elevator and rode it up to my floor. As I made it out to the hallway, my phone chirped, signaling that I had received a text. Thinking it was Calla or Cam, I pulled it out of the front pocket on my bag and nearly tripped.

Coming w/ Cam to help. Need to talk to u.

That was all the text from Jase said, but my heart was pounding and my stomach dipping as if the text had said much more than that. Like the text had read: I’m a fucking turd and I made a big mistake and I’ll love you a long time.

Except the text hadn’t said all that, but he was coming to help Cam. And that had to mean he’d gotten my brother’s permission and that also meant he had to have said something that made Cam agree. Which would’ve been hard considering I’d been a hot mess and that was partly his doing.

I stopped in front of my dorm suite, my pulse skyrocketing from the buzz of elation. Don’t read into it, I told myself. Just because he was coming over to help and he wanted to talk didn’t mean anything. And I also shouldn’t be as excited as I was. I reeked of desperation. Should I even tell him he could help? Part of me wanted to tell him no, but then I’d spend the rest of the night punching myself in the face. We did need to talk . . . and I wanted to talk to him.

My hand shook as I sent back a completely calm and unenthused Ok.

His response was almost immediate, tripping up my heart.