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The way her face crumbles is too much for me to take.

“I have a phone call to make.” I turn and head back to my room.

“Tell Lux I’m sorry.”

“Lux and I are done. She lied to me too, and I can’t forgive her for that.” I go inside my room and close the door. I stand in the middle of the room, unsure what to do next. My throat is clogged, and no matter how many shaky breaths I release one after the other, I can’t loosen the knot.

The tears that sting my eyes come fast and spill. I quickly swat them away. I haven’t cried since the day I took Ayla as a newborn to the hospital, and they hooked her up to oxygen and an IV. She was so tiny and helpless. I thought I would lose her. Her little hands were so cold, even though the rest of her body was burning. I still feel them between mine as I rubbed them to warm them up. I cried so hard that day.

I can survive anything, but I can’t survive losing my girl.

That’s when the tears come faster, and my hands ball into fists. Ayla is talking to someone on the phone, and I do what I never have before today: I open the app to confirm it’s Bron she’s talking to.

And there’s relief and disgust because I don’t trust her now, and that shatters my heart.

I lie in my bed, my face buried in a pillow. I want to pick up the phone, but who can I call? Lux is no longer an option. Our relationship is gone, and the thought that it won’t ever be the same between us, that I won’t get to smile with her and hold her, chokes me in a way that hurts more than anything.

I can’t call Cam or Chase because I just dumped their sister. Our friendship is probably dead too. That’s something I’ll have to deal with tomorrow.

So, I close my eyes and force myself to sleep. I don’t need anyone. I can always work it out by myself. But tomorrow, I’m going to the source. Noris and I will talk.

24

Oliver

“I’ll see you at the game this afternoon,” I say as we get to the front of the drop-off line.

Ayla doesn’t look at me, but she nods, unbuckles her seatbelt, and steps out of the truck. Her bag in hand, she begins to walk away but stops and half turns her head, stops, and then keeps on walking to the entrance.

I’m frozen in place. There’s so much I want to yell out my window. There’s never a day where I let her go to school without telling her I love her and cheering her on. Today, I can’t find the words.

She walks fast, disappearing through the back of the courtyard.

I breathe out.

This was the most uncomfortable commute of my life. The silence between us was deafening and gritting. She was buried in her phone, and I was lost in my thoughts. I put the car in drive again and head for the highway. I reach for my phone and unlock my screen. My finger hovers over Lux’s name, but everything hits me at once again.

I don’t have her. She lied to me. I broke up with her. Now I have no one I can talk to about this Ayla thing. If she and Ayla had not lied to me, I wouldn’t be in this situation.

And I’m pissed all over again. I’ve been feeling like shit this morning when I did nothing wrong.

My phone rings, and it’s my tile guy.

“Ollie, there’s a leak in the main bathroom. We opened the hole to see if we could fix it, and part of the ceiling on the floor below came crashing down.

“Shit. How did that happen?”

“The pipe joints were not tightened properly. We shut off the water supply and cleaned around it. You’ll have to tell the customer.”

I bob my head up and down. “I will. They already warned me that everything wasn’t up to code and some of the people who worked on this project were unlicensed. Get some photos and start prepping the area. I should be there in twenty. I’ll call the client and let them know.”

I disconnect the call and exhale. This is bad news for the client but a good distraction for me, so I dial their number before I leave thoughts of my current situation.

Twenty minutes later, we settle on replacing the pipelines and adding a new Sheetrock ceiling below. I call the warehouse and order a new, standing bathtub. I’m on the phone as I walk into the building and inspect the damage. I head out right after giving my crew further instructions on insulation. I need to return the bathtub we originally bought and pick up the new one along with some other materials. When I get there, they don’t have what I need, which prompts another series of calls with the client.

It’s eleven in the morning before I know it, and I just finished paying for the materials when I look at my texts. Some are from my crew, but I zero in on the ones at the top of my inbox.

Winter