Page 29

29

ZANE

I t was always dark by the time I got home, even now, when the sun didn’t seem to start sinking until it was at least eight. I dropped my lunch bag by the door, kicked my boots off, and sank down onto the couch.

My eyes closed instantly, despite the early hour.

But that was exactly how I liked it. It was why I worked twelve- or fourteen-hour days, seven days a week, as many in a row as my boss would let me before he forced me to take a day off.

The guys on my jobsite all assumed it was because I wanted the money.

But that wasn’t it.

I needed to be at work, because every second I wasn’t was a constant battle not to go running back to Saint View.

Being away from Fawn after knowing what it felt like to be with her was a new sort of torture, one I didn’t realize would be so all-consumingly painful.

One I didn’t know I would have to spend every waking moment fighting, because all I wanted to do was turn up on her doorstep and beg her to take me back.

The only thing that stopped me was knowing what she needed outweighed what I wanted.

She needed space and time to heal. And even though it had been killing me, day after day, week after week, my heart knew she was right.

That we never would have made it if we’d stayed together.

But it didn’t make the agony of being apart any easier to bear.

I fell into an exhausted sleep like I did every night, knowing with one-hundred-percent certainty that I’d dream of her.

I always did.

Raindrops fell on my face, tiny cold splashes, but it didn’t matter. Because in my dreams, they fell on Fawn’s face too. They ran in streams down her pink cheeks, and we both laughed, standing there in the rain, not caring that we were getting soaked, when the only thing that mattered was the two of us.

Until the rain turned heavy, and suddenly it wasn’t just rain, but an entire flood of water that got in my ears and eyes and mouth until I felt like I was drowning.

I woke up with a start, sitting upright, the room around me dark.

And water in my lungs.

I coughed and spluttered, my shirt wet and sticking to me while I wiped at my drenched face and gasped for breath.

“ So dramatic,” a feminine voice drawled in the darkness.

“Right?” a man answered. “You dump one little bucket of water over someone’s head while they’re asleep and they act like you dunked their head in the toilet and held it there while you flushed.”

My heart slammed against my chest; my brain too confused to identify the voices. I hit the touch lamp beside the couch, and a soft yellow light lit up the room.

Including Fawn’s siblings, standing over me, arms crossed, both of them squinting like I was some sort of weird animal on display at the zoo.

I said nothing. Not because I didn’t want to but because clearly, I’d been sleeping with my mouth open when Scythe had dumped a bucket of water on me, and now half of it was in my lungs.

Ophelia rolled her eyes and tossed me a throw blanket from the back of the couch so I could wipe myself off. She elbowed her brother. “Told you the bucket was a bit much.”

Scythe shrugged. “Hey, that was your idea. I just wanted to put his hand in it, so he’d piss himself—”

“That’s not a thing!” Ophelia argued.

“The seventh-grade sleepover where we did it to Malcolm Jones says otherwise! He soaked that sleeping bag! His mom had to throw it out!”

I wheezed and waved a hand at them. “As much as I really want to hear about the traumatic events you inflicted on other kids in your preteen era, Scythe, do you want to tell me what you’re doing in my house in the middle of the night?”

Scythe scoffed. “It’s literally not even nine-thirty. And we would have been here way earlier if Ophelia didn’t need to pee every hour of the drive down here.”

“Sorry that I don’t want to end up like Malcolm Jones,” she muttered.

I pulled off my soaked work shirt with a wince. “Question still stands.” I eyed them. “I’m assuming from the good mood you aren’t here to kill me?”

Scythe cocked his head. “That’s presumptuous of you. I’ll have you know, killing puts me in party mode. I could very well be about to slit your throat.”

Ophelia shoved him. “But in this case, no, he’s not.” She paused, considering her statement. “Well, not if you stop being such an idiot.”

I raised one wet eyebrow. “What have I done now?”

Scythe folded his arms across his chest and glared at me. “We’re here to find out your intentions in regard to our sister.”

I wasn’t following the conversation at all. “Sorry?”

Ophelia sighed, flopping down on the couch beside me then cringing when she realized she’d sat on a wet spot, courtesy of the drowning her brother had given me. “Zane, what we’re asking is, when are you going to go sweep Fawn off her feet and tell her you love her?”

I eyed them. “She knows I love her.”

Ophelia waved a hand around impatiently. “So why, exactly, aren’t the two of you together?”

“She needed time.”

“She’s had it.”

“I needed to be better. For her.”

Scythe sighed dramatically. “How’s that working out for you? You’re the best employee your boss has. You spend your tiny amount of free time driving around for meals-on-wheels. And I’m pretty sure I saw you doing naked tai chi in the backyard at dawn.”

I squinted at him. “I never did tai chi in the backyard. Naked or otherwise. At any time of the day.”

He grinned and slapped me on the shoulder. “Nah, that was me. You should try it though. Very therapeutic.”

I was pretty sure the face I made matched Ophelia’s cringe of disgust.

She shook her head. “That was a mental image I did not need.” She twisted so she was facing me. “Fawn is lonely. And so are you.”

I scrubbed a hand over my face. “It’s nice of you both to worry about your sister—”

“It’s not her we’re worried about.” Ophelia eyed me pointedly. “She has friends. Family. A son. She’s surrounded by love and protection and safety. She’s back in night school, and she’s working.”

Scythe poked me in the chest. “In other words, she’s awesome.”

Ophelia nodded. “But you…”

“Are sad. And I don’t even mean as in pathetic. I mean, as in literally sad.” All the humor had left Scythe’s tone. And suddenly he sounded almost…fatherly?

Having kids really had changed the man. Sort of. His naked tai chi comments still couldn’t be forgotten.

Ew.

Ophelia tapped me on the leg. “Look, I know we gave you a hard time, but I also know you aren’t your brother, and you never were. We don’t blame you for what happened.”

I sighed. “Thank you, but, and I mean this with no disrespect, it’s not you whose forgiveness I need.”

Scythe crossed his arms over his chest again and gazed down at me. “You’re not going to get it by working yourself to death and chatting up the ladies at the bingo club.”

I squinted. “What? I never went to bingo either.”

He winked. “Nah, that was me too. They love me there. And they don’t even mind when I cheat to win the gift cards.”

He walked backward to the door, saluting me as he went. “Come back to Saint View. I’ll bet Betty at bingo will let you cheat too. She’s got a thing for green eyes, so I’ve heard.”

Ophelia got up to follow him, her parting advice much more…sane. “I just want my sister to be happy, Zane. And I’m pretty sure that until you’re back in her life, she won’t be. Haven’t you both punished yourselves enough?”

She left without waiting for an answer.

But it was one I knew, deep within my gut, wrapped in layers of guilt.

I’d just been waiting for someone to set it free.