Page 63

CHAPTER

FORTY-SIX

REMI

I watch him pop the top from a beer, wearing a red flannel and dark blue jeans. He stares at the fire for a moment, the tent at his back—all done without my help—then walks around the pit before he sits beside me on the Mexican blanket, wrapping his arm around my shoulders.

I rest my head against him, knees to my chest, my thumbs through the little thumb holes on my hoodie. I’m back to them again, but for a different reason than before.

It’s cold out here, October now.

My stomach twists into knots as I think of meeting with Silas, but I push it aside. I’m already skipping class, lying to Sloane, fucking up, I might as well let it all go for the night.

The fire pops, but we’re far enough away it doesn’t matter. The heat is delicious though, and the flames are mesmerizing. I inhale the scent of the woods, the fire, Cortland at my side.

He pulled his truck into the site too, and it’s at our backs.

Not far from Ely, the campground is one I’ve never been to, and on a Tuesday night, we don’t have any neighbors in either lot beside us.

I glance at the stars overhead and think about the detectives asking me about my view that night. If I saw any then.

I was stunned with that question. With most of them. But I didn’t see the stars that night for the simple fact that all I really saw was Cortland’s eyes holding mine.

He kisses the top of my head, offers me a drink from his can of beer. But there’s other alcohol in the cooler by the tent, and besides that, I don’t want to drink tonight.

“No, thank you,” I murmur, and he finishes it off, then tosses it into the fire where it starts to melt.

“So polite,” he says with a smile as I turn to look up at him. The flames dance in his granite eyes, and they look nearly silver in this light.

“Is that a problem?” I counter, smirking at him.

He arches a brow, his legs stretched out in front of him, arm still around me, other hand planted on the blanket. “I don’t know,” he muses. “I kind of like when you’re a brat too.”

I smile wider at his comment, flashing my teeth, and his eyes dip down to my mouth. My blood heats, and I think about what might happen in that tent tonight. “Do you?” I tease him.

“Yeah,” he says, sitting up and turning to face me more fully, one hand cupping my face.

“I do.” His thumb traces my mouth and my lips part, almost involuntarily.

“But I like your manners too.” He pushes his thumb into my mouth, and I suck it, my tongue ring flicking against his skin.

His breath hitches, his eyes staring at my lips.

“Like that,” he murmurs. “So fucking sweet.”

Slowly, he pulls his thumb out, then puts it in his own mouth, and I clench my thighs together, knees still to my chest. He drops his hand, resting it on my knee, over my leggings.

“You’re so good, you know that?” he asks me quietly, his eyes back on mine.

“Is that why you liked me?”

He tilts his head, a smile on his full lips, his lip ring gleaming in the light of the fire.

“Yeah,” he admits. “And you were always in your own world. Nose in a book. Cheerleader with no friends. Lugging books around at the park on Saturday mornings.” He laughs a little as I feign offense, smacking his chest, my fingers lingering on his plaid shirt. “And I remember watching you fall.”

I know exactly what he’s talking about.

My chest tightens, my playful mood gone.

“I was coming in from practice. Y’all were in the gym.

” His eyes stay on mine and I squirm a little, uncomfortable.

“Maya was such a bitch.” He grimaces. “ Is such a bitch.” He looks away and I wonder if she’s said anything to him lately.

I think about the texts on his phone. The broken screen.

But I don’t say anything, wanting to hear this.

When he noticed me, back when I thought no one really did.

“I broke up with her that night, and you were so brave.” He offers me a small smile, squeezing my arm, his still around my shoulders.

“But we had a game the next day. Your ankle was swollen.”

I nod, swallowing down a lump in my throat. “And blue,” I supply.

He frowns. “And blue,” he repeats.

I had no idea he noticed.

That night hurt. It was like a zing of electricity in the most painful way just standing on it. I did one extension the night of the game, and I was terrified I wouldn’t be able to hold my own weight above my bases.

I did. Just barely.

When I came down, I thought I might faint.

“Maya bitched at me that morning,” he says quietly. “Before practice.”

I hold my breath, staring at him as he gazes out into the fire.

He shakes his head, shrugging. “Guess she saw I was crushing on you before I even did.”

I think about her in the café. Calling me a slut. I smile faintly now, realizing why she was so bitter.

“Why didn’t you stay off it?” Cort asks, breaking through my thoughts. “Or… get an Ace bandage or something?” He smiles a little, but it’s a confused smile.

I look down between us, at my knees. Think about going home after practice, dropping my gym bag by the door and leaning against the wall, sweaty and in pain.

Silas walked down the hall, his phone to his ear, dressed in a suit and tie, as always. When he saw me, he put the phone on mute, his cold, dark eyes fixed on mine. “What’s wrong?” he demanded.

For a second, I wanted to cry. Tell him everything. Not just my injury. About Maya. How I thought the quarterback had a crush on me. That my ankle was sprained, and I needed a doctor and wouldn’t be able to cheer at the game the next day.

But Silas and I didn’t have that kind of relationship. I think I would’ve been able to tell Mom all of that, but in the years before she died, she’d been absent. Always at home, but never really there.

That night, I sucked it all up, straightened my spine, my palms pressed against the wall at my back. “Nothing, sir.” I lifted my leg, wearing shorts, my ankle was visible, and I had already kicked that shoe off. “I just… I think I sprained my ankle.”

He’d glanced down at it in cold boredom that sent chills down my spine, his phone held to his breast pocket. “Can you walk?”

Surprised he asked a question at all, I gingerly stepped on it and ground my teeth together, sucking in a breath. “No,” I said, shifting my weight to my good foot. “It’s?—”

“I didn’t ask if you could walk on it,” he said, speaking slowly, as if he were talking to a child and not his seventeen-year-old stepdaughter. “I asked if you could walk.” His gaze was on mine, burning through me.

Tears welled in my eyes, but I forced them away, swallowing them down, my ankle throbbing, my legs trembling. “Y-yes, sir,” I answered him.

He nodded. “Great.” Then he put his phone back to his ear and walked away.

He had cooked dinner that night for himself, leaving nothing for me. Not unusual. I learned how to cook from an early age, but that night, I felt like I might puke from the pain. I shoved down three Tylenols and cried into my pillow.

Looking at Cortland now, I don’t tell him any of this.

I just say quietly, “It doesn’t matter,” offering him a small smile even as pressure builds behind my eyes.

He grips my chin, tilting my head up. “It matters to me.”

I’ve never told anyone about Silas. Sometimes, Sloane’s mom would pry, but I instinctively knew if I told her too much, something bad would happen to me.

And he was gone a lot on business trips, meetings and things I didn’t care about or understand, not that he cared what I thought about his work. He didn’t expect much from me, even though I was in cheerleading, never got anything less than an A in every single class… it didn’t matter.

My scholarship didn’t matter. Perfect attendance. It didn’t matter. All the ways I tried to not be like my mother didn’t count. It’s like he was waiting for that one moment I was going to fuck up.

And when I walked in the morning after the party that changed everything, that was it. “You’re just like your fucking mother.”

“I don’t know,” I tell Cortland, still staring into his gray eyes.

I feel the tears welling in my own, and for once, I don’t try to bury them.

If I dig any deeper, I might hit my soul, and if that cracked, I don’t think I’d have anything left.

My lower lip trembles as I stare up at him in the night.

“It’s just… my stepdad… he didn’t really care about things like injuries.

” I smile, but I feel it, the first tear falling, warm and wet down my cheek.

Cortland’s eyes dart to it, then back to me.

I want to bury my head in my hands. Escape into this hoodie so he can’t see my pain.

“So, I just got through it,” I tell him. I laugh a little, even though my heart feels like it’s breaking. “And besides, my ankle is fine.”

He doesn’t smile. He just keeps holding my face, my pain , in his hands. “Has anyone ever taught you what love looks like, Remi?” he asks.

I swallow, feeling shame burn through me, like a pit in my stomach. My anger flares as I face his pity. I grit my teeth, close my eyes a second, more tears clinging to my lashes. “I don’t want you to feel sorry for me.”

His lips press against my cheek, right under my eye. “I don’t,” he whispers, his mouth against my skin. “How could I pity a girl with so much fire? That’s like feeling sorry for the sun because it burns so fucking bright.”

I blink my eyes open, brows pulled together.

“If anything, I’m jealous.”

I shake my head, wiping the back of my hand over my eyes as he straightens, his head cocked as he looks at me with kindness in his eyes. “Why?” I manage to choke out.