Page 12 of Don’t Say You’re Sorry (Hawthorne University #2)

EASTON

Easton

I miss you.

A dam looks tired. Not surprising, considering he must have flown back to London, packed up all his stuff, and then flown right back here again, all within the space of three days. He doesn’t look as if he’s slept at all. The jet lag must be killing him.

His eyelids droop as he leans back on one of the sun loungers opposite me. He put his shirt back on after I left him standing in the kitchen with a hard dick. When he peeked at me as he covered his shorts with the hem, I hit him with a look that said, That’ll teach you .

I can tell his social battery is running low, but he’s still managing to talk to Xavi about the art he commissions for romance authors.

Xavi sounds genuinely interested in what he’s saying, even gets a few book recommendations while he’s at it, and Adam’s feeding off his excitement.

They seem to be becoming fast friends—something that pisses me off more than it should.

Does Adam have friends in London? Real friends who love him the way mine love me?

I hope not. The thought of him hanging out with a bunch of people I don’t know, having fun without me, forgetting about me , even just for a little while—it makes me want to hurt him.

Not just physically but mentally. Emotionally.

It makes me want to hurt him like he hurt me.

“I wouldn’t if I were you,” Nate whispers, his gaze flicking up to the boy I’m watching. “Trust me. It’s not gonna go the way you think it will.”

My lip twitches. “I’m not you. I got this.”

“Easton,” he says, waiting for me to look at him, his jaw tight as he leans forward on the sun lounger next to me. “I’m serious. It’s not worth it.”

I tilt my head. “Tell me how you think I think it’s gonna go.”

“You think you’re gonna fuck with him a little.

Pull him in so you can spit him back out.

Give him a taste of his own medicine. Break his heart so hard that the next time he leaves you, he’ll walk out of your life for good with his tail between his legs.

Lesson learned, right? You’ll finally feel better.

It won’t hurt anymore. You’ll have won. But trust me,” he says again. “That’s not how it ends.”

“Go on,” I say, humoring him. “How does it end, Nate?”

He sighs. “You won’t just hurt him. You’ll end up hurting yourself too. You won’t feel better. If anything, you’ll feel worse. You’ll regret it.”

“Do you regret it?” I ask. “What you did to Xavi?”

He nods subtly, turning his head to look at his boy again. “If I could go back…” He shakes his head. “My hate blinded me, E. I couldn’t see what was right in front of me.”

“What was that?”

“That I loved him, even back then, and that’s why he had the power to hurt me.

But also that he was hurting too.” He swallows.

“The day I lost my sister, he lost his best friend. His platonic soulmate or whatever. The only person who ever really gave a fuck about him before I decided to get my shit together. He’s not perfect, and he made mistakes, but he didn’t deserve what I did to him.

” He steeples his fingers. “Did you know he almost relapsed the night he left me?” he asks, his voice raw with shame.

I nod, leaning forward as well. Nate’s not usually a sharer. He doesn’t talk about shit like this. He’d probably smack me if I tried to comfort him right now, so I don’t. I just listen, mirroring his position.

“I found him with the fucking pill in his hand, man. I hurt him so badly that he wanted to feel nothing again, and I hated myself for it more than I ever hated him. If he’d have swallowed it—” He stops, refusing to go there.

“I hate to think what would have happened.” He glances at Xavi again.

“Thirty seconds, Easton. That’s all it would have taken.

I count myself lucky every fucking day that I didn’t find him thirty seconds later. ”

I look down, my knee bouncing. “Is that why you’re being so nice to Adam?” I ask, pulling his attention back to me. “Because you regret the way you treated Xavi when he moved in here?”

He narrows his eyes. “I’m not being nice .”

“Xavi didn’t get a barbecue,” I remind him. “Frankie and I both did.”

“That was different.”

“Because you hated Xavi.”

He nods once.

“But you like Adam?” I ask, my lip curling.

He stares at me for a few beats. “Adam didn’t break my heart.”

I laugh bitterly. “My heart isn’t broken, Nate.”

He gives me a look, one that tells me I’m full of shit. “Okay.”

I glare, though there’s no real heat to it. “I don’t like this side of you.”

He chuckles, shoving my head away. “Go.”

So I go. Standing, I walk over to Adam and Xavi, who’ve both been silently watching me and Nate for the last few minutes, though they couldn’t have heard what we were talking about.

“You tired?” I ask Adam.

A crease forms between his brows as he nods hesitantly.

He’s looked ready for bed for the last couple of hours, but he’s too polite to excuse himself at a barbecue that was technically thrown for him, especially when Xavi’s making an effort to talk to him and make him feel welcome.

Carter and Frankie aren’t going out of their way to make him feel un welcome, but they haven’t spoken to him at all, instead choosing to have their own little party in the hot tub.

Frankie doesn’t like him. And Carter…I don’t know what’s going through his head right now.

He’s acting weird, but I can’t figure out why.

I mean, I didn’t expect him to welcome Adam with open arms, especially with what I told him about us, but he’s being too quiet.

Too… not Carter. Other than that little taunt in the kitchen when we got home tonight, he hasn’t said a word about us.

Feeling eyes on the back of my head, I turn my head to find Carter staring at me with his head cocked, a lit joint between his fingers. There’s something in his eyes—a warning, or a challenge, maybe—but I ignore it for now.

“Let’s go to bed,” I tell Adam.

“Together?” he blurts out.

A smile touches my lips. He’s so cute. So easy . I could shatter him in a week tops if I wanted to.

“Come on.” I tip my chin.

Grabbing his shit, he stands and follows me toward the house, throwing an awkward good night to the others over his shoulder. Xavi gapes at me, and I wink at him, earning a glare from Nate. There he is—my angry, hotheaded, possessive bastard of a friend.

When we get up to Adam’s room, I walk inside with him, glancing at all his stuff on the floor. I didn’t really need to escort him to bed. I just wanted to see it for myself, to see that it’s real.

He’s really here.

“This is it?” I ask. “This is all your stuff?”

He shrugs. “It’s just my clothes and books, mostly.

I couldn’t exactly steal all the furniture in the flat and take it on the plane…

” He trails off, wincing a little at the mention of the flat I know nothing about.

I don’t know where it is, what it looks like, what floor it’s on, what his view looked like…

I don’t know anything about his life in London.

“You haven’t unpacked.”

“I know.” He rubs the back of his neck, struggling to meet my eyes. “I was waiting for you. I wanted to know for sure that you were okay with it. That you were okay with me…living here…with y?—”

“When did you get so nervous around me?” I ask, studying his face for his reaction. “Is it because I hit you? Are you afraid of me now?”

“What? No.” He shakes his head. “That’s not why. I deserved it.”

“Yeah,” I say. “You did.”

He drops his gaze, shame and guilt and regret written all over his face. “Easton?—”

“Get some sleep, Adam,” I cut him off again, heading for the door.

“Hey, sunshine,” he calls, then curses himself as if he didn’t mean to say it, as if the words were out before he even knew they were coming. He recovers quickly though. Glancing around, he waves a hand at the TV. “Want to watch a movie with me?”

I pause a foot away from the door. He looks as if he’s bracing himself for rejection, but there’s hope too.

Hope that what we had before isn’t lost forever.

He wants to fix us, to mold our broken pieces back together until they resemble the old us, but I’m not about to make it easy for him.

He’s going to have to try a hell of a lot harder than this.

I should walk out of here without a backward glance, but… Fuck. I don’t want to.

Grabbing the remote, I flop on his bed and make myself comfortable.

He smiles, dipping his head to hide it as he crouches to dig out a pair of sweats from one of his bags.

Facing away from me, he peels his shirt off, then hooks his thumbs into the waistband of his swim shorts, revealing the tight, round globes of his ass as he pulls them down, the brave little fucker.

Though he’s not so little anymore. His body looks different.

Tighter. Harder than it was when we were eighteen.

He’s leaner than me, but he could still take me if he wanted to.

The thought of him doing so makes my dick perk up.

When he turns around, dressed in a pair of black sweats and nothing else, I don’t look away, shamelessly dragging my eyes up his body from his bare feet to full, pink lips. I don’t care that he catches me watching him. He already knew I was.

Unable to help myself, I reach out, tuck my fingers into his waistband, and yank him onto the bed on his knees.

His hands shoot out, landing on my chest to steady himself, his dark hair falling over his eyes, heavy with exhaustion.

Sitting up, I keep my hand where it is, my knuckles grazing the soft skin above his dick as I put my mouth near his ear.

“You sure you know what you’re doing, little brother? ”

He sucks in a breath, exhaling near my cheek.

Rather than waiting for a response, I shove him down on the bed beside me and lean back into the pillows, my legs crossed at the ankle as I find a movie for us to watch.

He stares at the side of my face, saying nothing.

He’s not an idiot. I’m sure he’s fully aware that every encounter we’ve had since I punched him in that bathroom the other night has been far from friendly .

Far from brotherly . This is never going to work out the way he hopes it will.

We’re too far gone for that. But if he wants to play pretend, I’ll let him play. For now.

Hitting play on the movie, I set the remote on my lap and link my fingers on my stomach.

Adam grabs one of the several throw pillows behind us, turns on his side to face me, and cuddles it to his chest. Despite his best efforts to stay awake, his eyes begin to drift shut, and he falls asleep in under ten minutes, just like I knew he would.