Page 30

AVERY

I t’s been seventy-two hours, and I can still taste him on my lips. Three whole days have passed since Damon kissed me, and I swear the memory is etched into my skin like a roadmap to my heart.

I wipe down the espresso machine one final time, my reflection warped in its chrome surface, and I can’t help but smile at the girl staring back. Somehow, she looks different than she did just a few days ago. Hopeful. Happy.

“You sure you don’t need help closing?” Cara asks, already untying her apron.

“I’ve got it,” I say, trying to sound casual. Like my heart isn’t doing somersaults in my chest. “Just need to count the drawer and I’m out.”

Cara raises an eyebrow, her lips turning into a grin. “You’re happy tonight. Hot date?”

“Nah. Just dropping off notes,” I say, but the blush spreading across my cheeks betrays me.

“ Riiiiight ,” she drawls. “And I’m sure it’s not one of the hot football players that were in here the other day, is it?”

I say nothing, biting my lip to hide my smile as she shrugs her coat on and heads for the door. “I expect to hear all about it when I see you next” she calls out, and I laugh, turning for the registers.

Fifteen minutes later, I’m locking the front door of Java the Hutt, my backpack slung over one shoulder. Inside is my meticulously organized notebook for Professor Karr’s class—the one Damon has missed on account of me. The one where he’d been avoiding me up until now.

The wintry night air bites at my cheeks as I walk, tugging my coat tighter against the cold. I’m halfway down the block, already imagining the way his green eyes darken with intensity every time he looks at me when my phone buzzes with a text.

Fishing it out of my coat pocket, I check the screen.

QB :

Still coming over?

Three simple words that make my pulse quicken.

I begin to type back, unable to contain my smile, when the sound of an engine slowing behind me catches my attention.

Headlights illuminate the sidewalk, casting my shadow in front of me, long and distorted.

A sleek black SUV pulls alongside the curb.

Its tinted windows are too dark to see inside but reflect the streetlights, and when I glance down to the front bumper and see the familiar Pennsylvania plates, my stomach twists.

I know that car. Those plates.

When the back window slowly slides down with a soft electronic hum, I hold my breath, my thoughts racing.

What the hell are they doing here?

“Avery.” My father’s voice slices through the air like a steel blade?cold and precise?his presence every bit as commanding as always when he appears in the window frame. His dark eyes are hard as he sets his sights on me. “Get in the car.”

It’s not a request. It never is with him.

“Why?” I ask, wary as I glance from him to the waiting SUV.

“It’s time to stop running from your real life and go home.”

I scoff, crossing my arms over my chest. “No.”

“ Now. ”

“This is my life now,” I say, straightening my spine against the chill that has nothing to do with the winter air. “Besides, I’m meeting a friend, and I’m going to be late.”

I clutch my phone tighter, Damon’s text glowing up at me like a lifeline. Three dots of my unfinished reply taunt me from the screen.

“Then your friend can wait.”

“No.” I raise my chin while I stare him down, willing him to do something, to say whatever he came here to say. I’m no longer the same girl, the one who came running the second he called. The one who shrunk under his gaze. The one he always kept under his thumb.

“Avery Elizabeth Astor.” His voice drops an octave, the way it always does when he’s losing patience. “At least hear us out. You’re still a part of this family, whether you want to be or not.”

Not. Most days, I no longer want to be an Astor. Not when it’s cost me everything.

I turn my back to him, adjusting the strap of my backpack and walking away with purpose. My heartbeat thunders in my ears, drowning out whatever he’s saying now. Three steps. Four. Five. If I can just make it to campus, I can dip inside a building and lose him.

“Avery, wait.”

I freeze mid-step. This voice is softer, familiar in a way that makes my chest ache.

The echo of a car door opening and closing behind me is punctuated by the sound of my mother’s heels clicking against the pavement. I wait as the sound grows closer, until I can smell her perfume—Chanel No. 5—wrapping around me like the embrace she hasn’t given me in months.

“Please,” she says, her voice barely above a whisper. “We need to talk, Avery. It’s urgent.”

I turn slowly, facing her for the first time.

She looks thinner than the last time I saw her a few months ago.

She’s elegant as always in her cashmere coat and pearls, but there are shadows beneath her eyes that makeup can’t quite conceal.

I wonder how much of that is because of me, and how much because of my father.

“You couldn’t do this over the phone?” I ask, arching a brow.

“Maybe we could have if you’d answer when we called.”

I swallow, my throat tight. She has a point.

“Listen, there are things we need to explain.” She glances over her shoulder at the SUV where my father waits, his silhouette rigid behind the glass. “Things you don’t know about everything that happened. About why we had to—”

“I know exactly why,” I cut her off, the familiar anger rising in my throat. “You told me, remember?”

“Not everything.” She steps closer, her eyes pleading. “It’s more complicated than we told you.”

I shake my head, already backing away when she reaches a hand out to stop me, her bony fingers curling around my arm.

“If you won’t listen to your father for my sake, do it for Katie.

” My stomach clenches at the sound of my little sister’s name.

“Your actions affect her, too. Maybe her, most of all.”

It’s a low blow, using my sister to control me. One she knows will work.

“Using Katie to get me to cooperate, Mom? Classic move.”

My mother’s face hardens slightly, but beneath her anger, the worry in her eyes remains. “You may not like it, but what I said is true.”

I swallow over the lump in my throat as my gaze flickers to my phone, Damon’s message still waiting for a response.

If I don’t show up, he’ll think I’m blowing him off.

Maybe he’ll even assume I’m being dishonest about what I want.

The thought of him sitting in his apartment waiting for me, checking his phone, and eventually concluding I’m not coming makes the ache in my chest worse, more than seeing my parents.

“Fine,” I say with a sigh. “Give me a minute,” I tell her, stepping away.

“I’ll be waiting in the car.”

I nod in acknowledgment as I step away and type: Got held up at work. Might be a while, but I’ll try to make it.

My thumb hovers over the Send button for a moment. It’s not entirely a lie, just not the whole truth, and I wonder how he’ll take it.

I press Send before I can overthink it, watching the message disappear with an ominous swoosh. Tucking my phone into my pocket, I trudge toward the SUV, each step heavier than the last.

My mother’s already inside when I yank open the door and slide onto the leather seat across from them. The interior smells like expensive cologne and new car—the Astor family signature. I keep my backpack on my lap like a shield, my fingers digging into the smooth material.

“Jackson, let’s go,” my father says to our driver, not even acknowledging that I’ve joined them. The partition window rolls up silently, sealing us in our own private hell as the car pulls away from the curb.

The thought of Damon waiting for me makes my chest tighten.

“Where exactly are we going?” I ask, staring out the window as Java the Hutt grows smaller in the distance.

My father doesn’t answer, his attention fixed on his phone, thumbs tapping out what’s undoubtedly another million-dollar email.

“What’s wrong, Dad? Afraid I’ll tuck and roll if I don’t like the destination?” I say, sarcasm dripping from my tone.

“I wouldn’t put it past you,” he mutters, then lifts his head, eyes shifting from his phone to meet mine with an intensity that makes me shrink back against the leather seat. “The Astor walkway collapse,” he says, his voice suddenly stripped of its usual arrogance. “We didn’t tell you everything.”

The air in the car seems to vanish. Those words hang between us like a physical thing, dark and heavy.

Mom reaches for my hand, but I pull away.

“There are some things you should know before you continue this . . .” Mom pauses, pursing her lips before she adds, “Whatever this is with the Huhn boy.”

The Huhn boy. The way she says it churns in my stomach like acid. He’s not a boy, and he’s certainly earned his name.

“Damon,” I correct.

“Right, Damon,” she says his name, mouth puckering like she ate something sour.

“Vinny Huhn knows,” my father says, his dark eyes heavy on my face when I turn to him. “We told you he was suspicious about what caused it, but it’s more than that. He knows I altered the design. He knows the collapse is my fault and could’ve been prevented, and he has the evidence to prove it.”

The world tilts sideways. I grip the edge of the leather seat, struggling to process his words.

“What evidence?” My voice sounds distant, even to my own ears.

My father’s jaw tightens. “Original blueprints. Emails. Cost analysis reports showing the changes I made to increase profit margins. He’s the reason we made you break it off with Damon. It was his stipulation to keep quiet.”

“Wait.” My brain hurts as I try to wrap my head around what he’s saying. “Are you telling me that Vinny Huhn blackmailed you?”

My father offers me a curt nod. “Break up with Damon or he’d go to the authorities with what he knew.”

I bring my hands to my temples. “He wouldn’t do that?”

My father scoffs. “You think I’d make it up?”

No? Yes? Maybe?

I don’t know what to think anymore.