Page 87 of Ly to Me

“Your past doesn’t have to be your future. You don’t have to keep runnin’.”

Her wrists twisted in the ropes. “And what about you?”

My fingers turned cold against her skin. “I’m not running anywhere. I’m right where I’ve always been.”

“You’re not running, but if you think your past hasn’t been dictating who you became, then you’re either lying or blind.”

My molars clenched as I tucked her hair behind her ear. If I thought tying her up to get her to talk wasn’t gonna come with backlash…well, I wouldn’t be the man she once loved. Possibly still did, somewhere deep down.

“Go on,” I said, knowing only her words had the power to ruin me, but they would never ruin how I felt about her. Nothing would.

Lyra’s eyes narrowed to fine slits. “You’re bitter. Cold. And you either pushed everyone away or they left long before you could because I’ve yet to see someone you grew up with come around.”

“Hard to push away dead people,” I said flatly.

She went still, her eyes widening a fraction. I could see her thinking about those who were closest to me, and saw the moment she chose to bite her tongue from asking about the only one who gave her a chance back then besides my parents.

“What happened to your parents?” We both knew she knew they were dead. It was part of the contract she skimmed over. Hard to miss the word ‘will’ written at the top of each paper.

My thumb stroked over her jawline, my body refusing to let her go. “Car accident. About a year after you left.”

Her head tilted in my hand, all that sadness from before returning. “I’m so sorry.”

The things I left out surrounding their death faded into the background with those three words. I spent years blaming her for their deaths, thinking that if she had just stayed by my side, they would still be here.

But constantly staying stuck in the past, trying to picture the way things could have been, fixed nothing. It just trapped you. Kept you in a spiral, like the one I was finally ready to see the end of.

“I was ready to drop everything for you back then, Ly. So, why’d you run? Why leave me without at least tellin’ me we were over?”

“I know about the bet,” she whispered, her eyes now looking straight past me toward the barn doors.

I dropped my hand and took a step back. “Who told you?”

Her chin lifted. “Doesn’t matter, does it?” Her gaze cut back to me, full of sharp knives and fire. “You made a bet with your friends and you won that bet, didn’t you?”

“I—”

“Didn’t you?!” she shrieked, the sound echoing through the barn, yet somehow trapped in the confines of my ribs.

“Yeah. I won.” No use beating around that. “And I’m glad I did.”

She laughed. “Justifies me leaving more now, doesn’t it?”

I cupped the back of my neck. “You’re right.”

32

Lyra

The Admission

“That’s all you have to say?” His simple reply pissed me off more.

Carver strode back up to me and gripped my throat. I shuddered at the way he was looking at me, like the rest ofthe world had faded to nothing around us. “The bet was to fuck you before prom. They never said I had to spend every waking moment I could find with you, or introduce you to my parents, or rearrange how I wanted my future to go to make itours. I wantedeverythingwith you.”

“You didn’t have to take the bet.”

“I—” Car's lips snapped shut, his gaze darting away for a moment as he changed whatever was about to come from his mouth. “You’re not listening.” His grip tightened, and I let out a soft moan. “Nowhere in that bet did they say I had to fall in love with you. Fuck the bet, Lyra. I fell in love with you. Irrevocably. That's what happened. You claimed my entire heart and fucked it completely up when you left without giving me a chance to tell you that.”