Page 32 of My Return to the Walter Boys (My Life with the Walter Boys #2)
“Yes.” My response came out huskier than I expected, but it made Cole smile.
“Good.” His eyes burned into mine. “Let me know if that changes.”
Then he kissed me again, rougher and more fervent than before.
Everything fell away except for the slight sting of his teeth sinking into my bottom lip, the taste of cocoa on his tongue, and the feel of his weight pinning me to the ground.
Even my faculties receded as pleasure clouded my mind, which explained why I could barely remember my name when he finally pulled away from me five minutes later.
After pressing one last kiss to the tip of my nose, Cole rolled off me and collapsed against the blanket. I stared up at the sky again as my chest heaved up and down. Other than my hammering heart, the only sound that filled the small clearing was our labored breaths.
“If you guys didn’t study astronomy when you were out here, then what did you do?” I asked, finally breaking our silence once my breathing returned to normal.
“Took turns giving the stars made-up names,” he replied impishly. “Will always came up with the most ridiculous ones.”
“Like Urassus Major?” I guessed.
A laugh rumbled in his throat. “Exactly.”
The thought of Will entertaining his younger siblings as they watched the night sky reminded me of Lucy.
“There’s a skylight in my sister’s room,” I told him in a near whisper.
“It’s directly over her bed. Whenever I had a nightmare, I’d crawl under the covers with her, and she’d make up these wild stories as we stared out the window. ”
“What kind of stories?” he asked, tucking an arm behind his head.
“Space operas. Always about the same characters—Lexa, Jenny, and the Star Guards.”
“Star Guards?” he repeated. “What’s that?”
“A group of aliens sworn to protect the galaxy from evil.” My voice wavered as all the little details my sister wove together came rushing back to me, but I continued explaining.
“Lexa and Jenny were astronauts who were saved by the Star Guards after getting lost in space. Instead of returning to Earth, they decide to join them on their adventures.”
“Lexa and Jenny, huh?” he said, brushing his hand against mine.
I smiled. “They were sisters.”
“That’s cute.” He gave my arm a comforting squeeze, then shifted the subject to something less painful. “So what do you think—is there life out there, or are you a nonbeliever?”
We spent the next few minutes arguing over the existence of extraterrestrial life before moving on to Bigfoot, wendigos, and the Loch Ness Monster.
That turned into a discussion about conspiracy theories—which ones we thought were real and which were our favorites, Cole’s being that the reason the Louisiana Purchase was so cheap was that the land was overrun with werewolves.
When we ran out of silly things to talk about, our conversation took a serious turn.
“Hey, Jackie? I’m really sorry about last night.” For the first time this evening, his apology sounded sincere. “I never should have left you behind like that.”
Finally. I pulled away from the warmth of Cole’s body and propped myself up on an elbow to look at him. “So why did you?”
An emotion I couldn’t place flickered in his eyes. “Just something Nick said. It doesn’t matter.”
Obviously, it did, especially since his reaction was to ditch me. We wouldn’t be having this conversation otherwise. “It matters to me, though, and I think you owe me the truth. Were you…I don’t know, embarrassed or something?”
He released a defeated sigh. “Yeah, kinda.”
“No one made you hang out with us, Cole,” I said, my heart shrinking inside my chest. Although we ran in different crowds, his more popular than mine, I never thought he cared enough about his reputation to be ashamed of being seen with my friends.
His gaze snapped to me, and he pushed himself into an upright position. “Wait, you think—Jackie, no! You’ve got it all wrong. I wasn’t embarrassed by you or your friends. I knew exactly what I was getting myself into when I heard ‘Harry Potter trivia.’”
“Then can you help me understand?” I asked. “Because it sure feels like you were.”
Cole was quiet for a long time. Somewhere near the edge of the clearing, a small animal rustled in the undergrowth.
Finally, he said, “I felt like a loser, okay?”
I stared at him, sure I’d heard wrong. How could Cole Walter, the most popular guy at school even after he graduated, feel like a loser? Did he really not see how everyone always gravitated toward him? “But…why?”
“Because all my friends are off at school while I’m stuck here, doing nothing and going nowhere,” he admitted, each and every word coated with bitter dissatisfaction.
His statement did not compute. It wasn’t as if Cole’s grades were so dismal he didn’t get accepted anywhere.
By this time next year, he’d be gone too.
“Postponing your education so you can save up for tuition isn’t nothing,” I told him.
“It’s called being financially responsible.
School will still be there a year from now. ”
“It’s not just about school, though. I’ve got zero—I mean, I don’t…
Ugh. ” Cole scraped his hair away from his face, only for his bangs to flop back into his eyes a second later.
“Look, there’s only two things I’m good at—cars and football.
The latter is obviously off the table, so where does that leave me? Working at Tony’s forever?”
“You’ll figure things out,” I said in what I hoped was an optimistic tone. Unsure how else to assuage him, I took his hand in mine and laced our fingers together. “Isn’t that part of the whole college experience?”
“Easy for you to say,” he muttered. “You already have your life planned out.”
He wasn’t wrong, but my stomach still churned. I hesitated, not certain if I was ready to give voice to something that had been plaguing me since this summer. “Can I tell you a secret?” I didn’t wait for him to answer. “I hated interning at my father’s company. Investing is boring .”
“So…no Princeton? You could always apply to Boulder.” The thought of us attending school together must have cheered him up, because a smile finally returned to his face.
“Don’t be absurd,” I said, giving him a playful shove. “It’s Princeton or bust, but…” I trailed off, trying to organize my conflicting thoughts. “Maybe I don’t want to follow in my father’s footsteps after that?”
He cocked an eyebrow. “Was that a question?”
“Yes, and that’s the point I’ve been trying to make. It’s okay if you don’t know what you’ll do with the rest of your life, Cole. I’m unsure too. It’s normal, and it definitely doesn’t make you a loser.”
A frown touched his face. “You might be unsure, but you still have options. I feel like I’ve got nothing. Well, that’s not true. I have you,” he told me. “You’re the best thing I have going for me right now.”
“I don’t believe that,” I said as some undefined, discomforting emotion squirmed in my gut. “What about the engine rebuild you did for Carter? Didn’t he say he’d hire you again in the future? That’s not nothing.”
Cole gave a hum in response, and then we fell quiet, both of us talked out.
The temperature dropped quickly, and when I started shivering, we decided to call it a night.
Hiking out of the forest was more difficult than on the way in, and by the time we reached the truck, my muscles were aching.
All I wanted to do was crank the heat and curl up on the bench seat with my head in Cole’s lap.
I must have dozed off during the drive, because I woke sometime later to a gentle swaying motion and a warm, firm body pressed against mine.
The first thing I saw when I opened my eyes was Cole, who was carrying me into Parker’s and my room.
I snuggled deeper into his arms as he approached my bed, not wanting to give up his warmth.
“What’s going on?” I asked in a raspy, only half-awake voice that made him smile.
“You fell asleep on the way home.” He laid me down in bed, then tugged off my shoes. “Go back to sleep, Jackie. I’ll see you in the morning.”
“Don’t go,” I replied, clutching his shirt even as my eyes fluttered shut. “You’re comfy.”
When Cole didn’t reply, I thought he’d already left, but a moment later, the mattress dipped, and he crawled in next to me.