Page 40 of Things I Wish I Said

Chapter twenty-five

GRAYSON

I blink my eyes open, or at least I try to, but my left won’t give.

It’s as though someone inflated it with a tire pump, then glued it shut.

My right opens, but it’s enough to assess my surroundings.

Sunlight filters through a nearby window.

Soft white curtains. Shelves lined with awards and trophies.

A wrought-iron bed and a small desk with an ancient desktop computer.

It doesn’t take me long to realize I’m not at home, and even less time to determine I’m in Sinclair’s bedroom. I wonder how I got here until my muddled thoughts begin to clear, bringing with them a flicker of memories.

Ryleigh’s scan results.

Dustin.

The drugs.

The beating.

But how the hell did I get here ?

I bring my hands to my forehead and moan. I must’ve called her; it’s the only thing that makes sense.

“Hey there, Slugger. How’s the noggin’?” Her voice cuts through my thoughts, sharp and insistent.

I grunt and somehow manage to push myself up to a seated position even though every fucking square inch of my body hurts.

I wait until the sharp slide of the knife stabbing me in the ribs stops, then glance up at her through my limited vision.

Her whiskey eyes focus on my face, then scan over me.

She’s wearing her wig today, a fresh coat of pink lip gloss, blush, and that black winged liner girls wear, but otherwise, her skin is bare, giving me a glimpse of the light dusting of freckles over her nose and cheeks.

She looks beautiful, but then she always looks beautiful. With or without hair. With or without makeup. I’m quite certain Ryleigh could live out her worst of days and still take my breath away every damn time.

The sight eases something inside me, stills my racing thoughts.

“What time is it?” I croak out.

“Just past ten in the morning. You slept for a while, which is probably a good thing considering you spent a couple hours last night barfing up the contents in your stomach.”

I groan. “Please say you’re joking.”

“I’m not. Unfortunately, my bedspread might need to be burned. ”

“Shit.” I grunt, hating the picture she’s painting. “I’m so sorry. I’ll buy you a new one.”

“I don’t need you to buy me a new one,” she says, her tone soft—softer than I deserve.

With all the shit she’s going through, the last thing she needs is this.

I run a hand through my hair; it feels tacky, dirty. I’d hate to look in a mirror right now. “I shouldn’t have called you.”

In my right mind, I probably wouldn’t have.

“Here.” Ryleigh takes my hand and turns it palm-side up, then places a couple pills in it, ignoring me completely. “I’m sure you’ll be stiff today. It’s just ibuprofen, but it should help.”

I accept the meds with a muttered thanks, along with a glass of water she fetches from the nightstand beside her bed, then toss them back, gulping them down along with the entire contents of the glass.

“Are you hungry?” she asks, and I shake my head.

My stomach feels like it’s been torched. Just the thought of food makes me sick.

“I’ll take some coffee, though,” I say, eyeing her cup. “If you don’t mind.”

“Course. Give me one second.” She rises from the edge of the bed, and I watch her go, my gaze lingering on her ass and then those stellar legs as she walks away before I ask myself what the fuck I’m doing and scrub a hand over my face.

I feel like the walking dead, and I’m still checking her out?

I need to get my shit together and have about a week worth’s of sleep, but what I need the most is a shower.

Ryleigh’s bedroom door swings open a moment later, and she appears, carrying two steaming mugs of coffee instead of the one I woke to.

Turning, she juggles them as she locks the door behind her.

“I left it black, since I didn’t know how you take it.”

“Black is good,” I say as she hands me the cup.

I lift it to my lips and take a few sips, relieved when she makes no immediate attempt at filling the silence.

It’s not until I’ve drained half the cup that she asks, “So, you want to tell me what the hell happened?”

“Nothing you need to worry about,” I say, hoping she lets it drop. Sinclair doesn’t need to get involved in my mess. She’s already done enough.

“This is nothing?” She settles in across from me on the bed, crossing her legs to glare at me.

“You called me to come get you in the middle of the night! It took me two hours to find you, and when I did, I find the front of your car wrapped around a tree and blood dripping down the side of your face like you were an extra in a horror film.” She waves a hand at me.

“And when I ask what happened you tell me it’s nothing I need to worry about? ”

“I don’t want to drag you into my drama, Sinclair.

I fucked up and I paid for it. There’s nothing more you need to know.

You have your own stuff to deal with. The last thing you need is the added stress of mine, so when I say it’s nothing you need to worry about, that’s what I mean. I’ve got it under control. ”

“Yeah, it sure looks like it,” she snaps.

I take a sip of coffee, avoiding her gaze and doing my best to ignore the lingering nausea in my gut.

It doesn’t work.

When it becomes clear I’m not going to say anything else on the matter, Ryleigh sets her mug down on the nightstand and crosses her arms over her chest, turning the full brunt of her angry stare at me.

“I’m going to ask again,” she says through gritted teeth, “and you better not fuck with me, Grayson. I want an answer because I refuse to believe you’re as reckless as it looks. What. Happened?”

I stare at her, the resolve hardening her eyes to amber. The tight set of her mouth tells me she won’t let up. Ryleigh is a fighter. She doesn’t cave just because someone wants her to, and she won’t give up until she has answers.

I sigh and lean my head back against the headboard. “Payback’s a bitch,” I say, repeating Dustin’s words from last night.

“I don’t understand. Who . . .” Her words trail off, and I see the moment she connects the dots, the moment her eyes brighten like starlight. “Dustin.”

I nod.

“So, this is my fault.”

“No.” I shake my head, ignoring the way it makes the room spin.

“Yes,” she drawls. “I was the one who pissed him off by interfering with his girlfriend. I stood my ground, and it’s because of me you came in and saw him push me to the ground. I’m the reason you snapped and fought him. Which means I’m also the reason he wanted revenge.”

“No, Sinclair.” I set my coffee cup next to hers and reach out, hiding the grimace the sudden movement causes as I place a hand over hers.

“Don’t put this on yourself. This is on me.

I never should have gotten involved with Dustin in the first place.

I knew better, but I didn’t care. I could have taken you out of that kitchen and walked away, but I didn’t.

I chose to stay and fight. Just like I chose to text him last night to meet up. ”

“You—” She blinks at me as if trying to understand. “Why would you do that? You knew he was looking to get back at you.”

Shit.

I pull away again, wondering how I can say this so it doesn’t sound like she drove me to it, because at the end of the day, my inability to cope is all on me.

“After I left your place, I needed something to take the edge off. So, I messaged him asking for some smoke. I knew it was risky after his warning at Kip’s, but I was desperate. So when he agreed at double the price, I allowed myself to believe that would be the only way I’d pay.”

Or maybe I just didn’t give a damn. Maybe I wanted trouble.

I wait as my words register. If she blames herself for this, too, she doesn’t say so.

“So, what did . . . did he mess with your car or something? Or were you that messed up, and if so, why didn’t you call somebody. Call me! ”

“Dustin suggested I leave after I smoked and drank my weight in whisky, then followed me.” I shiver as I recall the sight of his taillights in my rearview mirror. “He then proceeded to slam into my car and run me off the road.”

Ry gasps. “Maybe I should take you to the hospital. Last night—”

“No. No hospital.”

“Grayson, you were vomiting, and you hit your head. For all we know, you have a concussion or a brain bleed.”

“It’s not a concussion,” I say, my tone calm.

“You don’t know—”

“Sinclair!”

She closes her mouth, her eyes searching mine with sympathy and concern I don’t deserve.

“I wasn’t sick because of the crash.”

“But . . .”

“I was sick because Dustin laced my weed with something.”

She’s silent for a moment, her eyes wide as she absorbs this information.

“Laced it with other drugs?”

“I’ve never used anything other than marijuana, I swear.

I might be an idiot, but I’m not a junkie.

I know my limits, but after I started smoking, I realized I felt a lot more messed up than I should, and I knew.

When I asked him, he more or less admitted it.

He’s been trying to get me hooked on the hard stuff for years, and this was just another way to dick with me. ”

“So, when you say he laced it with something, you mean . . .? ”

I lift a shoulder, and grimace at the sharp pain in my chest. “LSD, cocaine, fentanyl, PCP, who the fuck knows?”

And I don’t want to know.

She sucks in a breath. “Fentanyl? Isn’t that . . .?”

I sigh. “I’m trying not to think about it.”

“So, what now?”

“Stay the hell away from Dustin and get my shit together.” I scrub a hand over my face.

“At this rate, I’ll be lucky to keep my athletic scholarship when I start at George Mason.

They’ll take one look at me when I get to the field and know I’ve pissed away the season and wasted my talent.

I’ve been sloppy and it shows. I’m not in the kind of shape I need to be for a travel team, let alone a Division One college team.

If I don’t get my act together by the time we start training and conditioning, I’m screwed. ”

I say the words, but they don’t fully register. It’s like there’s this roadblock inside my brain, preventing me from giving a fuck.

“Why are you screwing around? I’ve seen you play. I know you love it, and the kind of talent you have takes work and dedication. Serious athletes like yourself don’t get to where you are by drinking and smoking.”

I exhale, tipping my head back so I can stare at the ceiling.

How do I tell her my father died from the same disease eating away at her now?

How do I explain that somewhere along the way my playing baseball became so intertwined with my father’s memory, it’s nearly unbearable now?

That it only serves as a reminder of this thing we both loved and shared, and now that he’s gone, every time I pick up a baseball bat or field a ball, it fucking hurts?

I can’t step foot on the field without thinking of the hell he went through those last three weeks, how quickly he deteriorated. The way it felt to watch him take his last breath and the shock that I was the only one to witness it when I thought I’d still have months.

When I was a kid, my father would take me out in the yard, and we’d practice for hours.

I spent years with him as my coach in little league and rec ball.

Then came junior high baseball for the school and summers filled with travel ball.

Countless tournaments and practices, doubleheaders and weekends on the road.

When I made varsity as a freshman, I’d never seen him prouder.

As a junior, in the spring and just before his diagnosis, scouts started approaching us.

And then the bomb hit. Dad was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, so I signed a week after his diagnosis as an early commit to George Mason—the same school he played for in college.

It was one of the happiest days of my life, mostly because I could see how fucking proud he was.

Three weeks later, he was gone.

I can’t put my pain into words, so I don’t try. It’s too hard, too painful, when it’s so much easier to shove it all inside, bury it so deep I can’t reach it.

I pinch the bridge of my nose, knowing I should open up to her when she’s done nothing but be honest with me.

Still, what I should do and can do are two different things .

“I went through a rough patch senior year, but I’m going to get back on track. This thing with Dustin, it was the wake-up call I needed. I’ll get my shit together.”

I try to catch her eye, but she won’t look at me. I can’t say I blame her. My answer is vague and closely resembles a brush-off.

I wish there was something I could do to make last night up to her, a way to pay her back, but I’m already doing the only thing I can by granting her wish.

Still, it’s not enough.

“Hey, Sinclair?”

“Yeah?” She glances my way, finally.

“I shouldn’t have called you.” I pause. “But thanks for coming.”

“Why did you call?”

I swallow, my gaze roaming over her face. “When I came to, you were the first person I thought of, the only one I wanted to see.”

Just like she’s the first person on my mind every other morning, and the last one I think about before I drift to sleep.

“Why’d you come?” I ask.

“Because you called.”