Page 138 of Trailer Trash

I already hear his footsteps. I search fast, spotting the notebook on his bedside table where I last saw it. I snatch it up.

He’s behind me and reaches for it.

“What the fuck are you doing? Give it to me,” he says sharply.

I don’t. I can’t. I curl forward, opening it up and reading a page. The handwriting is bold capital letters, each one pressed hard into the paper.

HOW COULD YOU LEAVE ME?

One sentence. Repeated hundreds of times.

He finally gets the book and snaps it shut. “What the fuck, Harlow?”

His expression steals my breath. It’s hurt and shock, like he’s the one who was just violated.

I blink, looking up at him, staring without words.

A phone bill. Someone dangerous. Something Clark was too frightened to explain.

Just then, I bolt out of his room and jump over the couch. I stumble but swipe up his phone from the coffee table.

The screen flicks on, its glow bright.

A lockscreen.

The phone is ripped from my hands.

“Unlock it and give it back,” I say and stamp my foot.

I don’t know what I’m doing bossing this man around. I don’t know where my fear fled to, but something in the depths of my mind tells me I need to know what his dad knows. Maybe to survive whatever comes after we finally part ways.

His chest heaves up and down. He isn’t the force he was earlier. He’s completely caught off-guard.

“Why are you doing this? What did my dad say to you?”

“There’s something important on that phone,” I answer, unable to hold back a rogue sob. “Show me, Killian.”

“No.”

He says it soft and remorseful, like he doesn’t want to deny me something, but has to.

“It’s drugs, isn’t it? You’re hanging out with bad people again.”

“Harlow—”

I shouldn’t say. Addicts freak. But I have to:

“I know you’re using. I can tell.”

“I’m not!” he booms.

I shake my head. “That’s why you wrote in that book like a crazy person! You were high, weren’t you? Those pages looked like the mind of a coked-out junkie.”

He lifts his lip in contempt, brooding.

You know what? I don’t need confirmation that he’s turning into the worst version of himself. I saw it. After what he did, I’m such a damn fool for hoping an addict isn’t lying to me.

I need to go.