Page 74 of Falling for the Enemy

“No.”

“How come?” he asked.

“It’s a little hard when you don’t know what you want.”

It wasn’t like her to be so indecisive. He wanted to give her an out and tell her that if this was too much, he would back off. But he was a selfish prick, and he wasn’t ready to do that. Not yet.

He reached into his pocket and pulled out his wallet, fanning through the folds and only finding credit cards, a few crisp bills, and a condom. “Where did you find a penny?”

“My console.”

He glanced back at the cars. “I used to come here after my mom died,” he confessed, remembering how many times he made wishes from this bridge. “I must have sunk eight piggy banks into that creek, begging to somehow bring her back. Once, I even…”

She looked at him when his words broke off, but he couldn’t bring himself to say what he’d been thinking. He didn’t need to, because she seemed to understand.

“They say bargaining is a stage of grief. You were a kid who just lost his mom. Don’t beat yourself up about it. We all have intrusive thoughts.”

He swallowed tightly, recalling how long it had taken those thoughts to fade. They finally stopped when his dad died. But no matter how many pennies he threw into that creek, his mom never came back.

“I never once wished he would come back.”

“That doesn’t mean you didn’t love him.”

Did he love his father?

Could you love and hate someone at the same time?

He glanced at Jocelyn, realizing those two emotions were more related than most people realized. “I thought I hated you for so long.”

She looked up at him with a flat, deadpan stare. “You did hate me, Soren. Until I showed you my boobs.”

“No, I didn’t. You got under my skin because no matter what I did, you were never impressed by me. You were so damn pretty—even in the third grade when the rest of us were trapped in that buck-toothed awkward stage.”

She laughed. “I was just as awkward as everyone else. Besides, I was the new kid in town. I needed to make girlfriends before I could care about the boys.”

“You showed up like a hurricane, inserting yourself so brazenly, no one had the balls to question you.” He chuckled. “You were the most confident girl I’d ever met. And part of me hated you for it, because I knew it would make it that much harder to impress you.”

“Why did you care what I thought of you?”

“You were beautiful. Every guy had a crush on you.”

She snorted. “Yeah, right.”

“I mean it. Then, once you got boobs, forget about it. We were all tripping over ourselves trying to get close to you.”

“Stop lying. I barely got asked out.”

“That’s because you terrified us. You were smart, quick with a joke, edgy, and sexy as hell. You had this look about you, unlike any other girl. Even your clothes were one of a kind.”

“According to you, it was only what was under my clothes that mattered.”

“That’s never been true, Joce. You’re sharp and funny, and you used to humiliate the balls off of me for sport.” He laughed. “I’d walk into school with a hundred-dollar haircut and designer jeans, and you’d annihilate me in one breath.”

“Sorry.”

“You should be. You made me question everything. But then I’d find myself in bed at night, fuming, wondering why you were such a bitch to me. I’d lose sleep over it.”

She sighed, but it wasn’t a pleasant sound. Hearing this was stressing her out.