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As if maybe that can fix what’s between us, what’s inside each ofus.
“You wrote them about me.” My voice is a rasp, and her chin snaps up, eyesflashing.
“Taylor Swift writes a song after every breakup. Doesn’t give her exes the right to hear her private thoughts until she makes thempublic.”
Her breath is light on my face, her lips close enough I could swoop down and claim them, learn whether her taste is the same or whether it’s changed,too.
“One problem with that assessment.” I breathe, and her brows lift. “We neverdated.”
She shoves against my chest. I don’t budge, but I do capture her hand with one of mine, hold it there until she stops trying to twistaway.
“I don’t care what you call it,” she retorts. “I was a kid. I wasin…”
“In what?” Her palm covers my heart, and I know she can feel it hammer in mychest.
We stare each other down, neither of us ready to givein.
I want her to finish that sentence more than I’ve ever wanted anything, as if her saying she loved me gives permission for me to unload on her,too.
To tell her she was my entire damned world, that when I learned she was at Vanier, I was confused and frustrated, but more than all ofit?
I was fuckingelated.
The one thing I consoled myself with a year ago was that she’d be better off without me. I never let myself use the L-word with her, swore that whatever I felt for her was mixed up shit amplified by ourcircumstances.
You can’t fall in a matter ofweeks.
Just like you can’t fall for someone who’s not talking toyou.
Who refuses to look your way in thehall.
And she can’t fall foryou.
I was wrong. I see itnow.
But even if she didn’t get over me as fast as I thought, even if there’s still enough attraction between us to incinerate acity…
She’s over me now. I know it when she pulls her hand out from under mine, and my blood cools a degree the second her touch isgone.
“The photos,Tyler.”
I hand her the stack. Annie turns and sets it on her dresser under the photo of her and herdad.
Then she grabs the faded jeans on her bed and tugs them on. I don’t bother looking away. She doesn’t ask meto.
The desire’s still there, but it’s overshadowed by something bigger, an uninvited emotion filling mychest.
“So, if I help you throw this party for Beck tomorrow night, you’ll keep my secrets,” she says under herbreath.
“Iwill.”
Annie buttons her jeans, straightening to look me dead in the eye. “Tomorrow, then. ForBeck.”
I nod. “ForBeck.”
But as I start for the door and she turns away to reach for a shirt, my gaze drags back to the stack ofphotos…
Hating that I didn’t realize how deeply I’d hurther.
