First and Forever (Heartache Duet #2) - Jay McLean Page 0,112
is,” I say, my voice suddenly cracking with the emotions I’ve held on to for too long. Feelings I’ve tried so hard to suppress.
Connor, the boy I met in high school, the boy I fell recklessly in love with, is sitting in my apartment, mere feet away, and he has no idea the impact he’s had on me and my family. None. He’d entered out of nowhere and left footprints wherever he roamed, and our lives are forever changed because of him. And I don’t know how to tell him that. How to portray how much his presence in my life has meant to all of us. I realize now, deep down, that it might be the reason I invited him here. Why I offered to cook for him: a small token of appreciation in a vast ocean of what Trevor refers to as Good. I’m staring, I know I am, but I can’t seem to shake it. I blink back the sudden heat behind my eyes and push down the ache in my throat. “What about you?” I manage to ask. “How’s your dad?”
“He’s good, Ava,” he says, his voice low as he pins me with his gaze.
Now I look away because everything is too much. Too soon. And too real. “Is he still living at that house?”
“No, he left after I graduated. I stayed until the lease was over… though for a while I did consider burning the place down.”
My eyes snap to his.
He adds, “It’s weird, right? An electrical fault when Trevor’s an electrician…”
My lips curve while I force out a sigh. “The insurance money sure came in handy,” I murmur.
“Oh, yeah?”
I push the steaks aside and move on to the salad. Without looking up, I tell him the truth, “We needed an immediate solution, and Peter helped with that side—”
“Peter,” he spits.
I glance up. “Why do you say his name like that?”
“Because I don’t like the guy,” he grinds out, his hands fisted on the countertop.
I wait a second to see if he’ll add any more, and when he doesn’t, I say, “Anyway, the insurance money helped with getting Mom’s placement and getting Trevor and me on our feet.”
He nods, slow. “So, you owe nothing to Peter?”
“Not a cent.”
“But your pride, right?”
“Not even that.”
“Good.”
I drop the knife, drop my pretenses, and shift on my feet. “Why are you so…”
“So what?”
“Your jaw’s all tense, and your face is red, and your fists are all punchy.” I slide the knife away from him. “And a little stabby.”
He chuckles under his breath. “I just don’t like the guy, Ava.”
“So you’ve said.”
Connor stays silent.
I sigh. “You know, secrets ruined us before, Connor, and I’m not saying that you and I are an us, but I’d like to… I don’t know… be friends?”
He laughs once. Bitter. “You want the truth?”
I nod.
Eyes set on mine, intense, he says, “I don’t want to be friends with you, Ava. I told you that once, and nothing has changed.”
I drop my gaze, my hand floating to my stomach to settle the butterflies there.
He clears his throat. “You know, Peter paid Mitch to do all that shit to your house. The paintballs and the BB gun and… all of it, Ava… it was all Peter.”
I gasp, shocked, my chest burning with anger. “That motherfucker!” I exclaim, shaking my head. “Good thing Trevor beat the shit out of him.”
Connor’s face lights up. “What?”
With a nod, I throw it all out there: “For a while, he’d been offering to”—I air quote—“take care of me.”
An indescribable sound leaves Connor’s lips.
I add, “I don’t know when he started looking at me differently, but he did, and it’s the reason I held off on taking him up on his offer. He’d given me a check a long time ago, enough to put my mom in care full-time, but I never accepted until… I mean, I always knew that I’d be indebted to him if I took it… in more ways than financially, but I was desperate, Connor.”
He takes a moment, his breaths shaky. Then he looks down at his hands, his voice as broken as his demeanor when he asks, “You slept with him?”
“No,” I breathe out. My head tilts back, eyes to the ceiling to stop the tears from falling. “I stayed with him, and after a couple of weeks, he crept into my bed one night while I was sleeping and—”
“Ava,” he cuts in, pained. “I don’t know that I can hear this.”