Before & After - Nazarea Andrews Page 0,31

a hand on her waist. "You’re mine and you’re fucking perfect. I don't give a fuck what your past was."

She smiles sadly. "You do. You might not want to care, but you do. You can't help it. It pissed me off to no end that you almost fucked Lindsay. It was a fucked move. I get it. I get why you were upset."

I stare at her and she lifts a hand, the tips of her fingers brushing over the stubble on my jaw, higher to push into my hair, and I lean into her, my forehead resting against hers. "It doesn't matter."

"Look at it. Read it. Then tell me that." She kisses me, a brief press of her lips and the hint of summer sweet sugar before she pulls back.

Chapter 14: After

It's carving my future into your

Skin, with lips and fingertips,

Twisting our lives together until there

Is no way to be

Anything but us.

Mapping the ink and curves

Of you until I know them

Like my own soul.

(Rike’s poems to Peyton )

“You ok?” he asks, and I glance at him. I’m reeling from what Lindsay told me.

She was getting married. I was her best friend, the maid of honor, the only person in Austin she really cared about besides Scott and Rike. It was us four against the whole world and we were fucking winning.

It was us two, privileged debutantes, and them, bad boys with tattoos and a past that made me cringe. And we made it work. We thrived.

And then it shattered.

Sometimes, the fairy tale is too fucking good to be true.

That was the only time Lindsay sounded bitter. And she had been. She’d been furious. I get it, though. She was on the edge of having it all—and something as senseless as a distracted cab driver snatched it away.

I might recover. I might get my memories back. But Lindsay would never walk away from the devastation of the accident.

“How is Scott?” I ask. His gaze flicks to me, startled. I shrug. “What’s happening to me doesn’t affect just you, and his fiancée is in that hospital still. How is he dealing with everything?”

Rike blows out a breath and flicks the blinker on, hitting the highway and speeding up. “He’s a mess,” he says honestly. “He should be on his honeymoon, and riding the wave of his band’s success. Instead, he’s spent the last month figuring out how the hell to keep her from leaving him and how he’s going to take care of her.”

I jerk around, staring at him. “Why the hell would she leave him?”

“Because she’s scared. Because she wants what’s best for him and always has. She won’t think that’s her, now that she’s in a wheelchair. Lindsay—she’s the best thing that could have happened to Scott. But it’s not easy being with him, and she won’t be the person to make his life harder unnecessarily.”

“But she loves him,” I protest shrilly.

His gaze slides to me and a bitter smile tugs the corner of one lip up. “Sometimes love isn’t enough, Peyton.”

He hits the blinker again, swerving for the exit, and I clutch at the door of the truck. We’re getting off the highway, and I glance out the window.

“Where are we? I thought we were going to get lunch.”

“We are,” he say.

The house he pulls up to is in a well-cared for neighborhood. The grass is a dirty green, and the flowerbeds a little overgrown, but there’s a wraparound porch with comfortable looking patio furniture, and a privacy fence hides the backyard.

I look at Rike, confused, and he grins at me. “I didn’t say where we were going, sweetheart. But this has been your favorite place to have lunch since the day we moved in.”

“This is our home?” I whisper, even though I knew. Of course it is. What else could it possibly be?

There is a tiny part of me, staring at this gorgeous house, that wants to race inside and soak it all in. Remember everything. Lie in the bed where I was happy.

A bigger part—the larger part—is terrified, and for a moment, I’m stuck to my seat, staring.

Rike pulls open the door and holds out his hand. His eyes are hopeful. And before I consciously make the decision, I put my hand in his and let him pull me from the truck. Against his body, all hard and hot against my own.

“Are you going to behave if we go in there?” I ask huskily, and then flush. I can’t believe I just asked that.

A slow smile curls