still got good ears, and they’ve been missing the company of a good story for a long time. Will you tell me yours, Chase? Give an old lady something to think on down here in the gloom.”
I slid off the chair with a groan, laying down on my side on the cool concrete and letting it soothe away some of the fire in my skin.
“Only if you sit down,” I urged and she moved shakily onto the seat.
“Such a good boy,” she said and emotion clawed at the inside of my chest.
“I’m not a good boy,” I told her, preparing to tell her exactly why. All of it, from the moment Rogue was forced out of town to the second I pushed her into that safe and stole the most bittersweet kiss of my life. “I’m the Devil in this story. You won’t like me by the end of it.”
I lay in my bed in my trailer with the window wide open, the sea breeze blowing in and making me feel at peace. Mutt was chomping on a Boneo thingy at the foot of the bed and I was trying not to drown in my grief.
It hit me worst when I was alone like this - if having ten armed men hanging around outside could be counted as alone - but in the silence, my pain found me.
It wasn't that I didn't feel it at all times. More that I'd made an art out of putting on a brave face over the last ten years, so I knew how to fake it until it almost felt real.
But when I sat in the quiet like this, it cut me more deeply, carved into my heart even sharper and made me feel all the worst kinds of pain.
"Run," Chase urged, grabbing my hand and damn near yanking me off my feet as we hurtled down the corridor away from our English teacher's classroom.
I threw a glance back over my shoulder just as the fuse burned down to the end and the string of firecrackers started banging loudly as they exploded one after another, the sound seeming like gunshots in the empty hall.
Chase yanked me around the corner just as Mr Parker screamed and a laugh tore from my lips.
We kept running all the way through the school until we were racing across the asphalt out front and tearing down the street.
I swung into an alley that ran down the back of a convenience store and tugged Chase after me so hard that he fell over his feet and crashed into me.
I tumbled back against the huge dumpsters lined up there and he slammed into me, cursing and apologising as I was crushed beneath his bulk.
"Sorry, little one," he half laughed as he tugged me upright again and suddenly we were standing too close to one another, my chest brushing his and my hair falling into my eyes as our laughter fell away.
Chase reached out to push my hair aside and I stilled, blinking up at him as my gaze fell to his mouth for a moment and the insane desire to push up onto my tiptoes and close the distance between our lips consumed my thoughts.
"Rogue," he murmured, his hand lingering on my cheek as whatever words he had for me caught in his throat.
"Yeah, Ace?" I breathed, wanting to hear what he had to say to me so desperately for some reason. My heart was racing and my skin was tingling where he touched me but neither of us seemed to know where we were supposed to go from here.
"I-"
"There you assholes are," Fox called and Chase flinched away from me like he'd been burned. "We finished egging his car, did you guys pull off the firecrackers?"
"Yeah, man," Chase agreed, stepping back and scrubbing a hand through his dark curls as he moved towards Fox and avoided my gaze. "You shoulda heard him scream."
My mind kept running over that day, the answer to what I'd been wanting so clear to me now when it had seemed so unclear back then. I'd been a kid growing into a woman, falling in love with her best friends and unsure how to adjust to that shift in our dynamic. I'd been a mess of hormones and in denial because I hadn't wanted anything to change and yet now, I wished I'd just taken that fucking kiss. I wished I'd seen him smile more often. I wished I could have been the one to save