First and Forever (Heartache Duet #2) - Jay McLean Page 0,106

bunch of letters and numbers and symbols, and then he taps a button and boom; he’s just made a couple hundred dollars for someone in less than five minutes.

So he says.

Austin groans into his pillow, clearly frustrated. “If I help you study—”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“Because every time you do, you make me dumber.”

“I make you feel dumber. Trust me, being around me has made you smarter, and you don’t even know it.”

“Probably,” I mumble, getting off my bed to sit at my desk. “Hey, is your dad still cool to have me work with him over the summer?”

Another groan from him, this one louder. “Yes, Connor. My dad loves you. He would love nothing more than for a Duke Blue Devil to work with him at our family’s junkyard… but why the fuck do you want to?”

“Money?” I shrug, lying. Truth is, I’ve had a shitty year on the court—my focus elsewhere—and I plan on spending the summer getting some extra training and coaching in. “Besides, my dad’s going to be in Europe—”

“You mean your dads.” He snorts, laughing childishly to himself.

“Idiot. They’re not married.” Yet. “And did you say shit like that in high school? Because if you did, it’s no wonder you got the shit kicked out of you.”

He holds a hand to his heart and jokes, “You’re hurting my feelings.”

“Uh huh.”

He stands beside me, looking over my shoulder.

I open my laptop.

He shuts it. “Are we really not going to this party?”

I open my laptop again and look up at him. “We’ll go for a half hour on one condition…”

“What’s that?”

I smirk.

He sighs. “This shit again?”

I nod, moving to the side so he can reach around me. Fingers swift over my keyboard, he taps, taps, taps at the keys, and with one large inhale, and a final sigh, he taps one more time until the Duke logo appears at the top left of the screen. He’d just hacked—so he says—into the school admissions database like he’d done many times before, and just like all the previous times, I click search, my fingers much slower than his when I type:

A

V

A

D

I

A

Z

And then I smile. “Let’s go try to get you laid.”

Chapter 46

Ava

It’s incredible how much things can change in just a few weeks. Even though Trevor and I had looked up pictures and reviews of Sunshine Oak, we were blown away by the facility when we saw it in person. Sunshine Oak isn’t just a treatment facility; it’s a community, and it’s filled with people who love what they do and the patients they care for. Trevor was only able to stay for a few days before he had to go back, but he left more than satisfied; he left happy… and a little jealous.

When Lydia at Sunshine Oak informed me that I had a fully furnished apartment, I expected something similar to the one I had back in Texas, so when Trevor pulled up beside the building, we had to just stop and take a moment. It wasn’t anything grand, but it was a hell of a lot better than what we’d assumed. “I don’t think you’re going to have to worry about half-naked old men and crazy old hussies here, Ava,” he murmured. And I cackled, so loud and so free, that it had him doing the same, and it felt so good to laugh, especially with him. We were dumbstruck, unable to comprehend the pure luck that had been dropped on us. We needed saving, sure, but this was beyond anything I could’ve ever imagined. And then the apartment itself… two bedrooms, with a bathroom attached to the master, open kitchen and living with dark floors and new appliances. The living room opened up to a balcony that overlooked a communal pool, and I couldn’t wait to sit out there with the sun and the stars above me.

It was just a tad better than the apartment—not room—Mom has at Sunshine Oak. Hers overlooks the community garden, and every morning she wakes up and looks out the window, and there’s color. So much color. Not just through her vision but in her life. And the doctors… my God, where the hell have they been the past few years?

In a way, I hate that it’s taken the help of a random stranger with money to spare to get Mom the care she actually needs, but I’m grateful. So very grateful. And so is Mom. I can see it in her smile—because she does that now. She smiles. At everyone and everything.