My Favorite Hal-Night Stand - Christina Lauren Page 0,86

surgery on June 22, and I’ll be there when he gets out of the physical rehabilitation facility on July 2 until the 25th.

I don’t even know what else to say. I’m dreading the trip, but I feel relieved, too, like I’m finally doing the things I should have been doing all along. It feels really good to tell you this.

I love you,

Millie

For eleven days I’ve read her messages and let them sink in, let them carefully smooth over the jagged damage her betrayal caused, but I can’t stay away anymore. I slam my laptop shut and grab my keys as I jog past the counter. If I was asked to recount the drive from my place to hers, I would describe only a blur of scenery punctuated at the end by the high-pitched squeal of my tires coming to a stop in her driveway.

I can barely pull in a deep breath, and when she opens the door in her pajamas, with her hair messy, and eyes red from crying, I think I stop breathing entirely.

She doesn’t say anything before she bursts into tears, and melts into me when I wrap my arms around her.

chapter seventeen

millie

It’s about twenty minutes before I can pull myself together and stop crying, but throughout all the sobbing, and hiccupping, and senseless babble, Reid guides me inside, pulls us down onto the couch, and holds me. When he presses a kiss to the top of my head, it just makes me cry harder.

He’s here, at two in the morning, which means that he read my last message and came right over. It means he’s probably been reading all of my messages—just like I hoped—and that I wasn’t just throwing my words into the vast internet void.

It also means that he doesn’t want me to be alone after everything I told him in my last note. He read what I said about Anna, and my dad, and heading home this summer.

He made me wait over a month, but isn’t going to make me wait anymore before telling me what he’s decided. Relief is in the distance—even if he tells me he needs to move on, at least I’ll know.

I sit up, reluctantly pulling out of his arms, and wipe at my face with the bottom of my pajama top. When I drop it, I realize I’ve just flashed my underboob at Reid. He blinks up to my face, a little dazed.

“Oops. Sorry.”

He gives a wicked half smile that makes a flurry of bombs go off in my belly. “No red silk.”

“I hoped you’d remember that detail.”

The smile slowly straightens into something more pensive—but thankfully still fond—and he reaches out to tuck my insane hair behind my ear. “There’s a lot to respond to in those messages, but after the one you sent tonight, I had to come over.”

An opening. He’s just given it to me, and I don’t want to mess this up. Sure, it’s easier to write all this to the computer and hit SEND, but the important piece happens when he’s this close to me, his hand resting on my knee.

Anna’s voice rings in my ears: If Reid were here right now, what would you want him to know?

Well, Reid is right here.

“I really missed you,” I say simply.

An easy start. Baby steps.

I watch his mouth, mesmerized, as his tongue slips out and is drawn across his lower lip. “I missed you, too.”

Needing air, I pull my attention away and study the rest of his face. He’s stubbly, and his eyes are a little hollow, like he’s gone for a long run without drinking enough water. On instinct, I lift my hand and press it to his cheek. “You did?”

He nods. “I almost called about five hundred times.”

“I guess it’s okay that you didn’t. I had—have—some work to do.”

“Yeah.” He shifts his gaze back and forth between my eyes, trying to read me. His brow furrows. “You okay, Mills?”

I shake my head, and my chin wobbles. “Not really.”

At his worried frown, I start crying again. What is with me? Seriously, it’s like a dam has burst and I’m an unending, sobbing mess. I fight the mortification rising inside, and trying to focus on Reid’s reaction helps: he seems completely unfazed by the tears and snot and hiccups.

“But I’m really glad you’re here,” I say through a sob. “Like, really, really glad you’re here. I can’t tell you how much I missed you. I have been—”

“Millie. Honey.” He tries to calm me, pressing his hand to