Total pages in book: 91
Estimated words: 84322 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 422(@200wpm)___ 337(@250wpm)___ 281(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 84322 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 422(@200wpm)___ 337(@250wpm)___ 281(@300wpm)
I nodded, taking another long sip from my whiskey glass, which was almost empty now.
“I’m sorry,” Tyler said, shaking his head. “I don’t know why I’m telling you all this.”
“I asked,” I replied simply.
Another quiet moment passed, and then Tyler took a sip of his whiskey, holding the glass between his legs when he was done with a distant smile. “You were fun tonight.”
I cocked a brow. “What do you mean?”
“At the bar. Dancing and singing the way you were… you were fun. You were different.”
“Gee, thanks.”
He chuckled. “I just mean that I feel like you’ve been kind of hostile since you got here. And tonight, you were… lively. Light. Carefree.” His eyes found mine in the shadows. “That’s how I remember you.”
The whiskey was swimming loudly in my brain, mixing with the vodka and tequila and beer and God knows what else was still hanging around in there. I warmed from the inside out, my thoughts fuzzy.
But my stomach dropped at his words, and a cold sweat prickled on my skin.
I threw back the last of my whiskey — which wasn’t much, but still too much for a single sip, and felt more like a shot. Then, I stood.
“I should head back up there.”
Tyler scrambled to his feet, opening his mouth just like he had in the bar, like he had something to say.
But he was silent.
I swallowed, turning, but two steps down the dock and he finally spoke.
“You’re in your head tonight.”
I paused, waiting, but kept my back to him as my pulse kicked up a notch. How could he tell?
“I saw it when you were on the bar, and again when you were sitting at the fire. You’re hurting.”
My head dropped, heart sinking with it as I tried to find my argument.
Then, a gentle touch brushed my elbow, and I zeroed in on the way his fingers wrapped around my arm.
“It’s because of what day it is, isn’t it?”
His words were just a whisper, but they might as well have been a blood-curdling scream for how my heart raced in my chest at the sound of them. I followed the line of his arm up to his shoulders, his neck, his jaw, noting the way it was tense before my eyes found his in the darkness.
“I don’t know what you mean,” I lied, swallowing the sour taste of the words down.
Tyler’s brows tugged together, his lips parting slightly, but then he released his grip on my arm, taking a full step back.
We watched each other for a long moment, and part of me longed to take it back, to tell him he was right, that it was the haunting of June eighth that had me fucked up. I wanted to tell him that it did this to me every year, that every year on this day I thought back to the last time I saw my mother, to the day she abandoned me for good.
And that I thought back to him, too — to that day in his room, to the way his skin was hot and sticky with sunscreen, to the way his lips were warm on mine, to the way it felt to be touched by him.
But what was the point?
He hadn’t been able to heal the wound my mother left. No one could do that but me. And when it came to what happened between me and him, it was even more pointless to bring up.
Because he’d taken it all back.
He’d said it was a mistake, that he was sorry, that he never meant for it to happen.
A day that had killed me and also brought me to life within hours meant nothing to him. It meant nothing to him — that he’d comforted me, touched me, kissed me, ruined me. It meant nothing to him that he’d made me feel more loved than I ever had in my entire life right after I’d convinced myself love wasn’t real, and then he’d ripped it away the very next day, taking everything I cherished along with it.
Tyler Wagner had scarred me.
And I didn’t need to remind myself of that anymore than I already did.
I tore my eyes from his, and a soft sort of awareness swept over me the farther away I got. Jacob — my boyfriend — knew everything about me, including everything about how my mother left and what it did to me.
Why hadn’t he asked if I was okay this morning when we talked?
Why did Tyler remember the day, but my own boyfriend didn’t?
I ignored the stupid questions — because that was exactly what they were: stupid. Jacob was the sweetest, most caring man I’d ever known. So what if he didn’t remember the exact day. Who would?
I didn’t let myself answer that question, either, wrapping my hands around my empty glass as I made my way down the dock.