Total pages in book: 155
Estimated words: 152045 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 760(@200wpm)___ 608(@250wpm)___ 507(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 152045 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 760(@200wpm)___ 608(@250wpm)___ 507(@300wpm)
He starts laughing.
I bite the corner of my mouth. Hard. “You might’ve been drunk,” I finally say, “but do you remember that at all?”
He beams. “I honestly don’t, but it sounds like me.”
I shake my head. Is that something he’d do to A.J.? No, because he gives a shit about our kid sister. Would he have purposely humiliated Hawke at a game? No. He loves Hawke.
And to my knowledge, he has never moved in on a girl one of his friends was interested in. He treats me like garbage.
“Why don’t you like me?”
“Oh, give me a fucking break, Hunter. They were jokes!” he yells. “You’re too sensitive.”
“You knew how those things, and the hundred other things you did, would make me feel!” I try to lower my voice, but I can’t. “You wanted me to feel like shit! Why?”
“Because I wanted you away from her!”
I stand there, staring at him, his eyes piercing me.
Dylan doesn’t move, but I see her chest rise and fall in heavy breaths out of the corner of my eyes.
I stand up straight. “So, you were jealous?”
“Let’s get one thing straight, Hunter.” He sneers at me. “I will never be jealous of you.”
“So why all the bullshit?” I ask. “Why not just tell me the truth?”
“Would you have given her up?” He cocks his head, challenging me. “Huh?”
Give her up? And let them be together?
I look over at Dylan, and I notice tears hanging in her eyes, about to fall. No. It would’ve fucking hurt too much. I can’t…
I can’t get the words out for a few seconds.
“If…” I blink, dropping my head. “If you made her happy…” I whisper. “If she was happy, then yeah.”
If she didn’t want me, I would never want to be someone who made her miserable.
I dig in my eyebrows, trying to get my fucking vision to clear. “Fuck.”
I twist around, but I feel a hand grab me. “No, no…” Dylan says, pulling me into her arms. “You don’t walk away. Come here.”
She pops up on her tiptoes, holding my face in her hands as she kisses me.
It only takes a second, and I wrap her in my arms and kiss her back.
Kade brushes past me and leaves, but it doesn’t even register to stop him.
She wants me.
Me.
“I love you,” I whisper.
“I know.” She presses her forehead to mine. “And he’s lying.”
“About what?”
“About something.”
She wipes the tears off her face and takes a step back. “I didn’t know I was coming between you—”
I grab her back. “You don’t come between us. He’s the problem, not you.”
“And we love him,” she says, and it almost sounds like a plea. “I won’t come between you two anymore.”
She wraps her arms around my neck, holding onto me for dear life before she lets me go.
“I can’t,” she says.
She leaves the room, and I slam my hand into the back of the door.
Goddamn him.
Dylan
My Hunter.
He was always my Hunter, wasn’t he?
I can’t be his, though, and walk into this house with the weight of Kade’s anger and act like we’ll be able to be happy at barbecues, birthdays, and Christmas. We won’t.
I yank open one of the French doors and charge onto the pool deck.
“You’re a fucking liar,” I say to Kade’s back, and I don’t give a shit who hears me.
He pours a drink. “Among other things…”
“You don’t want me,” I growl. “He wasn’t here for a year. I was. Just the two of us. Why are you putting everyone through hell?”
He bounces from one girl to the other and never asked me out or even wanted me alone.
He turns and faces me, a lazy smile on his lips.
I can’t stop myself. I slam the drink out of his hand, and it goes flying to my left.
“Ohh…” someone mumbles as more people take notice and watch us.
Kade cocks an eyebrow, moving closer to me. “If I’d made a move, what would’ve happened?”
He pins me a knowing look, and I harden my jaw.
“Would you have let me keep going?” he presses. “You would’ve, wouldn’t you?”
I narrow my eyes, balling my fists.
“Yeah, I think you would have. Maybe Hunter should know that,” he taunts. “That he’s just a consolation prize, Dylan.”
I whip my hand, slapping him across the face. His head jerks to the side as fire spreads through my palm, but I don’t regret it. The way he talks about Hunter…
I close the distance, speaking low. “There were no girls around me who liked doing the things I liked doing,” I tell him, my voice shaking. “Riding ATVs or motorcycles. None of them were into cars. I had you, and I had Hunter.” I look at him, his face still turned to the side and his eyes down. “I looked up to you. Especially you when we were younger, because you took up entire rooms, and you truly did not give a shit what people thought.” Tears stream down my face. “I would watch you, and I learned that your trick wasn’t to be yourself. It was to love being yourself. If I could find that, then…there was nothing to worry about. Nothing to worry about that I could control anyway.”