“You could say that,” August said. His voice was flat, a far cry from the easygoing tone I remembered. “Fox and Skye go way back.”
Fox’s jaw clenched as he pulled back from me, stuffing his hands into the pockets of his jacket.
My stomach twisted. This wasn’t how this was supposed to happen. Not here on the street. Not when I wasn’t prepared.
His silence was deafening.
I didn’t know what to do. The four of us stood there, as if in a daze. My skin tingled from where Fox’s hand had been, steadying me.
When no other solution came to my mind, I did the only thing I knew how to do…I moved forward.
Swallowing down the nausea, the fear, the guilt that was chiseling away at my heart, I straightened my spine. Pasting a fake, forced smile on my face, I turned to Emersyn.
She looked concerned, her gaze focused on Fox.
“I’m sorry about all this.” My voice sounded nothing like my own. As if my lungs were being strangled. “This wasn’t a part of the plan.”
Emersyn’s gaze flicked to me. “Is…everything okay?”
I nodded stiffly. “Sure. We just—we knew each other when we were teens. It’s been, um, awhile since we’ve seen each other.”
I felt him leave before I looked. Fox turned on his heel and walked away, shoulders tense and body rigid. No words. Nothing.
The fleeting feeling of wanting to go after him flooded me. I wanted to explain myself. I wanted to comfort him.
But I couldn’t. I had made my choice a long time ago.
My feet rooted themselves to the pavement. I shouldn’t want to go after him. I didn’t deserve to.
August mumbled a curse under his breath.
We glanced at each other briefly. August’s cold expression lacked the steel in his brother’s. He almost looked like he might feel bad for me. He shouldn’t. I deserved this feeling of shame coursing like glass through my veins.
“It was…interesting seeing you, Skye.” He pulled his arm from around Emersyn’s shoulders and took her hand instead. “But I have to go take care of my brother.”
Then he was gone, too. Emersyn trailed behind him, looking at me like she was totally dumbfounded.
I stared after them, lost and stunned. I had known returning home would reopen old wounds—but nothing could have prepared me for how deeply they still bled.
ItoldmyselfIwasready for this. Ready to be back. Ready to face the past like it was some old ghost I could banish with enough determination.
But one look at Fox Ramsey had shattered all of that.
I stared out the windshield, blindly following the directions on my phone to the rental I’d secured.
It hadn’t been easy finding a place close to Ember Hollow that was available for short-term rental. There weren’t any hotels around, and the one bed-and-breakfast in the area was owned by the Ramseys.
And I wasn’t setting foot near their family if I could help it. I loved them—always have—but they probably hated me. I wouldn’t burden them with my presence.
My pointer finger scratched at the raw skin around my thumbnail as the look on Fox’s face replayed over in my mind.
Recognition had shifted so quickly into pain and then…hate. He had never looked at me like that before, like a man built from anger. The soft edges I remembered—that quiet steadiness of him—had disappeared entirely.
And I had no one to blame but myself.
I bit the side of my thumb, not even noticing what I was doing until the sting of torn skin snapped me out of my thoughts.
I slammed my hand back onto the steering wheel, gripping it tight. A drop of blood welled on my skin, making me grimace. I hated the nervous picking habit, but it overwhelmed me when I was stressed.
