Maddie came around the edge of the bonfire first, her hands full of paper plates and a pie tin. She was laughing, her head thrown back, and it took me a second to see who was behind her.
Harper.
She looked different in the firelight. She wore jeans that actually fit, a soft blue tank top and pink sweater, and her hair wavy and loose around her shoulders. Her cheeks were flushed from the heat, and her eyes—the bluebonnet eyes I’d spent five years trying to forget—were fixed right on me.
For a second, nobody moved. Maddie stopped, pie hovering in the air, and followed Harper’s gaze. Harper stood perfectly still, a smile frozen halfway on her lips, as she took in the sight of me and Marisol, locked together on a bench with her arm still slung around my neck.
The world went silent. The music, the laughter, the crash of voices—all of it faded out, replaced by the pounding of my own heart. I could feel every set of eyes on us, the entire pack going still as they waited to see what would happen next.
Marisol’s fingers tightened on my shoulder, then relaxed. She followed my gaze, saw Harper, and in that instant, I watched her whole body change. The easy grin vanished, replaced by something colder, harder. She let her arm drop and straightened up, chin tilted high.
Harper’s eyes widened, a flicker of hurt crossing her face before she shuttered it away.
I tried to speak, but the words stuck in my throat. I wanted to run to her, to drag her away from the fire and the eyes and the old wounds. I wanted to tell her that Marisol was nothing, that she was just a friend, that I’d never wanted anyone but her.
But I didn’t move. I just sat there, trapped between the past and the present, unable to choose.
Marisol broke the silence first. “Looks like you got company,” she said, loud enough for everyone to hear. “Don’t let her down, Arsenal.”
She pushed off the bench, shot Harper a glance that could have shattered granite, and stalked away toward the woods. Maddie muttered something under her breath and hustled after her, leaving Harper standing alone in the glow of the fire.
I stood, slow, feeling every muscle in my body rebel against the movement.
Harper looked at me, and for the first time since that night at Eyrie, I saw real fear in her eyes. Not terror, not panic—just the simple, awful fear that comes from realizing your worst fear is about to come true.
I crossed the clearing, not caring that everyone was watching. The fire threw our shadows out ahead of us, twisted and huge.
I stopped a few feet away from her. She didn’t back up, but she didn’t come closer, either.
“And the hits just keep on coming,” she said, her voice barely a whisper.
I tried to smile, but it felt like my face might crack. “I’m here.”
She nodded, then looked past me to where Marisol had disappeared. “Clearly. You, her, my humiliation. Gang’s all here.”
“She’s a friend.”
Her mouth twisted. “She looked like more than a friend.”
I shook my head. “She was… comfort. That’s all.”
Harper’s eyes filled with tears, but she blinked them away. “I don’t blame you. It’s no more than what I deserve. If I had been stronger, none of this would have happened. I understand. I want you to be happy, Jess. It’s truly all I want. If I need to leave to make that happen. I’ll go.”
I wanted to scream. I wanted to tell her I’d waited, that I’d never stopped waiting, that even with every woman in the world on their knees, none of them were her.
But all I said was, “You can’t leave me again.”
She smiled, small and sad. “I’ll give it some time. But I can’t seethat. I won’t watchthat.” She nodded in the direction Marisol was walking away. “So if you needthatto be happy. Please, I’m begging you, let me go.”
We stood there, the fire crackling, the night closing in around us, the several members of the pack pretending not to listen.
She spoke one more time.
“I also can’t do this in front of the pack. I’ve been humiliated every day for the past three years.” She finally looked at me. “I’m done with that.”
Fuck. In all of this, I kept forgetting she was innocent. I was the worst kind of man; victim shaming, even if it was in my mind. I had to do better—bebetter. I’d been so caught up in my own hurt I hadn’t truly considered hers. The fire popped, and I’d turned toward the sound. When I turned back toward her, she was gone.
Chapter 14
