It doesn’t work.
He’s on my heels, hand catching my elbow and stopping me in the hallway to our offices.
His touch makes my heart beat even faster with anger, rejection, and desire. I hate it.
“Stop pretending you’re not mad.”
“I’m not pretending anything.” I can barely bite the words out. Energy vibrates inside me so hard that I can barely contain myself.
“You’re breathing like you want to scream at me.” His voice is in my ear. Low. Intimate. Flashing me back to how his mouth had been on mine, his hand titling my face to kiss me deeper.
I spin on him, glaring. I have to stack my walls higher, unused to needing them with him. “Leave me alone, Gabe.”
“That’s not what you actually want.”
“Yeah? You think you’re such an expert on what I want. But you still think I’m a kid. The perfect princess of Pinebrook. But I’m not her anymore. And it’s not right for you to try to make me her again.”
Pulling free of him, I dip into my office and grab my things.
Gabe stands in the door silently watching me. I hate how gorgeous he is, even with the sad tilt to his features.
Golden-brown eyes, the same ones I’ve confessed to a million times.
When I’m back at the door, ready to push past him, he bows his head. “I never thought of you that way. Not even back then.”
The makeshift armor I hastily strapped on cracks so easily at his words. I struggle to hold it in place.
Gabe shifts and catches my eyes.
“Maybe you’re not the one who really knows me.” With that he ambles away, head down, shoulders hunched, and it tears at my heart more than it makes me mad.
It takes me a second to catch my breath, but I shake it off and head home to gather myself completely before Adam comes to pick me up for our date.
My sister’s home when I walk through the front door. Her dark hair is up in two spiky buns that remind me of the ears she used to wear as a pre-teen.
The ones I stole and broke by accident, prompting her five-day campaign for a lock on her bedroom door.
“More rumors going around about you.” Daisy crosses her arms and gives me a pointed look. “Adam. Greyson. AndGabe? Got a thing for older dudes, don’t you?”
A blush fires in my cheeks as I look around for Mom and Dad.
Daisy rolls her eyes. “They’re not home.”
Sucking in a big breath, I blow it out.
Her raised brow and meaningful look has me cracking.
The pressure to confess what’s going on to someone breaks me down. Because if anyone will understand, it’s my big sister. She’s had far more rebellions than I ever did.
“I don’t know what everyone’s saying, but it’s true. Adam, Greyson, and Gabe. Kind of.”
“Kind of? How is it kind of?”
I tell her what he said, how I stormed out, and the guilt trip he laid on me before he walked away just twenty minutes ago.
The softening of her eyes has me turning away.
I just can’t deal with my feelings for him right now.
