“Dammit, I wasn’t gonna tell you that.”
“I see that worked out real well for you. Now, spill.”
I rested my head against the back cushions and blew out a deep breath. “Yesterday. While we were supposed to be bakin’ pies. We kissed.”
“You…kissed.”
“Fine, so we made out for a solid fifteen minutes, and he definitely got to second base, and I’m three-thousand-percent certain we would’ve had sex right there on the kitchen floor if Caleb hadn’t walked in. This is bad, Will. Really fucking bad.”
“What did y’all do when he walked in?”
“Jerked away from each other like a couple of teenagers getting caught by their parents. And then I made up a lame excuse and ran.”
So that was what I was now—an almost twenty-eight-year-old runner. A scaredy-cat who was too afraid of the what-ifs and unknowns to venture down that path with Hudson again. I had enough failures under my belt, thank you very much. I certainly didn’t need to add this one to the list.
“Well.” Willow cleared her throat. “Hmmm.”
“What’s the hum for?”
“Nothing!” Will said too fast. “Nothing. Um…”
“Just say it. You know you will. Might as well do it now and get it done with.”
“I’m gonna ask a question, and I want you to really think about it before you go blurtin’ out an answer, all right?”
I rolled my eyes but didn’t respond. I wasn’t going to agree to anything. Not before I knew exactly what my sister was up to.
“Would it really be so bad?” Will asked.
“What? Kissin’ him? Sleepin’ with him? No, I’m pretty sure it’d be amazin’ and would ruin me for all other men. Again.”
“Then I don’t see the problem.”
I released a frustrated growl. “I know you’re not this dense, Will. He’sleavin’. We’ve got less than three weeks, and then he’ll be off to—shit, I don’t even know where he’s supposed to be next. Or when his next deployment is. Or how long he’s plannin’ to stay in the army. Or how long he’ll be away from Havenbrook.”
“Maybe those are things y’all should talk about.”
Probably. Except, no. I couldn’t do that. The truth was, I was scared to death of the answers—whatever they may be.
What if his answer wasn’t what I hoped it’d be? What if itwas,but I still managed to screw it up? No, I’d definitely rather bury my head in the sand and go on in blissful ignorance than have a mature, adult conversation about this stuff.
“Or maybe you just throw caution to the wind and do it anyway,” Will said.
I breathed out a disbelieving laugh. “You do remember what happened the last time I did that, right?”
My sister was quiet for several moments. So long that I pulled the phone away from my ear to see if the call had dropped.
Finally, she said, “I had almost this same conversation with Avery, you know. Back when I didn’t know if Finn was stayin’ in Havenbrook for good, but I couldn’t dismiss the chemistry between us anymore.”
“Let me guess—she told you to get your freak on and rack up those O’s while you could.”
Will laughed. “Not exactly. She told me tryin’ is better than regrettin’. While it might end and it might hurt, none of that pain would compare to a lifetime of regret.”
Her words pierced my chest, burrowing into me so deep, I could feel them in my bones. I’d lived with regret. Every day for the past ten years, I’d regretted my actions. Wondered if things would’ve been different for us if we’d kept seeing each other. Or if we’d confessed our feelings a few months prior. Or if I’d kept in touch. Or if I’d taken him up on the half-dozen offers he’d sent me to fly to where he was stationed so we could see each other.
Yeah, I’d been living with a lifetime of regrets, and I still felt the pain. So maybe my sister was onto something.
My phone buzzed with an incoming text, and I pulled it away to see a message from Edna.
