“And you’re not pressuring me,” she added. “If anything, I’ve been thinking we were overdue for a real conversation.”
My chest tightened.Overdue for a real conversation.That sounded less like hope and more like a prelude to heartbreak.
She’s pulling away again. You said too much.
She’s scared.
My brain spiraled through every possibility, every past moment she’d turned distant, every time I’d watched something good crumble before I could hold onto it.
“Whenever you’re ready,” I said, trying to sound patient. Calm. Like my heart wasn’t suddenly racing.
Kira leaned back slightly, eyes lifting to the sky above. She shut them, breathing in like she needed to ground herself in something bigger than us. The wind nudged a strand of hair across her cheek.
Then she unzipped her jacket slowly, folding it into her lap. “Is it hot up here, or is it just me?”
I blinked, surprised. “It’s not just you.”
I took her lead, tugging off my hoodie. The air hit my skin, and I pulled at the neckline of my T-shirt, briefly stuck in the fabric as I peeled it off over my head. When I looked up, Kira was staring.
“Landon Cole.” She grinned. “Do you have a tattoo?”
It took me a second to realize what she meant. And then—oh. Right. That.
I tugged the collar of my shirt down a few inches, revealing the small infinity symbol inked just above my heart, barely larger than a quarter. Simple. Clean. Always hidden. Except tonight, apparently.
Her eyes widened. “When did you get that?”
I nodded, the weight of the memory settling in behind my ribs. “A few days after I left. I didn’t know what I was doing, really. I was angry and lost. But the idea of infinity—of us,maybe—stuck with me. I needed something to remind me that even if I screwed everything up, that wasn’t the end. That there’d be more chances.”
Her eyes didn’t move from the tattoo, her chest heaving up and down.
“I thought about you every day,” I admitted, voice low and tight. “I didn’t know how to fix what I broke. I’m still not sure I do. But I’ve always hoped there would be more chances for those destined to be together.”
Kira inhaled slowly, the sound delicate, like it cost her something. “You believe in destiny?”
“No. I believe in you and me. I believe that together we have the power to overturn any obstacle in our way, but we both have to want it. To want each other.”
Her hand dropped from her knee, resting against the blanket by her side. She looked down at her fingers as if surprised they’d moved at all.
“I never struggled with wanting you, Landon,” she murmured, rough at the edges. “That’s part of the problem.”
That hit me in the chest.
Instinctively, I inched closer, needing to close the space between us. “It’s always been you for me, sweetheart. You have to know that.”
Something in her shuttered—not visibly at first, but I could feel it. The quiet click of defenses rising behind her eyes. The way her body pulled back a fraction, her shoulders lifting, bracing.
“No, I don’t know that,” she said, her voice shaking now. “How can I possibly know that when you wrote me two words, then disappeared and never talked to me again?”
My heart stopped. “Wait…” I frowned, the world narrowing to the sound of my pulse in my ears. “Two words?”
Her eyes flashed. Hurt. Anger. Disbelief. “You broke up withme and left a piece of paper on my bed with only the wordsI’m sorrywritten. Like everything we had meant nothing to you.”
She sat up straighter now as if the weight of it all had finally come unchained, and the momentum wouldn’t let her sit still. “How do I know you won’t do that again? How do I know you won’t run the second things get hard?”
I sat back on my heels, gut twisted in a knot, the blanket beneath us suddenly itchy and suffocating. I raked a hand through my hair, breath catching in my throat.
God, no. No. That’s not what happened. That’s not what I left her with.
