I shake my head at her. “Not maybe. Definitely. He’s an idiot for not seeing what he had right in front of him.”
The urge to find the guy and throttle him hits me all over again. Quinn deserves better than that douchebag.
She gets a far-off look in her eyes and then she smiles again. “Remember that time you told me boys were stupid, and I should stop kissing them?”
I chuckle, remembering the first time I climbed in her window. “Yeah, I do.”
She gnaws on her lip, and I’m powerless against the memory—her cheeks blotchy from tears and heartbroken over some other dumb boy who didn’t deserve her.
Eighteen Years Ago
My heart beats against my sternum in a rapid rhythm. I thought Pops had seen me up in the tree for sure. But if he had, I’d be a dead man by now. He was bound to get the wrong impression if he saw me sneaking into Quinn’s window in the middle of the night—but I could tell something was wrong with her earlier, and she hadn’t wanted to talk about it with Wes around.
“What are you doing?” she hisses, easing the window open. “Pops is still up.”
“I noticed,” I say as I climb through the second-floor window.
Reaching Quinn's room involves scaling the tree growing beside the house, shuffling across the third limb to reach the porch roof, and carefully making my way to her corner window. Luckily, I’ve got decent balance. Otherwise, I’d probably have ended up flat on my back with the wind knocked out of me… or worse.
“What are you doing here, Tripp?”
She’s wearing her favorite pajamas—a set I’ve seen her in more than once. A yellow bear is printed across the top, elbow-deep in a honey jar, with matching shorts. They’re ridiculous. And adorable. And quintessentially Quinn.
I smirk. “Nice PJs, Quinnie the Pooh.”
She crosses her arms over her chest, suddenly looking self-conscious. At fourteen, she’s now eye-level with me but significantly scrawnier. She reminds me more of Bambi than the chubby little bear I’ve nicknamed her for—all long limbs and awkward elegance.
I toss a pack of Peanut Butter M&M’s onto her bed. I know they’re her favorite. “You seemed upset on the drive back from the fair.”
She avoids my gaze but immediately snatches up the candy from the bed. “I’m fine.”
“You were fine on the way there,” I say gently. “But on the way back? You looked like you’d been crying.”
“It’s no big deal,” she mumbles. “Boys are just stupid.” Her voice cracks, and I step towards her on instinct, wrapping an arm around her.
She curls into me immediately, hiding her face in the crook of my shoulder. I give her a gentle squeeze. “I’d say I’m offended, but I’ve done some pretty stupid shit, so that’s probably fair.”
She lets out a watery laugh as a stray tear dampens my shoulder.
“Come on, Quinnie. Tell me what happened.”
She steps out of my arms, eyes big, blue and glassy. “Pinky swear you won’t tell anybody?”
I flash her a sympathetic grin. “That bad, huh?”
Her cheeks go pink as she studies the carpet. “I just don’t want Wes to overreact and do something dumb.”
I offer her my pinky. “I swear.”
She hooks hers with mine, then narrows her eyes at me. “You’re not allowed to do anything stupid either.”
I lift an eyebrow but keep my mouth shut. I’m dying to know why she’s upset, so I won’t let her back out of telling me now just because I’m unwilling to promise not to do something stupid.
She exhales a shaky breath. “Brody Connors kissed me at the fair.”
I grind my molars together and manage a grunt that sounds neutral enough.
“I overheard his friends giving him shit for kissing me. He told them he wasn’t even into it—thatIkissedhimand that I was terrible at it.” The words rush out, as if she thinks they won’t sting as much if she just rips the band-aid off fast. But I feel how much the words hurt her just the same.
