Which was the crux of the problem, wasn’t it?
And Eva knew that was squarely her fault. From the get-go, she’d been determined to keep Lily at arm’s length—by any means necessary. She was the one who kept lashing out in sheer desperation, terrified of letting Lily get too close.
But Eva didn’t know how to do anything else. Didn’t know how to put the pieces together the right way, merge the online persona into real life to finish the puzzle and open up in a way she’d never dared to before.
Eva didn’t even know if she could.
“You’ve only got a couple of days left at school when you get back, right?” Kate’s voice tore Eva out of her thoughts.
“Last day is Monday.” An institute day, free of any students, where Eva could lock herself in her room and do the last few things she needed before the summer. “And then nothing until August.”
The Lily-free summer she’d wanted—except Eva hadn’t made it there unscathed. She’d had to go and complicate things the night before, caught in Lily’s eyes. In Lily’s words, “You have a big heart, for someone who doesn’t want anyone else to think she has one.”
Lily saw through Eva, in a way no one else had ever tried.
Just a few more days. Just a few more days, and then Eva didn’t have to see Lily, and she could forget all about her.
Chapter 22
“Don’t take this the wrongway,” Paige said when Lily slunk into the lobby five minutes before they were due to leave. “But you don’t look like you had a good night.”
Lily tried not to be bitter. She had had a great night—at least until she’d woken up alone. Not that she had been surprised. Eva didn’t seem like the type to stick around the morning after. Slipping out under cover of darkness was probably her MO.
Eva was nowhere to be seen, and Lily wondered if she wasn’t the only one leaving things until the last minute.
“I didn’t sleep well,” Lily lied, because she couldn’t bear the mortification of telling Paige about just what, exactly, she’d been up to all night. “I can’t wait to be back in my own bed.”
Away from Eva
Eva didn’t look Lily’s way once as the kids were rounded up in the lobby, and Lily sighed. She closed her eyes, and remembered the taste of Eva on her tongue, the feeling of her hands, clutching Lily’s back as her hips arched.
Lily thought it had been bad after the Winter Formal, but now she knew exactly what Eva looked like beneath her pencil skirts and crisp blouses, and she didn’t possibly know how she could look her in the eye ever again.
“We should talk about this,” Lily had said, and it was like watching a shutter go down behind Eva’s eyes. She’d let it go but she’d meant it, too—they couldn’t go on like this.
Not anymore.
Lily couldn’t exactly accost Eva on the bus ride to the airport with so many ears around. Unless…
Lily glanced at her phone, an—admittedly risky—idea forming in her mind. She waited until they were on the bus to put it into action, when Paige was distracted by another teacher as Lily typed.
I meant what I said last night. We need to talk.
Her thumb hovered over the send button before pressing down.
Eva sat three rows in front of her, and Lily watched as she shifted in her seat to fish her phone out of her pocket. She turned around to glare at Lily when she read the message on her screen.
If looks could kill, Lily would be a mere puddle.
I told you to delete my number.
Well, I didn’t.Obviously.And I wouldn’t have had to use it if you weren’t so determined to avoid me.
I’m not avoiding you.
Lily scoffed.Oh, please. What time did you sneak out of the room? Five? Six?
Lily could no longer see Eva’s face, but the movement of her shoulders suggested she jabbed angrily at the phone of her screen as she replied. Well, let her be angry—just like Lily had been waking up alone.
