“I was just leaving the dining hall when I saw you walking and—anyway, it looks like you two need a minute, then. I’ll be waiting outside for you, Belinda.” Connor’s gaze locks with mine, and I can sense he has so many questions, but he’s being respectful. I’m guessing it’s because he noticed the distraught look on Julian’s face—his glassy eyes and flushed cheeks.
Connor leaves the lobby, and I want to collapse with relief. “I won’t tell him anything, Julian. I promise.”
“He’s a right good friend. I can’t deny it.” Julian slowly shakes his head. “Better than I’ve ever been for him. You can go ahead and tell him, Belinda, if it makes things easier for you. I mean, you don’t need to go into all the sordid details, but if you let it slip that Isla and I are in a relationship, I won’t hold that against you.”
The way he uses the present tense—Isla and I are in a relationship—makes me want to wrap him in another hug. She’s not gone. Not yet. Maybe not ever. The hope I’m too afraid to look at directly shimmers on the edge of my awareness like a mirage. She could wake up and be okay. It seems impossible, and yet …
“Are you sure?” I’m shocked at how easily he gives me permission. “You can trust me. I know how to keep a secret.”
“So does Connor. I doubt he’ll tell anyone about this, either.” Julian gives me a quick hug. “Thank you for letting me unload on you. I feel much better.”
I don’t bother reminding Julian that I came at him like he’s a criminal I wanted to catch in a lie. If he feels betterafter revealing his secrets, maybe he won’t even remember that I knew about him and Isla in the first place. I’m glad I could be there for him, even if the circumstances were less than friendly at first.
“Thank you for telling me.” I offer him a small smile, and he returns it.
We exit the clock tower together, and I join Connor where he’s waiting for me. The guys exchange a fist bump as Julian passes, but he doesn’t stop—just keeps walking toward the dorms. His head is angled down, probably heavy with thoughts of Isla. Regrets he has about their time together. Hope that he’ll have a chance to make it right.
Once Julian is out of hearing distance, I offer Connor a simple explanation. “He needed someone to talk to.”
“So he chose to confess his deepest, darkest secrets to the new girl on campus?” Connor frowns. “Make it make sense for me, Billie. I’m not the jealous type, but I can admit I didn’t love seeing the two of you together like that.”
Guilt swamps me. “It was nothing, Connor. I promise. Sometimes … it’s easier to confide in someone you haven’t known since the day you were born.”
“I suppose you’re right.” He scrubs his hand across his jaw, and I can practically feel the doubt radiating off him in subtle waves.
“I think he has a hard time talking to any of you about what he’s going through because …” My voice drifts. I know Julian said it was okay if I told Connor about him and Isla, but it still doesn’t feel like my story to tell. Then again, being truthful with Connor is starting to outweigh the importance of keeping anyone else’s secrets. There’s so much that I’vekept from this boy that I care more and more about with each passing day. The need to tell him what we talked about makes my chest grow tight until it feels like my heart might burst. “It was about Isla.”
Connor’s frown deepens. “What about her?”
“They were seeing each other. Secretly. They had to keep it under wraps because of a … family feud, I guess? Seems like a bad reason to keep your girlfriend as classified information, but who am I to judge?”
“Ah, right. There’s always been some tension between the Vales and the Ashworths,” Connor says.
Hearing him say my last name throws me for a moment, but I brush it off. I put on a bright smile and curl my arm through his, shifting closer to his firm, warm body. “Will you walk me back to the dorms?”
“Like I can turn you down.” He smiles at me, and we begin to walk in silence. After a minute or so, he says, “I think it was good of you. What you did for Julian.”
“What do you mean?” I fight the nonstop guilt that wants to sweep over me like a wave and pull me to the bottom of the darkest part of the ocean. I was basically interrogating Julian until I broke him. That’s not very good of me.
“Helping him out. Being someone he can count on.” Connor sends me a knowing look. “That’s hard to find around here.”
“No kidding.” The understatement of the year. You can’t trust anyone on this campus. And everyone is keeping secrets.
Connor’s phone dings with a notification, but he ignores it. “I think maybe that’s why I was drawn to you at first. You seem steady in a way the rest of them aren’t. Grounded. Likesomeone I could rely on.”
“I’m stubborn.” I lift my chin. It’s an asset and a curse.
“Stubborn and beautiful.” His smile is sly, and my heart skips a beat. “A winning combination, I might add.”
“Ooh, you flatter me.” I rest my free hand on my chest with a light laugh. I remember feeling like I’d found Belinda’s laugh on the plane—a high, tinkling sound without any real warmth. But the sound I just made? It was … real. The happiness that’s supposed to come with a genuine moment of lightness vibrates through me, nothing fake about it. Maybe there’s a world where Billie Vale and Belinda Winters merge into someone who laughs like this all the time. In that fantasy, Isla and Mom are both hale and healthy, the boy next to me is as familiar to me as my own skin, and I …
I’m happy. Content.
I get pulled back to reality when Connor’s phone dings again. And again. A cascade of alerts brings us to a halt in the middle of the path on the east side of the courtyard. One ding after the other sounds, all different pitches and tones. As if he’s getting notifications from every app he’s got.
“Something must be going—”Another notification interrupts him.
“Maybe you should check your phone?” I wince at the scowl that appears on his handsome face.
