Then, I felt his teeth drag over my jaw, nibbling his way toward my mouth.
I wet my bottom lip, ready to taste him again.
“Liam, did you remember to get that girl’s number this time?” Danny’s voice rang through the car like an alarm, and we both separated instantly.
Liam’s chest pulsed into my side, panting.
“Well?” Danny pried.
Liam cleared his throat. “I was a little preoccupied to ask for her digits.”
I laughed and then covered my smile with the back of my hand.
“Nice.” Danny chuckled. “I spotted her when we opened up. Nikko did you a fucking solid, man. She was smokin’ in that red dress.”
In a fit of jealousy, the girl beside me jabbed Danny in the ribs, making his arm jerk and the car swerve.
I shot my hand up to the handle overhead, gripping it tight.
Danny righted the steering wheel immediately and frowned. “Aye! Not cool, Hannah!”
She narrowed her eyes at him in the rearview and went back to staring at her phone.
My heartbeat continued to thud in my ear, but it was no longer because of Liam or the split-second swerve of the car. It was that we were crossing a bridge.Thebridge.
Danny must’ve taken a different route home than the one we had taken on the way to the show. Nina knew I’d almost died on the bridge—or just below it—and had probably gone out of the way to avoid it and hadn’t told me.
I looked beyond the oncoming cars and saw the guardrail. It had been replaced shortly after that accident, but I could still see the curved and bent metal from the police photographs.
The moon cast a glistening light on the moving water below. It was a picturesque scene to most, but to me, it was a spitting image of the worst night of my life.
I looked to Nina for comfort, but she’d fallen asleep on top of Nikko. My eyes shot to Danny, but he was busy with the road and was no use to me. Besides, Danny was good at keeping it in. The real emotions anyway. A guy could look at him wrong, and he’d throw several curse words his way or look for a fight, but when it came to the things that cut deep, he sealed it all in. The entire month after our dad had passed, I couldn’t get a word out of him. I guessed that was something we both had in common—keeping things locked up. Pretending they didn’t exist.
But I couldn’t be like Danny when it came to this. I’d tried to erase that nightmare with therapist after therapist, but some trauma never left, even after you accepted what had happened. Nothing could prepare you for losing someone you loved, but no one told you how much it fucked you up when you experienced it firsthand. That was a scar Danny would never wear.
Suddenly, my steel-like seat belt tightened around me like the walls of my throat, but I welcomed the feeling of safety that swiftly followed. After all, my seat belt that night was the reason I was still here today. The only reason.
“Close your eyes,” I heard through the chaos in my head. It was Liam bringing me back from the edge with those three words. “Close your eyes, Avery.”
It sounded simple, but I was trying not to blink, terrified of the images that might appear in the absence of light.
I shook my head, panic filling my chest.
His arms pulsed, getting my attention again. “Then, look here. Look at me,” he urged.
I found his warm eyes, and the world around me began to blur. The music screaming through the car faded into the background. Hannah, Nina, and the rest of the band didn’t exist. It was just me and him. My breathing evened out, falling into sync with his. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw his lips move, and then his chest hummed. So, I focused on that, trying to hear what he was saying without breaking eye contact.
I listened close.
Closer.
And finally, I could make out his words. He wasn’t speaking; he was singing the lyrics to “Never You.” It was one of their songs I listened to when I wanted to feel happy.
He remembered.
I wasn’t sure how long we sat there like that while he sang to me. Thirty seconds? Sixty seconds? Liam’s arms loosened, so I knew we were at least over the bridge.
The adrenaline from the night began to wear off. My nerves were fried and my eyes heavy. I rested my head in the crook of Liam’s neck, hoping he’d be okay with it. We’d crossed several lines tonight. What was one more?
