Jace Cooper does not answer to anyone, or give a damn if I am sitting here losing my mind while he does God knows what with God knows who.
The thought hits me again, sharper this time. More vicious. Nicole’s blonde ponytail swinging as she walked. Her perfect smile that probably tastes like bubble gum and promises. The way she followed him down that hallway like she owned him.
Maybe she does now.
Maybe, while I was at the hospital sitting with my dad, pouring my heart out about Jace and how much he means to me, he was touching her. Doing all the things he does with me but with someone who does not come with complications, feelings, or expectations.
Someone who will not ask him for more than he is willing to give.
I’ve reached my limit with waiting, wondering, and constantly refreshing my phone every thirty seconds like some desperate, pathetic girl I swore I’d never become.
I’m done sitting in this house that feels too big and too empty without him in it, which is completely insane because this is my home and my space. The place I lived perfectly fine in before Jace Cooper crashed into my life with his smirks and his trauma and his infuriating ability to make me care about him.
I shouldn’t need him here. Or notice the absence of his boots by the door, his jacket on the chair, or the sound of him moving around.
But I do, and I hate myself for it. But here I am. Like every other girl who thought she could be different. The one he would actually stay for.
I grab my keys off the counter and head out the door, my heart pounding so hard I can feel it in my throat, in my ears, and in every nerve ending, screaming at me to stop, to think, to not do this.
But I don’t listen.
He’s probably back at the trailer now, hiding out in that freezing rust bucket because it’s easier than facing me. Or maybe he is not hiding at all. Maybe he is exactly where he wants to be.
If he will not answer my calls, then he can damn well answer to my face.
And he is going to tell me the truth. All of it. Where he’s been? Who he’s been with? Whether any of this was ever real or if I have just been fooling myself this entire time.
Chapter Twenty
Jace
Istare at the bottle of Jack on the crate. The one I stole from the corner store on the way home today. The shop assistant was too busy scrolling through his phone to notice me slip it under my jacket.
It sits half empty now. Or half full, depending on how optimistic you are feeling.
I’m not optimistic.
I reach for it, my fingers brushing against something else on the crate. It’s something I should have thrown away years ago but can’t seem to let go of, no matter how many times I tell myself it doesn’t matter anymore.
The photo.
Creased and faded from being shoved in pockets, backpacks, and whatever crappy drawer I had at the time. The edges areworn soft from the many times I pulled it out and looked at it, like some kind of masochist who enjoys pain.
It’s like if I stare at it long enough, I can go back to that moment—back to when things were different, when she was different. When I still had hope. There’s that fucking word again.
In the photo, I am maybe five or six at most. Small enough that my arms barely reach all the way around her waist, but I keep them wrapped tightly, like I’m holding on for dear life. It’s as if some part of me knows she’s slipping away, and that if I let go, she might disappear.
I was right.
I’m actually smiling, one of those big, silly kid smiles that says I still believed the world was good. That people stayed. That mothers didn’t leave their children behind like forgotten trash.
That love was real, permanent and something you could count on.
God, I was a fucking idiot back then.
My mom looks beautiful in this photo. Her blond hair catches the light, falling in waves around her face. The identical blue eyes I see every time I look in the mirror, but hers are bright—alive—full of something I can’t quite name, yet I remember feeling safe in. In the photo, anyway.
Before the pills and needles. Before whatever the hell she was chasing became more important than the kid clinging to her in this picture. More important than making sure there was food in the fridge, I got to school on time, or that I wasn’t sitting alone in a dark apartment, wondering if she was ever coming home.
