And if I’m heartbroken by the time this is all over, I only have myself to blame.
But it’ll all be worth it.
“Cole?” I whisper, struggling to fall into any form of sleep.
“Yeah, Snow?” he whispers back, placing another kiss on the top of my head.
“Do you want to go for a drive?”
“A drive?” he questions, lips now pressed on my forehead, and I nod against them. “It’s two in the morning,” he says after checking the time. “Is anything even open?”
“Back home, whenever I got overwhelmed but couldn’t bake for whatever reason, I would go to the beach to just clear my head. Since Grangewood doesn’t have a beach—”
“Would a creek do the job?” He sits upright against the backrest of my bed, taking my hand into his lap as I mimic his motion.
“A creek would be perfect.”
“Let me just run upstairs and grab a clean shirt, because now that you’ve pointed out the smell, I’m a little self conscious.” He laughs awkwardly, ripping it over his head, leaving his rippled, tanned chest bare, and I fight the urge to touch him, even for just a second.
“Go,” I say with a sly smile. “I’ll change too.” And that’s exactly what I do while trying my best to ignore the fact that he and I are hanging out without thebenefitsof our arrangement. All while he’s doing whatever he can to make sure my mind doesn’t stray.
Only, it does.
Not about my mother and her betrayal, though.
Chapter thirty-one
Cole
I see it happening.
Hell, Ifeelit happening, and there’s no way to stop it. My brother is never usually right about shit like this, and while he might be right about some of it, I won’t let him be right about the rest. I won’t let whatever this is with her become a distraction.
I’ve witnessed Jenna be vulnerable.
Sad.
Broken.
Disappointed.
She might wake up angry tomorrow, too, and I have a feeling she’d have every right.
And still, I feel it in my fucking chest.
The way my t-shirt is soaked with the tears she voluntarily let fall as her hands moved against my body to wipe them away.
The way she jolted awake, and instantly calmed the moment she realized I was still beside her.
I know things about Jenna that everybody knows. Things on the surface, and what makes her tick. But I don’t know the little things that upset her, the things that break her heart, and I have a feeling she won’t tell me, even if I ask.
What I do know is that she left for California intending to spend a week there, but came back not long after she arrived, after someone told her she wasn’t wanted. My gut tells me this has to do with her mom, but I’m not going to outright ask. She came back to Grangewood, no doubt to ignore whatever it was, and to just focus on her job. But I have a feeling whatever it was that set her off, it won’t be easy for her to get over—to ignore.
Putting the car in park, I turn off the ignition as I slowly turn to face her, unsure if she actually wants to get out and head toward the water, or if she’s hoping we just sit here in silence.
Instead, she does none of those things.
“I thought my mom was going to die,” she says quickly, and I open my mouth to ask what she means, and if she’s OK, but she continues. “Things between her and I have been strained since I was a kid,” she admits with a shaky breath, and I take her hand in mine, resting them in her lap.
