“Sure.”
I wipe my clammy hands down my jeans and adjust the hoodie, wrapping and unwrapping the drawstrings around my index finger on repeat. I count my breaths until we exit the interstate, pulling up at the first available gas station—a promise of caffeine and maybe a sandwich.
Though I’m not sure I can keep it down.
I twitch for the door handle, but Matthews clicks a button, locking the door.
“You should stay here,” he says, fetching his jacket from the back seat. “How do you take your coffee?”
“Double espresso, one sugar, please.”
He gives me a solemn nod, exiting the car. I watch him enter the shop, frowning at the screen of his cell before pressing it to his ear. He’s probably letting Dad know how we’re getting along.
Once again, I toy with the hoodie’s drawstrings to keep myself from clambering over to the driver’s side to leap out, run after him and snatch his phone.
Matthews is red in the face, the conversation growing more heated if the way he’s gesticulating and pacing by the coffee maker is any indication.
I rub my face with both hands, trying to push this headache away through my temples. The minute I see Dad he’ll get a piece of my mind for keeping me in the dark this long. Does he really think I’m safest when I’m oblivious? He’ll know better once he learns his hiding place was breached. He locked me away for weeks with a man tasked to dig out something hidden in my memories.
I sink my teeth in my bottom lip, warding off the overpowering feelings. This pain should only be mental, but it feels physical, visceral even... as if someone reached into my chest, wrapped their fingers around my heart, and ripped it right out. Frustrated, I wipe the tears trickling down my cheeks with the sleeve of my hoodie. Well, not mine... Nash’s.
Every moment we spent together plays before my eyes on repeat. Every look, every touch, every kiss.
Lies. All of it. Filthylies.
He got close to me out of necessity, not choice. I’m not important. I’m never fucking important.
Alex wanted a perfect little doll who’d open her mouth on command. And Nash wanted whatever’s locked in my head.
I breath in on the count of four, trying to block the memories, lies, and betrayal, but it doesn’t work. Nothing works. Nothing calms me down. I haven’t kept my tears at bay for longer than a few minutes since I bolted out of Nash’s car.
That was almost eight hours ago. It’s dawn outside now, the sky tinged with soft pinks and oranges, a breathtaking view if the pain squeezing my chest left any fucking breath to take.
God, I should’ve known.
Nash was too perfect.
Wewere too perfect together.
Nothing that perfect can be real.
The driver’s side door opens and the bittersweet aroma of freshly brewed coffee breaks my train of thought.
Matthews slides into his seat. He’s ghastly pale, his lips pinched into a thin line. He passes me a cup, shoving his into the holder before whipping his seatbelt in place. The air around us feels heavy. Loaded.
Suffocating thanks to his silence and my racing mind.
“Is everything okay?” I ask, wrapping both hands around my warm cup. “You don’t look so good.”
“Just tired,” he says, turning left out of the gas station.
My eyebrows knot in the middle and I open my mouth to question why, instead of driving toward Columbus like we have been all night, he whips us around, heading back the way we came.
“There’s been a change of plans,” he answers before I can speak, his voice tense. Whatever the change, he’s clearly not happy about it.
And clearly doesn’t want to talk, so I sip my coffee and watch the world pass by. We don’t stay on the interstate long, exiting half an hour later.
He’s not using a map, but he knows his way around the narrow, winding roads. I guess we’re headed somewhere he’s visited a lot.
