“He could have taken you with him,” I press.
Of course he didn’t. James doesn’t care about anyone but himself. I’ve spent the past sixteen years trying to get Esme to understand that he wasn’t worth saving, but she still gave her life to him.
Her hand shoots out, reaching for me, but it stops halfway. She drops it, tucking it back at her side. I want to surge forward and take it. Unfurl it and brush my fingers over her knuckles. I want to bring it to my lips and kiss her palm. I want to memorize every line and detail. Inhale the scent of her perfume and her beneath it. I want to draw her in against me and hold her forever. This could not be a worse time. I’m good at shutting those parts of me down.
“I get that you’re mad,” Esme sighs. “I am too. I might have wanted to murder him myself, but the hour and a half drive kind of helped me calm down.” She swallows painfully, like she’s choking on glass. “I didn’t want to be the kind of mess that you had to take care of before you even began to fix this.”
Esme’s eyes are so dark under the harsh fluorescent lighting. Some of the guys have replaced theirs in their rooms, but I’ve never bothered. I have ugly floor lamps and a few on the nightstands and on my desk. I usually just flick one of them on.Or no lights. The computer monitors spanning across the desk’s large surface opposite the bookshelf are often enough.
It’s a miracle I haven’t burned my retinas out.
The light might be harsh, but it somehow softens Esme’s sharp features. She’s tall and angular. My brother used to complain that she had no boobs and a flat ass. Because he’s the worst human being.
“You should never have been with him.” I don’t mean for that to come out, and certainly not sounding as petulant and incendiary as it does.
Esme’s sharp intake of air bruises my own lungs. I want to tell her that I’m sorry. That I know she’s in shock and fighting with everything she has to hold it together, and now isn’t the time. I want to reassure her that I’ll help her. That I can make all of this go away, no matter how impossible it seems. For her, there’s nothing I can’t and won’t do.
The words clog in my throat, so many, so painful, wrenched from that black void where I’ve shoved a decade and a half worth ofthings that can never, ever be uttered out loud.
“You know why I did it,” she whispers into the silence. She looks up at me from under her thick lashes. All the years fall away. All the decisions. All the bullshit and the pain and the trying. All the things we said and never said. All the wasted time. She’s so raw. So open.
It guts me and it triples the rage. I already know that if I open my mouth, I’m going to say the wrong thing, but I can’t help it. “I think you wanted to be a martyr.”
“Shut up.” I wish she’d snarl at me, but instead she bows her head, and it comes out without heat. A whisper that trembles all over the room.
I hate myself for all of this. I wish I could stuff those words right back down my stupid throat. I wish that she was mine to comfort, but even now, broken and needing it so badly, the shock wearing off and her world crumbling, it’s not right. She’ll never be mine. It guts me. It tears me apart. I’m going to bleed out here right in front of her and my brother will have succeeded in getting us both killed.
“I came here because I knew it would be safe.” Her voice hitches on the last words. She swallows thickly. “I hate this place. Hate Hart with a fucking passion. I come back here once a year. Christmas only. You know that.” Her voice wavers, but she holds it together. “I might hate Hart, but I’ve never hated you. I’m sorry that we were best friends and I drifted away. I’m sorry that I went to Seattle for college and stayed. I’m sorry that I needed to escape and that I never wanted to look back. I’m sorry that I was young and scared, and then I was just… scared. James has never told me he loved me. Did you know that?”
I didnotknow that.
I know everything else. Everything fucking else. My brain doesn’t have to give me a play by play rundown of the past decade and a half. Wanting what I could never have. Loving a woman who would never be mine. Settling for friendship because she needed it so badly and I neededher, and I only ever wanted her to be happy.
James has always been an asshole. Insufferable. Spoiled. Unfaithful. He had the world in his hands and all he did was piss all over it. Not just Esme.Everything. James is my brotherby blood, but he’ll never be a brother to me in the ways that my club brothers are. We all took vows and those mean something. James has never taken a vow in his life that he hasn’t broken.
“We…” Esme trails off, glancing at me nervously, like she expected the Wizard who has always been a little dorky, sweet, calm, so well fucking behaved and even and level, and instead she found a wild animal. “Our relationship hasn’t been… it’s—not much of a relationship and hasn’t been for years.” Her eyes snap back to my face. Fragile. Wounded. Desperate. Begging. Glowing with the quiet embers of a dull rage that has thrummed through her veins since she was a child. “I came because you can find anyone. Because I trust you.”
I have to go to her. I know how dangerous it is to touch her, but I have to close the distance and take her hand. My fingers close around hers. Her skin is warm. So smooth. She trembles beneath my fingertips. I smooth them over her palm while my heart leaps up and goes tumbling straight to the floor. The breath smashes out of my lungs, but I still force out words.
“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said what I did.”
Her teeth sink hard into her lower lip. “You should be frustrated by me.I’mfrustrated. We’ve sat down so many times, and I’ve always known that ninety percent of my life choices were just shit.”
I force myself to remove my hand. I’ve been holding onto her for far too long. “You should leave him.”
“It’s funny,” she chokes. “I actually came to that conclusion before any of this started. I went to the beach. I walked into the ocean. I thought about pitching my ring into the bay but changed my mind and decided to sell it and give the money to a shelter instead, so it could help people. It’s prettysad, ironic timing, I know. If that’s not my whole life summed up in one sentence…”
I want to take her hand back. Press my fingers to her pulse point. Fold her into my arms. “It doesn’t have to be anymore.”
“That’s a nice sentiment, but I think it’s going to get worse before it gets better.”
It’s been worse for a long time. We’ve both been trapped in our own cages. If she left James, she’d be free to discover who she wants to be. My heart nearly redlines in my chest.
Wow, asshole. Don’t you dare get excited. She’s been sort of single for all of five seconds. Pathetic, much? So fucking rich, bro.
Her lips tremble. “This isn’t simple, Wizard. It’s never been simple.”
She’s right. It’s always been noise. Deafening. All around us. It’s always been complicated. Esme belonged to James, but she grew up withme. We’re friends in a way that she’s never been and could never be with James.
