“So,” she said. “That’s the guy she doesn’t talk about?”
Nate looked at me.
Then at the street where Dylan had disappeared.
Then back at Lily.
“Yeah,” he said. “That’s the guy.”
I wrapped my arms around myself, fingers pressing against the hidden cuff beneath my sleeve.
My wrist still ached where Brett had grabbed me.
My heart ached worse.
Nate’s voice softened. “Come on, Destiny. I’ll get you and your friend back.”
I nodded, because if I opened my mouth, I might cry.
Or scream.
Or call Dylan and tell him I was done letting him decide what my life was supposed to be without asking me.
Lily slipped her hand into mine.
Her palm was warm.
Steady.
For once, she didn’t make a joke.
That was how I knew she understood.
We walked toward Nate’s bike and the black SUV that had pulled up behind it, one I hadn’t noticed before. More club men inside. More protection. More reminders that no matter how far I moved, the past still knew my address.
But this time, something had changed.
Only now I wasn’t seventeen at a grave. I wasn’t eighteen under a palm tree. I wasn’t drugged, cornered, or waiting for someone else to decide what happened next.
I was nineteen.
I was in nursing school.
I had a best friend from Idaho with a weaponized tote bag.
I had my mother’s diamonds in my ears, her turquoise on my hand, and Dylan’s cuff around my wrist.
I had built a life.
And if Dylan thought he could keep walking in and out of it like a man with no place in my story, he was wrong.
Because the thing about blank pages was this:
Eventually, I got to pick up the pen.
CHAPTER 7
DYLAN
