“You’ll figure it out.” Lukas pulled out his phone and checked it, then frowned at it. “I’ll be back in two minutes. Start reading.”
I watched Lukas slip from the room and let out a shaky breath. I closed my eyes for a second and tried to center myself. I’d do anything to earn Lukas’s forgiveness, and if he wanted me to sit there and read a million books, that was a price I was willing to pay.
I took a deep breath, wiped my sweaty palms on my pants, and started to read.
I read about his life as a kid. His struggles in school, the cracks he’d slipped through. The mom who was barely a mom and never when it mattered the most. The dyslexia revelation shook me to my core. I’d noticed that Lukas liked to handle paperwork alone, and I just always assumed it was so he could give it his undivided attention. But according to the book, at first, it was so he could struggle through by himself and then eventually, it was so no one would see him using assistive technology.
Lukas was still scared that people would think bad things about him if they knew.
He talked about the older guy who’d recruited him. The contract he’d signed that had locked him in with this guy for far too long with far too many restrictions. The way that Lukas hardly scraped by, again, as someone else who said they were going to protect him took advantage.
It was then I realized that nothing would ever happen between Lukas and me. The moment he’d sworn to protect me, it was all over between us. As if there had been anything there to begin with.
And then I came to the chapters about Leo, and I pored over every word, clinging to stories that I’d never heard, trying to paint them in my mind like they were memories.
I’d always wondered why Leo had worked so hard to keep me away from this part of his life, but after reading Lukas’s book, I sort of understood a bit better. But it was the people in this part of his life who had cast the safety net for me when he died. It was the people in this book who had been there when he couldn’t be anymore.
And it was the person who did the most for me that I’d hurt today.
For better or worse, Lukas sat there on the couch as I read the whole book and when I was done, he didn’t seem to hate me at all. He didn’t even seem mad anymore. His grace was far more than I deserved.
“Don’t look at me like that, kid. I turned out okay.”
His expression was soft and far too forgiving, but that was Lukas. He cared about people. Even sometimes to his own detriment.
“I’m so dumb.” I sniffled, doing my best not to have a complete and total messy breakdown in front of him. My tolerance for humiliation had reached its limit for one day.
“You’re not dumb.”
“You were never going to see me as anything more than a kid brother, were you?” I rolled the chair away from the desk and braced my elbows on my knees. My voice wanted to wobble out of me, but I managed to keep it steady by lifting my head and looking him in the eyes. “Were you?”
He wasn’t. Sawyer was more his age. More his type. Sawyer wasn’t some kid he’d been saddled with to watch over. And he made Lukas happy. Lukas not seeing me the way I wanted to be seen should have hurt more, but he tugged me up into his arms and gave me a hug that felt like forgiveness. Like understanding. Like he knew what a mess I was and wasn’t going to hold it against me, even if it cost him something important to him. Like Sawyer.
I hoped it didn’t.
I pulled away from the hug that I still wanted to hold on to and stuffed my hands in my pockets. “I’m going to go.”
“I’ll tell Jax and Blue to expect a call from you.”
I narrowed my gaze at him. I had been avoiding them on purpose, and maybe Lukas knew that. “I know what you’re up to.”
He smirked at me. “I have no idea what you mean.”
It was clear that he must have been tipped off to the fact that I’d been ghosting everyone, and now he was doing what Lukas did best. He was looking out for me. Even after all the problems I’d caused. And now it was my turn to look out for him.
I told him that he should tell everyone about his struggles with dyslexia. That if they knew, they wouldn’t think less of him. Lukas considered my words and nodded slowly, though I wasn’t sure if he was agreeing with me or just thinking over what I said.
“How’d you get so smart all of the sudden?”
“I did a lot of growing up today.” I paused. “Can you tell Sawyer that I’m sorry?”
It wasn’t that I didn’t want to do it in person, but I understood that after all the trouble I caused, the least I could do was stay out of their way for a little while. Lukas wanted to see Sawyer.
As for me, I didn’t particularly want to see anyone.
SIXTEEN
JAX
