Page 180 of Arctic Titans of Northwood U: Volume 3

Damon smiled. “That’s where you’re hiding these days?”

“Keeps me busy,” I said. I hadn’t seen Damon once in the last ten days. He was either not doing anything or avoiding me completely. I suspected that he was avoiding me, which felt fair enough. We’d gotten spooked by Nick. Avoiding one another had seemed like the most natural thing to do.

Besides, Damon was someone who could walk away with his pride intact. He’d always been a master of that.

“Are you in a hurry?” Damon asked, though his voice said he didn’t think I was.

I shook my head.

His lips stretched into a smile that made his eyes twinkle. “Good. Because I’m here to win you back.”

I wanted to scold my heart for leaping like this. Nothing had changed. We were still so far apart, so uncommitted, so intangible and immaterial that my rational mind couldn’t see a way through it. And I had to trust my rational mind.

“That’s a smile,” Damon said. “You’re smiling.”

“It’s very like you to make a grand announcement,” I said.

Damon took a step forward. “It’s really fucking simple,” he said, voice rough. “I owe you so many truths that it’ll take a whole night to tell you. But by the end of it, you’re gonna be mine, Seth. You know you will.”

I knew I would. My heart knew it, at least. I wrapped my arms around myself against the cold, against being pulled into another mess. “What truths?” I asked.

“Nick, for one thing,” Damon said, mischief gone from his face and his voice. He was careful with this, I saw, and it only made me more worried.

“What about him?” I asked.

“Nick and I were, sort of, you know, sweet in high school,” he said uncomfortably.

I couldn’t help the laugh that broke from my throat. “Sweet? What else, Damon? Were you his gal?”

Damon laughed nervously. “Don’t know what to call it, Seth. We were too young to be dating. But it was more than just passing cute notes. Anyway, I ended things with Nick because I liked you instead.”

The ground shifted beneath my feet. An ancient, long-gone life flashed before my eyes again. Every time Nick told me to beat it because he and Damon were playing games in the living room, every time Damon invited me to join them anyway, and the sudden change between them. I remembered Nick telling me not to go near Damon. And I remembered going very near Damon anyway, only to see him beam with joy that we got to hang out. For the first time in my life, I hadn’t felt like an afterthought. He’d made me part of a gang, even if it was only the two of us.

Then, it all flashed before my eyes. Nick broke Damon’s collarbone when he slammed him into the boards. Damon spread an embarrassing story about Nick. My brother joined the rival team and carved his way to the top just so he could spite Damon. And Damon met me in the fields and forests, tempting me into the sweetest sins.

I’d always thought I was somehow part of their feud, like a weapon Damon could use. A sort of tool for satisfaction, something Damon could do to feel like he was getting back at Nick. And it was goddamn sexy to feel that way, but it was never going to last.

“Six years ago?” I asked, the words still ringing in my ears. “You liked me six years ago?”

Damon nodded. “I liked you a lot, Seth. But you knew that, right? Because we kissed.”

“Three years later,” I reminded him.

Damon shook his head. “I just…I just wanted to be around you, Seth. Always. You made fun of me, and it felt right. And the more we were around each other, the more I liked you. But then we left.”

“You left first,” I told him. It wasn’t something I could hold against him. He was going to college, I still had my senior year left, and nothing was going to happen, but we kissed. And part of me felt abandoned for a year until he returned. Until the summer we’d spent in the glass and in the forests, away from Nick, away from everyone, keeping the sweetest secret to ourselves.

A sudden laugh ripped from me, and I shook my head. “I stole my brother’s boyfriend, huh?”

Damon shook his head. “You couldn’t have stolen me, Seth. I was never his, I swear.”

I took a step toward him, my arms loosening a little from around my torso. “Really?”

“Really,” Damon said. “I was always yours. Even when I wasn’t.”

“Damon,” I whispered.

“There’s more,” he said, warning me to wait before deciding how I felt. “Last year, after you and I…drifted, I guess, I was lonely. Hell, I was heartbroken. You were in Chicago. And…” Damon closed his eyes. “And Nick was here. He was, I don’t know, the closest thing to you, so we…”