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“Sure she does,” I say, all bright sarcasm burning in my veins. “And I’m a fucking saint.”

Reaching down, I grab my helmet, fingers subtly tracing the Starry Night sticker on the back that says Watch me Van Go! on it. It’s worn with age, the words barely still legible. But I know that Lily sees it, that she remembers what it says.

She’s the one who put it there.

Her eyes are still on the sticker when I look back up, so I snap my fingers near her face to pull her attention up.

“Wear them,” I say, before giving Paloma a long look and heading back out to drive home.

• • •

The shower is a heated steam room version of some kind of sanctuary. I’ve let the water run long enough and hot enough that the mirror has fogged up before I even step inside the glass walls.

Still, ducking my head beneath the warm spray, letting it run over my neck and shoulders does nothing to relieve the tension there.

“You’re not the boss of me.”

I clench my molars, shutting my eyes tightly against the sight plaguing me—Lily with her porcelain neck beneath my tattooed grip, eyes dilated, mouth open on punchy breaths.

The memory mixes with older ones, past and present versions of her swirling until I can barely tell one from the other. But either way, I’m keyed the fuck up.

Lily and I waited a long fucking time before we gave in to each other, but then it was like striking a match for a blazing inferno, impossible to quell. We couldn’t stop. And we were two horny teenagers with no parental supervision.

And then, when she was gone, the craving of her was almost as difficult to deal with as the loss of her. So I’d gotten pierced, like that alone would take the edge off.

My hand glides down my shaft, thumb pressing to the group of barbells pierced to the underside, caressing lightly over them at the end of each pump.

Trying desperately to keep out a certain redhead, I focus on something else—anything else. Drunken kisses with my ex-teammate outside a bar, brick scraping my back like nails against my skin. Hotel rooms and showers at away games. I even try imagining Holden’s mouth, his neck in my grip at Ro’s birthday where I’d kissed him during spin the bottle.

But none of it is her.

Frustrated breaths choke out of me.

Fuck it.

I can’t even find it in me to feel guilty when the image in my head is suddenly her. Lily, in her pajamas and soft hair, skin like silk. Like spilt milk over my bedsheets, in some fantasy world where she exists in my room with me.

She chews her lip. Or bites my neck—I play each scenario like choosing a favorite record. Her nails in my skin. Her body under me, beside me, above me—the small O-shape her mouth forms when she sinks all the way down, like I’m too deep for her to breathe without feeling me everywhere.

“Fuck,” I breathe, half a groan.

It barely takes a minute, because it’s her.

And I don’t feel any less frustrated than I was before.

Chapter 29

Lily

Near the edge of campus, there’s a shorter building with all glass windows around the red ivy-worn brick. It seems odd and slightly out of place for its size, but that’s because half of the rooms exist in the basement.

Most of the art rooms for painting, sculpture, and other mediums are in the brighter spaces. In the lower level, there’s photography and most of the art history archives housed at the university.

Including a singular Van Gogh sketch gifted by a deceased donor years ago.

“Good today, Lily?” my professor, Dr. Ann, asks, skirting by my drawing table. It’s my least favorite medium—charcoal. I wash my hands nearly constantly and find myself using an entire roll of paper towels to keep the smudges off, though it’s nearly impossible. Especially when it gets under my fingernails.

Today, I’m distracted enough that I haven’t bothered reaching for the charcoal, mindlessly drawing with my clean, sharp pencil. My stomach has consistently attacked me all morning, so I’m half bent over my desk, spine curved in horrid posture.