Page 1 of Holding On To Good

Prologue

Willow Kincaid had fought tooth and nail against it. She’d tried brushing it aside, ignoring it, and even outright rejecting it, but you couldn’t hide from the truth. It was always there, lying in wait, ready to spring at a moment’s notice. It stalked you like prey, ran you to ground and then, when you were at your most vulnerable, it latched on with teeth and claws, ripping and shredding until there was nothing left but the searing pain.

And the realization that you were now forever changed.

Everything inside of you—everything you’d buried so deep, everything you’d taught yourself to believe, every feeling you’d denied, every fear you’d hid—shifted and rearranged and floated to the surface, big and bright and loud and impossible to ignore any longer.

It was huge. And should only happen once in people’s lives and only at the biggest, most monumental of moments. Something so dramatic, so life altering, you had no choice but to acknowledge all those previously buried thoughts, feelings, and fears.

Worse, you had no choice but to accept them.

It should not happen on an ordinary Sunday afternoon in mid-March. Or when you were doing something as mind-numbingly boring as geometry homework.

And it definitely shouldn’t happen because your best friend smiled at you.

It was ridiculous. Stupid and silly and so juvenile it took all she had not to race outside, stand in the Jennings’ front yard, tip her head back and try to drown herself in the cold, pouring rain.

She and Urban Jennings had been friends since they were eight. Literally half their lives. It was far from the first time she’d been on the receiving end of one of his slow grins. She’d seen his lips quirk into that lopsided, reluctant smile hundreds of times before. Thousands. Being able to tease a grin or laugh out of Urban had long been one of her greatest pleasures, bringing with it a sense of satisfaction. A warm feeling of contentment that was soft and comfortable.

But this? It was like one of the lightning bolts flickering outside had snaked under the closed windowpane and tapped her on the forehead. Her skin prickled painfully; her entire body felt flushed and hot and itchy.

She wanted to tip her head up, shut her eyes and just soak up the warmth of his smile like she was a damp, bedraggled wildflower and he was the friggin’ sun. She wanted to scoot closer to him on his twin bed and press her thigh against his. She wanted to straddle him, for God’s sake. To lean against his broad, solid chest and trace the shape of his mouth with her fingertips. Wanted to lightly rub at the shallow dent on the left side of his mouth that always deepened with his smiles or frowns. She wanted to press her mouth to his.

She wanted, wanted and wanted some more.

And that was the problem.

These feelings, this entire experience, was new when she’d thought there couldn’t possibly be another first between them. Exciting, when there’d only ever been the ordinary. Frightening, when she’d never, not once, had anything to fear from her friendship with Urban. Her thoughts and feelings, her secrets were safe with him.

Had always been his as much as they’d been hers.

But these wild thoughts, these terrifying feelings were only for her.

This secret was too huge, too risky to share.

Ugh. She was so stupid. She’d gone and done the most idiotic thing she could ever do. She’d become a walking, talking, living, breathing cliché.

She’d fallen in love with her best friend.

Just kill her now.

“Willow?”

Her gaze flew up to find Urban had gotten to his feet and was staring down at her, his smile fading. Her heart lurched, like it was trying to free itself from her chest. As if it trusted Urban with its care and safety more than her.

She couldn’t even blame it. He was really, really good at taking care of things.

Other people, especially.

She had to swallow before she could speak. “What?”

“I asked you twice if you wanted something to drink.”

Keeping her eyes down, her face turned away slightly, she blushed—blushed, for God’s sake, the heat rising from her chest to flood her face—like a middle schooler whose crush had finally talked to her.

“Sorry,” she said. “I’m just super focused. You know how I am about geometry.”

He made a sound, a low rumble from his throat that could’ve been an affirmation. The Urban Jennings way of saying that, yes, he did indeed know how she felt about geometry from the few—but passionate—rants she’d gone on this year, bitching and moaning about how she shouldn’t be forced to take the class since she was never, ever going to use any geometry in real life.

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