Page 25 of Bring You Back

I stuff my face with the last of the ice cream to let her know that time’s up on this conversation. Nothing she can say is going to change my mood right now.

“Ah, fuck,” I groan when actual brain freeze hits me.

Reyna smiles in amusement and I give her a dirty look. Then she says something that shocksme.

“Tiffany isn’t the whore of Bellsby. My mother is.”

I stare, slack-jawed. She’s right. How could I forget?

A laugh bursts out of me and she laughs back for about two seconds before it dies off, her stare falling to the hand gripping the edge of the bench. She just gave her mother a pretty disparaging title. It has a seed of truth that hurts her to say aloud.

I take her hand from the bench and hold it between us. “Your mom’s not a whore.”

“Yeah,” she ponders, then gives me a serious look. “I think it’s actually Banks.” Her demeanor cracks, and we’re laughing again.

She’s right this time, too. Banks could give any deviant around here a run for their money. Unable to commit and obsessed with sex, he’s worked his way through every girl who would have him, which is, surprisingly, a lot.My dick is like a magic wand, he told me once right after using it on some girl in “his” guest room while my parents were out. He gestured to it, standing right next to me, and my eyes looked down before my thoughts could stop them to catch a quick glimpse of the tent he was sporting through his shorts. I jerked away and told him to watch where he points it, and he thought that was so funny, he spent the next couple minutespointinghis dick at random things in the house while shouting commands like it was an actual fucking wand.

I find myself laughing at the memory, but stop before I can miss him.

Banks can be annoying as fuck and an absolute douchebag, but no one has ever made me laugh as hard.

Reyna brings me back to now with a shift at my side. I realize I’m still holding her hand as she looks toward the doors to the ice cream shop. She has to get back to work, but she doesn’t want to leave me. She squeezes my hand and I let hers go with a warning, a command, a piece of advice, a hope.

“Don’t go back home tonight.”

She sighs against the bench and moves her hand to her lap, playing with her fingers. “He won’t be there long. You know how she is, and you know howtheyare.”

Yeah, and I also know I won’t be talking Reyna away from her room. Not tonight, or any night. It’s her sanctuary, her resting place, her art studio all rolled into one. She’s made it her favorite place in the world while being attached to her least favorite place in the world. That’s also why we end up there more than we end up in mine.

An afterthought takes hold, telling me that I don’t want to possibly take that from her, to taint the good of her with the bad of me. That we should probably stick to my room.

“Fine,” I sigh out. “But if he doesn’t leave, you come to my place.”

“I know,” she says with a pointed, deep-dimpled smile, like I don’t need to tell her.

“Or go to Tommy’s,” I add with more encouragement in my voice. I should be doing that—encouraging her toward Tommy. From the look on her face, though, that’s thewrongthing to do.

“There’s not really any room for me at your place now,” she says, changing her tune.

“Banks isn’t staying there.” I’m adamant, ready to kick him out if he shows up again.

“So Camille is?”

I grit my teeth to keep myself from returning her tone. She’s pointing a finger, accusing me of doing something I haven’t even done, of something I should’ve said. What she just said—there’s not really any room for me at your place now—was a test. She gives out a lot of them. For this one, she wanted me to say thatCamilleisn’t staying, not Banks. She wanted me to say that she’d be staying inmyroom, not a guest room.

The problem is, it wasn’t natural for me to say those things. The natural thing was to focus on Banks. We were just talking about him. It makes sense in my head. You know what else makes sense? The fact that Reyna was there when I told the whole room that no one—namelypastno ones—is staying in my house. Did she miss that? No. Reyna’s head is a boomerang, her thoughts pointed darts that get sharper with every rebound.

I know she and Camille have had their issues, like we all have, and I’m currently adding to them. But that part isn’t my fault. I didn’t ask Camille to come back.

Still, placing Reyna above her and in my bed instead of a guest bed wasn’t natural. And Reyna knows it. But all I have to do is backtrack and say it, anyway. Aim for the words that will bring her dimple back.

“Last I checked, there’s a spot right next to mine on my bed. And it’s yours.”

She smiles.Right answer.

She leans up and kisses me. I kiss her back and hate myself all over again.

7

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