Page 48 of Bring You Back

As much as I hate it, knowing this leaves me and Reyna with one simple truth.

We’re going to break.

We’ve already started.

I close my eyes with a sigh and stand up. The way to fix this now is to go back. Back to the moment right before I kissed her so I can stop myself. So I can prevent us from going down this road.

But I can’t.

I back up toward the door and call Tommy. He picks up after the first ring. “Is she okay?”

“She’s sleeping,” I tell him, then jump right to the reason I called. “Can you—”

“I’m on my way,” he says before hanging up on me. The fact that he knew I was asking him to come, that I need him to be here for Reyna instead of me is both a reassurance and an insult. I’m grateful for one and I deserve the other.

He’s here in five minutes.

He breezes past me, right to Reyna’s side, looking down at her from his place on the edge of the bed. He doesn’t look my way, and I take his silence as my cue to leave.

“How’d you know I was with her?”

I stop, halfway out the door, but I don’t turn around or answer him. I wait for the obvious answer that I made clear in my grilling over Reyna at the beach.

“You came here and you saw us.” His voice is closer to my back, lowered. “But you didn’t come inside, or make it right with her, or …step in.”

“Is that really what you wanted me to do?” I say as I face him, doubt in my voice.

“Come off it,” he snaps, showing me the Tommy who confronted me after he found out about me and Reyna. I’m seeing more and more of those flickers lately. “You’re still her friend. And that’s what she needed today. Herfriends.”

He holds my stare and I warn him with a look to not even mention the name we’re both thinking. I don’t need to be reminded that I was the only one who didn’t show up for Reyna. He knows better than to make me seem like a worse fuckup than Camille.

He shakes his head, lowering his voice again. “And what I want doesn’t matter, because this is the way it is.Youhave her.Youshould be stepping in and fighting to keep her. You shouldwantto.”

I’m this close to turning away and dismissing myself from this lecture, butthatsets me off, and I fire back, “I dowantto.”

“Then you don’t letmetake care of her.”

“Okay,you’rethe one who needs to come off it. You’re her friend, too.”

“Andyou’resupposed to be more than that.”

I step up to him. If he wants to keep throwing shit in my face, I’ll throw shit right back. “And yet,I’mnot her favorite.”

Tommy steps back, discouraged, and I know he’s about to brush that off. “She’s drunk.”

“And she laid out all of her feelings pretty well tonight,” I point out, giving both of us a mental rundown of the verbal lashing she gave me and Camille. Reyna meant everything she said, and he can’t deny it.

“Tommy?”

Her soft croak draws our attention, but when we look at her, her eyes are still closed. She must’ve opened them for a split second, or heard Tommy’s voice through his failed attempts to keep quiet. But in her condition, she won’t be able to recall much of this tomorrow. Even if she does, it’ll just be bits and pieces she won’t be able to put together.

Tommy turns back to me, having had the same thought as he doesn’t bother lowering his voice this time. “Camille’s right. I’m making excuses for you.”

Now I wish he had lowered his voice. Better yet, not said anything else at all. Camille. Everything in my life now keeps coming back to her. Because she’sstill here. Saying shit about me and Reyna, behind my back, to Tommy when I told her she doesn’t get to have an opinion. And apparently, she’sright.

“I’ll never understand hurting your family.” Tommy continues his lecture, and I hear him, but my head is now somewhere else. “We’re not the ones who hurt you,” he says with a motion between himself and Reyna before settling on her. “She’snot the one who hurt you.”

No, that’s a different girl. And that mouth of hers is making everything worse. Her presence now is hurting everything.

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