Page 43 of Hearts of Fairlake

"Probably because I don't want my boyfriend to mention that I used to sleep with that annoyance," I grumbled. Itwasn't like I was bothered by the fact that I'd had a sexual relationship with Bennett for a while or that I regretted it. The sex had been fantastic, and it had been a good way for us to work some of our problems out with someone we trusted. But that was history, and while it had been good at the time, it wasn't something I needed anymore, and I felt it could be easily ignored.

"And your boyfriend," he began, walking up to me and putting a hand on my chest, "has told you several times that he's very glad you had someone like Bennett during those times."

"Okay, sure. But does it require you to bring up the sex?"

He thought about it for a moment. “I know you express yourself best physically, so yes, it's brought up because I know it helped you."

"I can see you’re holding something back. What is it?"

Devin grinned. “What? I'm not allowed to enjoy the mental picture?"

I groaned. “Devin."

He laughed, fingers curling around my arm. "What? I'm not going to get jealous or pissy about it."

"There's a big difference between not getting jealous about someone I was with before we got together and commenting on how much you enjoy the mental picture."

"What? We both know I think you're the hottest thing to walk this planet since Colin Farrel's heyday. And I'd be lying if I said Bennett isn't attractive."

"Wow, I get one-upped by a celebrity and the idiot. That's great."

He snorted. “I said the hottest thing since. Maybe I have a thing for mean-looking bad boys."

"I am fucking rolling in the compliments today. Stop before my ego bursts from being overfed."

His hands slid under my shirt. “Mean-looking doesn'tmean you can't be handsome. Or sexy. Or the best thing that's ever happened to me, and despite all my teasing, I wouldn't give you up for anything. In fact, I'm bound and determined to keep a death grip on you."

It had been a long road for us, and neither would call it easy. Our childhoods hadn't been the best, but mine at least had been improved by his presence in my life, a best friend who understood and accepted me. Then he'd disappeared, and for years, I never knew where he was or how he was doing. Well, I didn't know exactly what or how he was doing, but I had a very good idea, or rather, several horrible ideas.

You wouldn't know it now, looking at him as he crept his hands further up my shirt to playfully molest my stomach and chest, but he’d been a heavy drug user. I never figured out just how hard it had been at its worst, but I’d seen him when he was fighting like hell to get clean. Of course, sometimes it was hard to tell who he was fighting the hardest, himself, the drugs, me, or the world. There had been so many times when I wondered if we would get through it with just the two of us, but here we were.

More importantly, herehewas. I would never be able to explain how in awe of him I was at the strength and tenacity he’d found to get to the other side. The haunted, starved look that had marked his face and body for ages was gone, and the color had returned to his skin. There were a couple of scars on his arms from the needles and a mark on his face from when his insane ex-boyfriend and dealer had shown up to drag him back, but other than that, you’d never know what he’d gone through.

The other changes, the important ones, were beneath his skin and weren't easily seen. He didn't fidget constantly from a restlessness, an anxiety that continuously existed deep inside him. The hollow look that had nothing to do with the dark circles had gone from his eyes, replaced by the impishglint I remembered so strongly from when we were younger. He laughed far easier, slept more peacefully, and I didn't see him constantly looking over his shoulder in fear of what might be out of sight.

"What's going on in that head of yours?" he asked softly, his fingers no longer playfully stroking my skin. "You've got a lot of thoughts going on."

I snorted. “Thinking about the past. And the present."

"Oh? Not the future?"

I shrugged. “What's the point? We're set up for a good future. Why think about it?"

"Why think about the other stuff then?"

"It's notbadthoughts," I clarified for him. "I was just thinking where we came from and how we ended up here instead. I always wanted something like this for us but never thought we'd get here the way we did."

At that, he laughed. “Oh, I see. You mean you didn't expect we'd get together after I went off and became an addict, then came crawling back to you in desperate need to get clean?"

"Why do you do that?" I asked with a scowl. "You always put yourself down. Like you weren't the one going through hell and had to fight your way out."

His brow arched, but his lips didn't thin, which meant he was a little annoyed but hadn't gotten to the point where he was ready to start chewing me out. "And do you think I...did it alone? Like you weren't going through your own shit?"

"Nothing I was going through made it impossible for me to help, or even that hard," I frowned.

"I meant going throughmyshit, Chase. You think I didn't know back then that you were going through your own hell just trying to help me?"

"I just?—"

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