Page 44 of On the Edge

“Nate follows you?”

“We follow each other.” He shrugs.

I sit back in my seat, stunned. The sudden movement has the room spinning as the whiskey threatens to ignite the fire that is consuming my stomach at the thought of them being connected like this. “I kind of feel betrayed. You said you’d punch him if you ever saw him again, yet you follow each other on social media like you’re friends?”

“That was years ago,” he reminds me. When I woke up from my coma in a hospital in France, Marco was there and Nate was not. And Marco’s been here for me ever since. “And now he does that crazy heli-skiing off piste, which is fun to watch. I saw the video of him skiing the Cathedral in Alaska a couple days ago. It was ... what’s the word you Americans use? Legit?”

“He ... what now?” The Cathedral is only accessible by helicopter and skiing down it is equivalent to slinging yourself down the face of a cliff. In the backcountry. With enough snow to cause an avalanche. So essentially, insanely stupid. And Nate isnotinsanely stupid. Or at least, he didn’t use to be.

“You didn’t see it?” Marco seems surprised.

“I blocked him on social media, and everywhere for that matter, when he left.”

“Then why do you have that picture of him and Alessandra?”

“Sierra texted it to me. She knows I’m in Italy and that Alessandra is half Italian, so she was worried I might see it on the newsstands here.”

“Well I’m fairly confident he’ll seethis,” he says, showing me the photo that has already garnered over a thousand likes since he posted it roughly two minutes ago.

I look down at my drink, wishing it was doing a better job of dulling my feelings. Instead, I seem to be feeling things even more deeply tonight. “I doubt he’ll care.”

“A picture of us drinking together in a hotel in Italy, looking at each other like that?” He drops his voice lower as he says, “Nate will care. Trust me.” His dark eyes bore into mine, one eyebrow quirked as if challenging me to disagree.

“He would have cared, back then,” I correct him. Back when Nate and I were so crazy in love that his possessive jealousy made him stupid. “But it’s been years, Marco. He won’t care now.”

“We’ll see.” He shrugs.

But will we? Even if he was jealous, how would I ever know?

* * *

It sounds like someone is jackhammering right outside my hotel room door.Bang, bang ... bang, bang. Then a pause, thenbang, bang ... bang, bangall over again. I glance at the clock, alarmed that it’s already nine thirty in the morning.

What the hell time did I get back to my room?I try to remember what time it was when Marco and I left the bar. It had to be close to two in the morning. The fragmented memories of Marco helping me back to my hotel room flash through my head. I think he may have held my hair back while I threw up, or maybe I was holding my own hair back with one arm while hugging the toilet with the other. Those memories are too fuzzy, and too embarrassing, to recall.

But I woke up alone in my bed. Like I always do.

Bang, bang ... bang, bang.

I’m about to grab a pillow and put it over my head when I hear Marco’s voice. “Jackson, wake up.”

I spring out of bed, which is a mistake because the whole room tilts sideways and I have to put one hand down on the edge of the bed and one against the closest wall to steady myself. This is not good. I have to be packed and downstairs for the van to the airport in an hour, and I can hardly stand up straight.

I stumble to the door and check the little view hole. Sure enough Marco is standing on the other side, his fist raised like he’s going to start banging down my door again. I reach for the handle, swinging the door open and narrowly missing my big toe.

“Please ...” I groan. “Stop pounding on my door.”

He steps in, shutting it quickly behind him, then lets his gaze travel the length of my body. His eyes return to my face and he looks like he just saw a train wreck.

“That bad, huh?” I say.

“Did you just get up?”

“I think I’m dying,” I croak.

“No whiskey next time,” he says as he reaches out and slides his hand over my head before gently squeezing the back of my neck fondly, “eh?”

“Never again.” My voice is so raspy I hardly recognize the sound.

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