Page 51 of Edge of Heaven

“You’re lying.” She searches my face intently.

“I’m not.” I scowl at her. “And even if I was, it’s none of your business!”

“If you need help getting away from him, just tell me.” She lowers her voice. “Angus and I can help you. We can?—”

“Stop.” I squeeze her arm, probably a lot harder than I squeezed Mick’s a few minutes ago. “Please, just stop. You have to trust me. I know what I’m doing. And I’m fine. Please, if you care about me at all, don’t cause trouble for me.”

“How can helping you cause trouble?” she asks, her eyes filled with concern. “Taryn, I’m worried about you.”

“I know. And I appreciate it. But there are things going on I can’t talk about right now.”

“But you could talk about them to Mick.” She actually looks a little hurt, adding something else for me to feel bad about in my life.

“He knows things because of when we met before,” I say. “So he already knew about… some of it.”

God, this is complicated.

I know I can trust her, and I’m probably a shitty friend for not telling her about Toby or the situation with Callum, but I’m teetering on the edge of my sanity right now. It takes all my strength to deal with him, and the last thing I need is for other people to get involved.

“Taryn!” Callum’s voice is laced with annoyance—what else is new?—and I give Ryleigh an apologetic smile.

“I’m sorry—we’ll talk soon. I promise.”

She smiles brightly, as if she understands how precarious things are with Callum, and waves at him. “Hey, Callum!”

“Hey, Ry.” They’ve come to what I can only describe as an understanding now that she interviewed him for her magazine. He behaves around her for the most part, and she doesn’t give him any shit.

Hopefully, that continues.

“You guys planning a shopping trip?” he asks in a lighthearted tone that isn’t typical for him.

“Nah.” I shrug. “I don’t need anything.”

“You should go anyway,” he says magnanimously. “You’ve got to be bored on tour. And a few of us are talking about golfing when we get to Reno.”

I blink.

Golfing?

Since when?

“It’s a charity event,” he continues. “Rockers for Rugrats or some shit.”

“Rockers for Childhood Cancer,” Ryleigh corrects him under her breath.

“Yeah, that.” He grins. “Anyway, Dusty and me are gonna do it.”

“Have you ever golfed before?” I ask curiously.

He shrugs. “I’ll figure it out. How hard can it be?”

“It’s harder than it looks,” Ryleigh says, falling into step with us. “But I’m actually going to be there covering the event for the magazine.”

“I’m sure Taryn will be bored. She’s not the outdoors type.”

That’s true, but he says it like it’s a character flaw and I remind myself that I don’t care what he thinks of me.

“I’m not the outdoors type either,” Ryleigh says, “but I’ll be in the VIP area most of the time. Maybe we can get Taryn a VIP pass so she can hang with me.”

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