Page 92 of Don't Take the Girl
"She's your best friend. You'd know better than me."
"Fair, but I know you have to have some kind of opinion. It's not like she's a complete stranger."
"I honestly don't have an opinion. Warrick and Sydney are both adults and free to do whatever they want. He isn't that old. He's only in his early forties. He and his late wife had Asha at a young age. I could see the Sydney I used to know going for an older man. She's very smart. An older man would challenge her the way men her own age can't."
Her eyes look past me, and I can see her wheels spinning. She agrees with me, but there's something else.
"I don’t disagree with you, but what if Asha finds out?"
There it is. She's happy to support Sydney, but she doesn'twant to see a friendship destroyed over something that might not be forever.
"That's why I don't think Trigg's threat had any real imminence. I'm in the dark on whatever does or doesn't exist between those two, but I know he likes her, and because he likes her, I know he wouldn't frivolously hurt her."
"You're right," she says with a cleansing breath before propping herself up beside me on her elbow. It's in that one natural movement, one that should be no cause for concern, that the blanket slips, and my heart beats out of rhythm. Her eyes immediately zero in on the ink that wasn't there before. "What's this?" She sits up, grabbing her dress to cover her breasts and get a better look at the heart on my right thigh with her initials in the middle.
I close my eyes when I feel her finger trace over it.This is it, London. You said you want to keep her, to stand in the light beside her and be whatever she needs you to be, so fucking do it.
"It's your initials…" I start.
"We have the same initials. I'm not sure I believe you…" The spirit in her voice dims, and something else filters in. "Why here?"
I grab the shirt I was wearing last night and sit up beside her, draping it over her shoulders before saying, "It was a reminder of why I had to stay away…why I lost my heart."
"I don't understand," she whispers, and when her worried eyes connect with mine, I see the exact moment her world starts to fracture.
My chest aches as my heart thunders against my ribs. This is it, the moment I've clawed my way away from for six endless years, the reason I became a ghost in my own hometown. I'm about to bleed out a truth so raw it might kill us both, and I'm terrified she won't survive it. Terrified I won't survive watching her break.
"God, Laney, you have no idea how this is destroying me…" My voice cracks as I cup her face, memorizing every freckle, every curve, because this might be the last time she lets me touch her. "I never wanted to hurt you. Never wanted to be the one to put that look in your eyes."
Her hand comes up to cover mine. "You're killing me now by not letting me in. We're drowning in secrets, London. We can't heal if you don't trust me with your pain. We're bigger than what's broken us."
The love in her voice still, after everything we've been through, guts me. "We lost six years, Laney. Six goddamn years because I couldn't bear the thought of you living with the truth."
"Then don't let us lose any more." Her lips brush my cheek like a prayer, soft and desperate. "I love you. Nothing changes that. Give us a chance to prove it. Please."
"I lost you the night of your senior prom. I lost my heart to one fatal wound, but it wasn't my hand that killed a man…" I lick my lips, tasting salt and fear, and find the courage buried beneath six years of nightmares to add, "It was yours."
Her pupils dilate, her right eyelid twitching as if her body is trying to reject what her mind is processing. Tears well in her eyes and threaten to spill over. I pull her head against my chest before they can fall and shatter us both completely.
"No." The word comes out barely a whisper. "No, London, that's not... You took the blame. You told everyone it was you. You?—"
"I lied." My voice cracks. "I lied to everyone. To the police, to you. Your stab wound hit his femoral artery. He was going to bleed out within minutes."
Her face crumples and I watch the weight of years of believing I was a killer shift into the crushing realization that she was the one who took a life. "Oh God," she breathes, looking down at her hands like she's seeing blood on them for the first time, turning them over.
"You survived." I grip her face tighter, desperate to make her understand. "Laney, you survived. He was going to hurt you. You fought back. You saved your own life."
Her eyes are wide and unfocused, and I can practically see hermind replaying that night with terrible new clarity. She presses her palms against her temples, shaking her head like she can force the truth back out.
"I'm sorry." I pull her against me, and this time, she doesn't resist, but she's rigid in my arms, her body locked in shock. "I'm so fucking sorry."
Long seconds stretch between us, her breaths coming heavy and ragged against my chest, but I never feel her tears fall. She's holding herself together with sheer will, and it's the most heartbreaking thing I've ever witnessed.
"Six years," she whispers. "Six years, I lived with the guilt of what I thought you did for me... Going to prison for my crime." She expels a heavy, stuttered sigh. "It's done," she says softly, her voice hollow but steady. "It's been done for years, and nothing I feel about it now will change that."
"I wanted to tell you so many times. Every letter I never sent, every phone call I never made... I wanted to tell you that it wasn't your fault, but I also wanted to spare you from ever having to know."
She pulls back to look at me, her eyes red-rimmed but lost, like she's drowning in her own guilt. The shock is wearing off now, replaced by the crushing weight of reality.
