Page 41 of Beach Reads
This is where Whit could say something. Where he could ask me to stay with him. If he said the words, I’d agree in a heartbeat. It was never really about the travel, not at all, it was about having a choice. Deciding my own fate.
I wait, the silence taut in the office.
The words I desperately want to hear don’t come.
“I can help you, if you like,” Dr Whitaker says instead after a moment, tapping a finger on the form. “We’ll get you out of here, Poppy, I promise. Out to see the world.”
Ugh. My fingers are numb as he presses a pen into my hand, his chest so hard and warm against my back. And when Whit brushes my hair over one shoulder, trailing soft kisses down my neck as I write, my chest cracks open. Everything hurts, and tears sting my eyes.
“Good girl.” He bites down gently on my shoulder, and I suck in a shaky breath, forcing my pen to keep moving over the page.
I’ve won the jackpot, alright. Had a taste of heaven. But I don’t get to keep him, do I?
* * *
There are blog articles and TV features. The flash of cameras every time I walk past the Honey Cove gates. So many phone calls, Whit sets up a special filter on the institute phone lines, and a million and one questions from Janice at the poolside.
Is this what I expected from my vengeance? A media circus and an explosion of interest in me online? Endless photos of my father, red-faced and furious as he denies the allegations?
I guess so. And it doesn’t matter what Governor Lennox says now: his political career is ruined, along with all the internships and fancy jobs he once planned for me.I’ll never go home after this. Will never see my family or society friends again.
My life is a smoldering crater, and I’m the one who pulled the pin on the grenade. Cue my cool-guy shades.
“How does vengeance taste, Poppy?” Whit finds me floating on my back in the pool, staring blankly up at the stars. It’s after midnight, the air crackling with static, and the photographers have only just given up on trying to scale the Honey Cove walls. The doctor’s voice is teasing, but my mouth twists.
“Bittersweet.”
His feet shift against the paving stones. “Ah.” He’s backlit by an ornate lamp post, and his tall, broad-shouldered silhouette makes my stomach do high kicks. “It’s not how you imagined?”
I shrug one shoulder and accidentally dunk myself, coming up spluttering and red faced. Whit doesn’t laugh at me. He never does when it really counts.
Ripples fan out across the inky surface of the water as I swim closer to his edge, coughing to clear my throat. “It’s fine.” I’m hoarse. The stone is still warm under my fingertips when I grip the poolside, baked all day by the sun. “But I spent all that time obsessing over Gina’s article and getting the word out. I never really thought about what comes next.”
“You’ll figure it out.” The doctor’s voice is so confident, ringing through the courtyard. He has such faith in me, and it makes me want to cry. “You’re so brave, Poppy, and there’s a whole world out there just waiting for you. You’re going to take it by storm.”
Okay. But do I really have to? Without him?
My forehead thunks against the pool wall. “Ow.”
“Hey.” Whit’s alarmed, squatting to pat at my shoulders. He strokes my wet hair and the shell of my ear. “It’ll be okay. Did you hurt yourself? Let me take a look.”
I tip my head back and stare past him at the stars. It’s too dark to see his eyes anyway. Gentle thumbs probe at my forehead, and my heart is raw, and I’m sinking, sinking, sinking. My head may be above water, but my soul is curled up on the bottom of the pool. They’ll fish it out of the filters tomorrow with the drowned bugs and dead leaves.
“Something’s wrong,” Whit says softly. With my forehead? Did I really smack it that hard? “I thought you’d be excited to leave, but you seem…”
Here goes. It’s easier to admit these things in the dark. “No. Well. I’ll never be excited to leaveyou, Doc.”
There’s a long pause, where the only sounds are the gentleslosh, sloshof pool water and the leathery flap of bat wings overhead. Then Whit gusts out a breath, and his touch on my head gets firmer. He’s stroking my hair; cradling my neck. Patting and soothing.
“This time together has meant a lot to me too.” His tone is so freaking careful, I could scream. “But Poppy, the things you want—the adventure, the travel—”
“You’rewhat I want.” For a girl confessing her love, I sound super grumpy. I grumble the words at the wet stone, my sore forehead creased in a scowl. “Dumbass.”
The doctor chokes out a laugh. But he’s not listening to me, the jerk, he’s still petting my hair as he says: “It’s been intense, I know. I feel the same way. But you’re young, Poppy, and in a few months’ time, you won’t even remember—Jesus!”
Whit shoots to his feet, slapping at his now-soaking chest, and I glower up at him, ready to splash the big idiot again. “Iwon’tforget. If I got my way, I wouldn’t leave at all. This is the first time in my whole life that I’ve ever had a real home, that I’ve ever felt l—” I break off, throat tight, because I can’t say that word. Not now, when he’s sending me away. “The first time that I’ve ever belonged. And now I have to leave.”
That last word comes out as a croak, vibrating with despair. And Whit stares down at me, his shadowed chest heaving like he’s been winded.
