Page 97 of Steadfast
I sat up and pulled Sophie against my chest. I buried my wet face in her hair and wrapped my arms around her. “The only thing I have ever been afraid of is losing you.”
Sophie snorted into my shirt. “So why did you say we couldn’t be together?” She didn’t add “dumbass” to the end of that sentence, but I heard it anyway.
“I didn’t want to dread what I thought was inevitable. That’s why I used drugs in the first place. Dread.”
“Of what?”
This wasn’t easy to admit. “I knew you were leaving Vermont, and I wasn’t goinganywhere. You were the best thing that ever happened to me, and I knew I was going to put you on a plane to New York and you’d be gone.”
“Jude!”
“I’m not trying to make you feel bad.”
“Honey, that was a really grim outlook. Maybe it wouldn’t have happened that way.”
“I was nineteen, Soph. I thought I knew everything.”
She hugged me tighter. “I need you, dumbass.”
There it was. I laughed.
“…and you are smart about a lot of things. I think so highly of you. But I need you to give yourself a little more credit.”
“I do. I will. If you let me try again, I won’t be such an idiot.”
“You better mean that,” she said, her voice shaky. “Don’t run away from me again, Jude Nickel.”
“I won’t. It doesn’t fucking work, either. You own me. You always have.”
“Even when you’re not perfect, you’re still mine.”
Shit, I really was. “Okay, baby. Okay. I get it now. I’m truly sorry.”
She pressed closer. “I know you are. And we’re going to be okay. But you have to believe it or it won’t be true.”
“I want to believe it. I love you, Sophie. Always have.”
“I love you, too.”
My eyes leaked again. We sat there for a long time until I got myself under control. “You probably have places you need to be,” I said, rubbing her back. I could hold her all day.
“Not for a couple hours,” she said. “Let’s go sit somewhere and have coffee.”
“Where?” Just because I was ready to admit that I wanted to be with Sophie didn’t mean we could go public.
“Anywhere. The diner on Main Street.”
“But what if…?”
She shook her head. “We’re not in Colebury. It will be fine. My dad’s spies are at work or sleeping off the night shift. Let’s notworryso much for once. Come on.” She offered me her hand.
I took it.
Chapter Thirty-One
Sophie
Internal DJ tuned to: “You Are My Sunshine”
