Page 59 of Exposed

“Kennedy and I will always be friends,” said Matt. “Just like you’ll always be friends with her. And we’re moving forward, remember?”

I took a deep breath. “You guys just looked really good together down on that field.”

“Kennedy distanced herself from me as soon as she found out you were back. Trust me, it wasn’t all hearts and roses down on that field. She practically cringed at my touch.”

I laughed. “That’s not how it looked.”

“She could barely even look at me. I actually thought she was going to tell me she was in love with Felix after the game.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. We had dinner with him last week. Well, I crashed their dinner. Tanner was meddling. It’s not important. What’s important is that Kennedy reacted differently to seeing him than she did to seeing me. I think I may have messed up their chance back in high school. And now that I’m seeing everything a little clearer…they’re a really good fit.”

“I hope so. I want her to be happy. I want both of them to be happy. I can’t believe Felix never got married.”

“We all took your death hard, Brooklyn. But now that you’re back? Hopefully we can all just move forward.”

“He looks almost exactly the same,” I said.

“Please don’t put me back into that love triangle.”

I laughed.

Matt grabbed my hand. “I’ll be your dirty little secret, but I won’t do that again.” His eyes dropped to my lips.

Matthew Caldwell was no one’s dirty little secret. And I was done over thinking all of this. “Do you want to come in?”

He smiled. “I thought you’d never ask.” He climbed out of the car in a hurry, like he was worried I’d change my mind. Or maybe he was just excited to get upstairs. But instead of pulling me inside, he opened up the back seat and picked a sleeping Jacob up into his arms.

Matt was really good with him. And seeing them together made my heart beat better. It made it feel like I’d eventually be okay again.

I followed Matt up the front steps. He pulled out his key and let himself in. Yeah, this definitely just felt likeourhouse. Especially with all the amazing things Matt had added this morning.

Matt froze in the entranceway and I almost bumped into him.

I stepped to the side to see what he was staring at. The tops of all the roses had been cut clean off. The vases were just filled with thorny stems. It would have been a little menacing looking if there weren’t yellow rose petals scattered everywhere. Creating a path upstairs. It was like a romantic scene you’d see in a movie. How had Matt arranged this? I hadn’t seen him on the phone all day.

I walked around him and started to follow the path.

“Brooklyn, stop,” Matt said.

But I was already running up the stairs, following the path. I was getting used to surprises from Matt. And I couldn’t wait to see what this one was.

“Wait!” Matt yelled. I heard him bounding up the steps behind me. “Brooklyn!”

I pushed the bathroom door open and screamed at the top of my lungs. There was a man leaning over the tub with a machete.

He screamed when I screamed, and dropped his machete onto the tiled floor. He stepped away from the tub that was filled with yellow rose petals.

Matt pulled me out of the way, somehow shielding me and Jacob even though Jacob was still in his arms. “Nigel, what the fuck?” Matt said.

“What does that word mean?” Jacob asked. But his eyes were glued to Nigel. And there was a scowl on his face, like he knew Nigel and didn’t like him.

I grabbed Jacob out of Matt’s arms. “Wait, you two know this guy?” I asked.

“That’s Mr. Nigel,” Jacob said. “He lives in Abuelo’s castle too.” He kept scowling at him.

Nigel scowled back. “Mr. Jacob,” he said.

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