AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I spared an annoyed glance at my sister before looking back at the girl.
I twitched with the need to go to her. To lift her head so I could look at those eyes again. To lay bare every secret within them.
For years it’d been like this. Silent. Charged. On the edge of igniting.
We were like the resistance before a trigger breaks. The world around us had fallen into a silence so unnerving and intoxicating, and with each passing week we inched closer to when that silence would explode into chaos.
“You notice when she comes in,” Libby suddenly mumbled, catching my attention. “How long have you noticed her? Or cared?”
“Libby . . .”
She looked at me curiously, like she’d just realized she was sitting with a stranger. “It’s been . . . it’s been years. And after finding out that Lily O’Sullivan might be alive—”
“That’s enough, Libby.”
“You’re more concerned with some girl you don’t know than avenging your—”
“I said that’s enough,” I growled, the warning and demand clear.
I let my head fall into my hands as memories assaulted me. My chest moved exaggeratedly as I tried to force my breathing to slow—tried to force every want I’d just had away.
It was like the entire universe was mocking me by placing this girl in my life, week after week. Taunting me with a torrent of emotions I’d never wanted to experience again. Daring me to make a move.
I had . . . and I’d been slammed with the cruelest memories ever since.
Being captivated by someone for any reason was something I couldn’t afford. Something I couldn’t allow.
My obliterated heart couldn’t take it.
Kicking at Libby’s foot, I ground out, “Let’s go,” and stood to leave.
I kept my head down as we walked, but was unable to stop myself from glancing over my shoulder—searching her out—one last time when we reached the door.
The warning glare from her friend said what I’d already told myself dozens of times—I needed to forget about her. But that would always be impossible. The need to move closer, the need to beg her to let me be someone who deserved her, told me as much.
“I gotta get out there, Lil. Need to get on the street,” Beck mumbled the next night as he walked into my room. “You need anything before I go?”
I glanced at him from the window seat, but went back to looking outside without responding.
The only thing I wanted was to know more about Texas . . . something Beck knew since I’d already tried to get additional information out of him a handful of times over the last two and a half days.
He’d stayed firm on his decision not to give me anything.
Rather, he’d stayed loyal to Kieran by not giving me anything.
“I told you, Lil, this life’s a burden. Be glad you don’t know,” he’d said repeatedly. “Fine, you wanna know somethin’? Kieran loves you and would do fucking anything for you. Think on that. Know and be content with that. Stop digging because that’s gonna get you nowhere, except maybe dead, and we’ve been working our asses off to keep you breathing.”
As if I didn’t already know that.
But that was the last time I’d asked. It was the last time I’d spoken to Beck at all.
“Look, you wanna be pissed? Then be pissed. But don’t fucking take it out on me or Kieran.”
A disbelieving laugh punched from my chest, my head shook slowly. “Who should I be mad at?” I gave him a wary glance. “Mickey? What’s going on disgusts me . . . but when I think about it, it doesn’t surprise me he would do something like this. It surprises me that the two of you would—that you wouldn’t put an end to it. It disappoints me. It hurts to be so ashamed of the two of you that I can barely look at you, Beck. At least with the drugs, people are seeking you out. They’re making a conscious effort to seek you out so they can put something in their bodies . . . so they can harm themselves. But those girls they’re taking? They’re innocent. They don’t want what’s happening to them and they don’t want to be ripped from their lives.”
His shoulders fell and his mouth opened, but no response came.
“You want to know what hurts more than knowing you both kept this from me and that you’re a part of it? It’s that this is what Kieran chose over me.”
