I couldn’t help but jolt a bit hearing Lydia’s name on his lips. They hadn’t been friends before.There’s a blond guy,Daisy had said earlier.Super hot. Lydia was dancing with him.
Jamie nodded slightly. “It suits you.”
Daisy whirled on Jamie for the compliment, eyes narrowing.
But he’d spoken the words that’d been whispering in the back of my mind. Beck’s hair was naturally a dark brown, and he used to keep it cut short because his mother had hated it in his eyes. Longer like this, and bleached, gave him a wild edge that matched his eyes. A look that suited the image he’d started crafting four years ago.
The boy in front of me now—man, really, since he was nineteen—was a stranger. Taller, more muscular, with a stronger line to his jaw. The only familiar thing about Beckham Jennings was his eyes.
Eyes I couldn’t bring myself to look into.
“You grew,” Beck said to Jamie, a small curve to his lips. “Like a weed. What are you now, six-two?”
“Six-four.”
Beck gave a low whistle.
“I didn’t realize you were coming back.” Jamie’s voice took on a strange quality now, almost laced with an edge. “I didn’t think you wereevercoming back.”
Beck slid his hands into his dress pants’ pockets, rocking back on his heels. He gave a lazy shrug. “Aunt Ally said she missed me. Apparently convinced the board of Richies to give me another shot. Who can say no to free room, board, and meals for a summer?”
“A summer?” My hand slipped off Jamie’s dress shirt, and without him balancing me, my foot slammed into the ground. “You’re here… for the whole summer?”
Beck’s head had tipped down, watching Daisy set my heel in front of me. When I spoke, only his eyes swiveled up. The green was almost electric as it cut through his dark lashes, and it zapped me even from several feet away.
“The whole summer,” Beck confirmed slowly, and gave me a crooked smile. “Exciting, isn’t it?”
I could feel Jamie looking at me, and Daisy’s head also tipped up, both gauging my reaction.
So running into Beck tonight wasn’t just a one-off. It was only the beginning.
More like the beginning of the end.
Something stronger slipped down my spine. The old Nellie had been the one cowering. The Nellie I was now lifted her chin. “Not the word I’d use.”
“No. It wouldn’t be, would it?” His twisted smile didn’t fade. “Who’s Mr. ASMR?”
And just like that, he’d toppled my confidence almost as quickly as I’d built it. “W-What?”
“You asked if I was Mr. ASMR. A part of me just wanted to say yes, to see how you’d react, except it sounds like an embarrassing thing to admit to.”
Of course Beck wasn’t Mr. ASMR. It’d been a ridiculous thing to ask, and an even more ridiculous thing to hope for. There was nothing calming about his presence, nothing gentle about his ringed fingers. Beckham Jennings wouldn’t sit by the Bayview Pier and record the sounds of the beach. He wouldn’t have responded so warmly to my message. He probably would’ve blocked me.
Humiliation trickled down my throat, both because he knew and because he didn’t.
“If it isn’t you, then you don’t need to bother yourself with it,” I said with a polite smile, one I’d mastered. “If you’ll excuse us, we should probably go in and make our rounds before the ceremony starts.”
Beck arched a dark brow. “You speak like that now?”
Don’t take the bait, Nellie. “Speak like what?”
“So… insufferably proper.” He tipped his head to one side, then the other. “Don’t tell me you got boring, Nell.”
Over the past four years, I’d wondered what it’d be like running into Beckham Jennings again. I’d wished it had never happened. I’d hoped it would. It was a confusing dichotomy that I’d found myself having over and over. During the day, the thought of him would make my stomach turn. At night, before falling asleep, the thought of him would make my chest ache.
I didn’t want to see him… and I did.
And now, the moment had finally come to pass, and I realized which emotion was true—I absolutely didnotwant to see him. Not here. Not now. Not with the Pembletons and the entirety of Alderton-Du Ponte society fifty feet away.
