6:58.
I look at my phone again. Still nothing. The excitement has long since curdled into something sharp and uneasy. By 7:05, I’m done waiting. I grab my keys. The drive to his apartment is a blur. My thoughts won’t sit still long enough to form anything coherent.
Maybe his phone died.
Maybe something came up with his family.
Maybe—
Each possibility feels thinner than the last. I pull into his apartment complex, parking like a soccer mom late for a game. The engine cuts, and for a second, I just sit there, hands gripping the steering wheel, boutonnière clenched in my other hand.
“Don’t be dramatic,” I mutter, forcing a breath out of my lungs. “Just… go check.” I open the door, step out, and stop short when I see him walking out of his apartment. Relief surges so fast it almost knocks the breath out of me.
Until I seeher.
Blonde and bubbly, hand hooked around his arm like it belongs there. Likeshebelongs there. My chest caves in on itself. I don’t move. I can’t. I just watch, paralyzed.
My stomach turns as she leans into him, head tipping back with another giggle. My neck heats as he smiles down at her—easy, effortless, the same smile he gives everyone. Not the one he gives me. No, this is his public smile. Safe. Not even remotely real.
He walks her to the car, opening the passenger door like it’s second nature. My fingers tighten around the boutonnière box, crushing the petals. “Who’s that?” she asks, her voice carrying just enough in the quiet lot.
My heart stutters as Travis looks up and sees me. And for one split second— just one—I see it. Panic. It’s raw and sharp in his eyes. Hope flickers, fragile and desperate in my chest.
Say something. Do something. Come to me.
Instead, he shatters my heart into a million pieces…
“Nobody.”
My legs won’t move, so I just fall back against my car. I try to play it off, crossing my ankles like I’m just casually here. Like I didn’t just watch my entire world tilt off its axis. He doesn’t look at me again.
Not once.
He rounds the car, gets in the driver’s seat, and a second later the engine roars to life. The tires screech as he peels out of the parking lot like he can outrun it. Outrunme.
The silence that follows is deafening. I stay there for a second, then push off the car, numb, and slide into the driver’s seat. The door shuts and everything breaks.
Hot tears spill down my face before I can stop them, a choked sound ripping out of my chest as my hands slam against the steering wheel repeatedly. “Fuck—!” My voice cracks, the word dissolving into something raw and ugly as I hit it harder, like I can beat the feeling out of my body.
Nobody.
The cruel word echoes in my head. Over and over. I squeeze my eyes shut, chest heaving, hands trembling where they rest against the wheel. Six fucking months and I’m nobody to him.
Then my breath shudders and something inside me goes cold. Not just numb. Not just empty. It’s sharp, precise, andlocksinto place. I drag in a slow breath, forcing my hands to still. The tears stop and the shaking eases. I look down at the crushed boutonnière in my hand. The petals are ruined.
Bruised and useless, like me.
I let out a quiet, humorless laugh. “Yeah,” I murmur, voice hollow. “That tracks.” My fingers loosen, letting it fall to the floor of the car. And in the quiet that follows, I make two decisions. Clear, unshakeable, and final.
I will never give my heart to anyone again.
And I will never—ever—hook up with another straight guy as long as I live.
I stare ahead, jaw tightening as the decision sets like cement over my heart. Lesson learned. The engine turns over and I drive away, leaving the old Spencer Stark standing in that parking lot.
He’s dead to me.
Fifteen
