"You can come in me, I'm on the pill," she whispered, her breath warm against my ear. Even if she wasn’t, I had a vasectomy years ago.
I released myself into her, the rough texture of the wall against my hand grounding me as the other arm supported Sydney's weight, her body soft and sweaty beneath me.
"Fuck," I gasped, my voice a hoarse whisper, as I gently lowered Sydney to the cool ground, feeling the weight of exhaustion in my limbs. The high was over, I got it out of my system, and now the deep ache was back.
I wanted it to be Amelia. Sydney's presence suddenly disgusted me. The scent of her perfume, once alluring, now felt cloying and suffocating. I felt a prickling urge to flee, my skin crawling with revulsion.
“That was amazing,” she grinned as she put her clothes back on, while also fixing her hair.
I nodded, not showing her the same enthusiasm.
“Yeah, thanks. I needed that.” Without saying another word, I opened the door and left her standing there, feeling the weight of her confused expression as she stared at my retreating form.
She probably wanted me to cuddle her or some shit, but for me, that was just something to release this frustration.
She served her purpose, and now my focus was back on Amelia. I knew that made me out to be an asshole, but I couldn’t care.
The stuffy air pressing on my chest, I descended the creaking stairs, each step echoing slightly. Pushing open the heavy, varnished door, the cool night air, fragrant with damp earth andhoneysuckle, washed over me. There, framed in the doorway's light, stood Amelia.
She stood at the water’s edge, the dark sea before her like a vast, rippling shadow under the moonlight. Each wave crashed with a muted thunder, frothy tips dissolving into the black expanse. I wanted to reach for her, but I didn’t.
I’d always been a coward when it came to the real chase. Once it got too close, I ran. I’d been terrible to her, and that guilt clung to me like a second skin.
Amelia Langston will be the death of me.
9
AMELIA
Tonight,we all lost ourselves in the orbit of alcohol. The others were blasting music, mingling among themselves and making memories that they’d forget by morning.
I stood in the empty corridor, swaying, lost in the depths of the dark. I wondered if I walked out and left, would anybody notice? Would I float away and disappear? Or would my shadow spread and fill the space like fog?
The night was a blur, and the moon glared down from its position in the sky. I remembered being underneath that same moon with Caiden in Colorado. The fury in his stare, the heat of his breath, the strength of his arms as he held me after I nearly drowned in the river.
That moon witnessed our fury, our hunger, our terror, our trauma, our consuming desire for each other. I peered out the window and could almost see Blake’s shadow in the light of the moon, standing in the darkness of the sea, watching.
My breath picked up, and suddenly I couldn’t see straight. Chills lathered my skin. The walls felt too close, too suffocating. I needed out.
Not bothering with shoes, I flung the door open and disappeared into the dark.
The waves were black glass under the moon. Cold, endless, hungry. I wandered where the sand turned wet and hard, the wind flaying my bare arms, the taste of salt and something feral on my tongue.
I needed the night to swallow me whole, needed silence, but the world wouldn’t give it. Every step was a memory, a ghost, a bruise I pressed just to see if I could still feel pain.
Somewhere behind me, laughter spun out from the house, too bright, too alive. I walked faster. My feet left shallow prints, erased every time the water surged up, greedy and quick, swallowing the evidence. I wanted to be erased too.
The sea was a tyrant. Pulling, threatening. I thought about Colorado, about rivers that turned to traps, about cages and glass, terror and heat, and the way Caiden’s hands had bled for me, the way his eyes had promised pain and rescue all at once.
A crunch in the sand behind me. I froze, back prickling, pulse gone fast.
“Amelia.” His voice was low, ruined, smoke-rough from drinking and things he never said.
I didn’t turn. Didn’t need to. I felt him. His presence, his fury, his hunger. My body responded before my mind did: heart stuttering, heat pooling low, legs rooted.
He caught my arm hard enough to make me gasp, spinning me, dragging me into the shadow between the dunes. The moon set his features in silver: jaw clenched, eyes black and endless, mouth twisted in something like agony.
“Why are you following me?” I managed, but my voice was a lie. I knew why. I wanted him here as much as I wanted to run.
