Page 52 of Bound By Fury

His eyes are closed, his head tilted against the wall, but his features tighten as I cross in front of his desk, carefully stepping over him and muttering obscenities as my toes strike the solid metal of his right leg and I almost trip. His hand shoots out to encircle my wrist, steadying me. He still hasn’t opened his eyes.

I yank the sleeve of my blazer from his grasp and pick a seat in the column along the windows. Dropping my bag, I slide into the desk, pulling out a notebook and pen. I’m doodling swirling eyes and triangles with missing bottoms when a shuffling beside me makes me jump.

“Sorry,” Lucas says, amused. “Didn’t know you were gonna be in this class.”

His dimples crater his cheeks in a tentative smile, and I can’t hide the soft stretch of my own lips.

“Why are you allowed to talk to me now?” I ask, shooting right past the small talk. We’ve known each other too long for that.

“Huh?” he asks, running his fingers through his pitch-black curls.

“Don’t pretend like you don’t know what I’m talking about,” I say. “Malachi,” I utter his name like a curse, “clearly hates me. But you’re acting like nothing happened. It’s honestly freaking me out.”

He chews on the end of his pencil, his eyes focused on the folder in his hands like he’s unsure of what to say, but then he laughs, and when he turns to me, his expression is painted with a familiar sense of mischief.

“You know what? He hates me, too.” I fight the urge to glance at Malachi in the background, to see if he can hear us.

“Things have changed, Harper, in ways you’d never understand. Without Lex…” He stares down at his desk as he talks, and I trace the planes of his face with my eyes. “It’s just—he’s different now. I know you’ve noticed. I’ve tried to get through to him, but…”

I look at my fingernails, freshly painted a sparkling cornflower blue, and pray that my curls hide the flush of embarrassment that spreads across my cheeks. God, I’m selfish. I’ve been so busy hating both of them for ghosting me that I haven’t stopped to think about what it must have been like here, after everything. How things might have broken so irreparably, not just with me, but between the two of them as well.

He shrugs. “He’s not going to let me in, and I’m not going to be his second anymore. I don’t live in his shadow. I’m my own person, and I do what I want. But after the accident—I felt so guilty. Kai and I fought that morning because I wanted to say bye to you, and he didn’t want me to come along. Said he had something private he wanted to talk to you about. But I was like, what the fuck, because you and I hadn’t been able to talk since… well, you know—”

The almost kiss. The fight. My regret.

“—and I wanted to tell you…”

He pauses, and my heart is beating in my throat. When I meet his eyes, they’re clouded over and overflowing with something that causes flutters low in my belly.

“You wanted to tell me…,” I whisper, watching as his tongue runs across his bottom lip.

He shakes his head. “I just—I wanted to tell you I was going to miss you.”

When darkness suddenly shadows his expression, I sit up a little straighter.

“But he didn’t want me to come. So we fought about it. And then Uncle Jo overheard us and got pissed because Kai promised he would stay away from you. Told Kai he had to go with the fam to some meeting with these guys from down in Cullowhee, and then they started fighting again, and I didn’t step in to stop it. Kai was already so messed up from the day before, and I… I mean, I should have done something, but I didn’t. I ran.”

I suck in a breath, hiding my trembling fingers beneath my thighs.

“While I was running to you, hoping to say goodbye, you were already driving away. An hour later we got the call. His parents were gone, and he and Lexie were going into surgery.”

It’s taking everything in my power to not burst into tears.

Lucas clicks his pen over and over as he speaks.

“For a long time I thought, if only I’d stood up for him, he wouldn’t have been in the car. Lexie would still be alive. We’d still be okay…” His face is splotchy with color and his eyes are red and shining at the mention of his little cousin.

The door to the classroom slams shut, and we jump, our heads whipping toward the sound. Confused, I scan the room and realize Malachi is gone.

My chest is heavy, each breath stinging inside my lungs.

“Shit,” Lucas mutters. “I didn’t think he was paying attention to us. I’m sorry, I should—I’ve gotta…” He throws his stuff in his bookbag as he stands, his chair scraping loudly across the linoleum.

“No, um, of course you should…” I gesture to the front of the room.

He shoots me an apologetic look before standing and flinging his backpack over his shoulder. I stare at the door as it shuts quietly behind him.

All this time I was wracking my brain, trying to figure out why they were so mad at me. Turns out Lucas was maybe never even mad at me to begin with. Malachi was clearly angry because I almost kissed Lucas, or maybe because of all the horrible things I said that night? But he was going to come say goodbye before his dad forbade him. Before everything changed.