Page 132 of Always: A Legacy Novel

He knew that now, too.

First love was poison.

It infected like a disease, and spread like a wild fire. It was something he couldn’t seem to get rid of with her. He couldn’t get rid of this way he felt, even when she was breaking his fucking heart all over again. It pushed wide open like an ocean, and pulled back in like a tide ready to drag and drown.

First love was pretty and dangerous.

First love made it hard to let go.

Cross kissed the crown of Catherine’s head, and then his lips ghosted over her hairline, and to her forehead. Soft and easy, slow and gentle. But he still let her pull away when he was done.

Even though it hurt.

Even though it killed.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry,” she whispered.

He shrugged.

That was easy, too, right?

“I just need to figure some—”

“It’s all right, Catty.”

Except it wasn’t.

Not at all.

Cross used his thumb to wipe the tears sneaking from the corners of Catherine’s green eyes. He didn’t need to ask then if she understood what she was doing to him—again—because he could see all too damn well she was doing it to herself, too.

He didn’t know if that made it better or worse.

“Friends,” he said, his voice a rough murmur. “That’s what you said, right?”

She nodded. “Yeah.”

He couldn’t just be friends with Catherine Marcello. He didn’t know how to be just anything with a girl he was pretty sure he had loved since she was thirteen. A girl who watched him with pretty eyes, and he smiled with a bloody mouth. He didn’t know how to be just anything with her, but he didn’t have a choice.

He hooked his pinky finger around hers, holding tight.

“Friends, then,” he said.

“Friends,” she echoed.

Cross’s fingers circled tight around Catherine’s wrist for a quick second, and his thumb rolled over her pulse point to feel her heartbeat. It raced.

Like his, too.

“You need anything, you know where I am, Catherine. I’ll always have your back, no matter what. For anything, all right?”

“Yeah, Cross.”

One more kiss to her forehead, and he wiped the last tear on the tips of her eyelashes away, before saying, “You know I love you.”

“Promise?”

It was torture.