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CHAPTER 4
Emily was pushing her dinner around her plate again. Tyler was texting again.
Her parents were bickering again.
She kept thinking of Michael in the batting cage, the fury that carried through every swing. The conviction in his voice as he’d confronted her in the parking lot.
I’m not hurting anyone.
And then that twelve-foot crack had split the pavement.
But worse, she kept thinking of the color of his eyes in the sunlight. The moment of intimacy when all that stood between them was a few links of steel.
.
“You’re leaving?” said Nick.
“Look. Guys ...” Michael sighed and ran a hand through his hair. “I didn’t mean right this second—”
“So you are,” said Chris. “You’re leaving.”
Gabriel had backed up against the wall, and his arms were folded across his chest. “What’s going to happen to the rest of us?”
“Are they going to kill you?” said Chris, his voice hollow.
“Tyler won’t stop,” said Nick. “Just because you’re gone, the rest of them will still—”
“Boys.”
Michael felt their mother come up behind him, felt her slim hand on his shoulder. “No one is leaving,” she said. “People say things in anger all the time. Michael didn’t mean it.”
Three sets of eyes locked on his.
“Tell them,” she said.
Michael looked at his three brothers. He could read the new emotion there: desperation. They wanted him to deny it.
He wanted to.
He just didn’t want to lie.
So he shrugged off his mother’s hand and went for his bedroom.
And he didn’t come out all night.
CHAPTER 3
Emily stared at the door to the shop. Sweat was trickling down her back despite the blasting air-conditioning.
I come on Wednesdays and Fridays.
Maybe he wouldn’t show. Her father sure hadn’t been subtle when he’d called the Merricks. But maybe that would work against her. Just like the other day. Michael had seemed just as surprised to see her—and then she’d gone and provoked him. Sure, her parents had a deal with his, but it felt flimsy. Kind of like those treaties with countries who kept nuclear warheads.
We promise not to use them unless you piss us off.
Maybe she should keep a putter on the counter.
Maybe she shouldn’t have told her parents.
