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He shook his head and walked away. It was the last time we ever talked about what I’d done.
“Rip? Rip!”
The shout pulled me from the memory. I found Trevor staring at me. “Sorry, I got lost in a memory of something.”
He gave me a look that said he understood. “You need to take a break? You’ve been busting your ass all morning.”
“No, I’m good.”
We normally used the machines to gather up the hay bales, but Trevor thought some manual labor was needed today. It was an unseasonably cool day for May and it looked like a storm was fixin’ to blow in. I was still sweating my ass off, though. Of course, I’m sure my hangover wasn’t helping.
“You boys in the mood for a party?”
I looked up to see Steed on a horse.
“What kind of party?” I asked.
“A welcome home party for Chloe.”
I wiped my brow and smiled. “She here yet?”
He returned the smile, but something wasn’t right. It was almost like he couldn’t look at me. “She’s about an hour or so away. Mom, Paxton, and Waylynn are cooking up a feast. Alyssa and Mike will be there. I know Chloe would love to see you there, too, Rip. Especially since y’all haven’t seen each other in a few months.”
I nodded. Our friendship had survived that dreaded day. Only because Chloe chose to pretend it never happened. She still came to all my games and cheered me on. She came to parties with me as long as Mike and Alyssa were there. Anything that would keep us from ever possibly being alone. It was hard because I had tried like hell to get Chloe to talk to me. To talk about that day. I needed to tell the truth. She had come out of nowhere and admitted her feelings. To say I’d been scared shitless was an understatement. I tried for three months to talk to her about it before I finally gave up.
Then I met Heather. She had come on to me pretty hard one night at a party, and I had been truthful with her and told her I was in love with Chloe. She knew the whole story and didn’t care. Heather and I hit it off and dated for a while. She was the girl I lost my virginity to. She was the girl who made it her mission to make me forget about my first love. It would never happen, and she and I both knew it. We hooked up off and on over a few years. It never amounted to anything. It was just physical. I couldn’t do more than that, not when my heart was already owned by one girl.
Heather was Chloe’s cue to move on and start dating, as well. She dated a few guys here and there. One she saw pretty regularly for a few months, and I knew that was the guy she lost her virginity to. It nearly gutted me when I overheard Alyssa telling Mike that Chloe had finally had sex with someone. I walked away, almost physical ill. Then she met that asshole, Easton. I fucking hated the guy from the moment I met him. They had been dating for almost a year. Their relationship was one of the reasons I busted my ass in an attempt to graduate early. I couldn’t stand to see him hanging on her. Kissing her. Touching her. I had to get away from College Station as soon as I could.
I balled my fists even now just thinking about the asshole.
“Rip? You’re going to pop a vein. Jesus, what are you thinking about?” Steed asked.
My eyes bounced from Steed to Trevor and back to Steed. “Nothing, sir. Sorry. Yeah, I’ll be there. What time?”
“Six.”
“We’re almost done so we’ll have plenty of time to get there,” Trevor said.
After Steed rode off, I went back to grabbing the bales and tossing them onto the trailer, faster and harder than before. I was pretending like each hale of bay was that dickhead, so my energy knew no bounds.
“Stop for a second, will ya?” Trevor said, pulling off his gloves and tossing them onto a bale. “Sit down.”
I did as he asked, taking the time to reach for my water.
“I have a feeling I know what you’re going through.”
“What do you mean?” I asked, wiping the sweat off my brow with my shirt sleeve.
“If I had to guess, I would say you got scared.”
I laughed. “Trevor, what in the heck are you talking about?”
“It was Chloe who told you how she felt and you told her you didn’t feel the same. Am I right?”
My smile faded.
He nodded. “But you did feel the same, didn’t you?”
Swallowing hard, I took another drink of water.
“Steed didn’t want to tell you because he knows it, too.”
With a confused look, I asked, “Knows what?”
