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I nodded sleepily, nuzzling into him. Still coming down off my euphoric high.
“Yes,” I whispered. “It will. But for one thing.”
Luke’s piercing gaze found mine. “And what’s that?”
Staring through those stormy grey orbs, I managed a smile.
“We’ll have each other.”
Fourteen
KAYLA
It was one thing to have sex in a warm, sun-kissed loft overlooking a beautiful, scenic lake.
But it was quite another to do itagain.
It seemed almost sacrilegious, doing such a thing on the day of Elizabeth’s funeral. And even doing it with her ex-boyfriend, because once upon a time she and Luke had actually been lovers.
That was a really,reallylong time ago.
The whole affair had been a high school fling, and Elizabeth had been the one to end things. For that reason I couldn’t feel bad. I could tell though, as we lay sprawled naked in the cozy little nest Luke had built with his own two hands, that despite his earlier assertions, he still felt some measure of responsibility for our friend’s demise. That somehow, if he’d only zigged instead of zagged, he could’ve prevented her from the overdose that ultimately ended up taking her life.
“She always was her own person,” I told him after our second round, tracing slow lines down his chest with one painted fingernail. “Elizabeth never listened to anyone. What makes you think she’d have listened to you?”
But Luke wasn’t in a self-absolving mood. “We lived in the sametown,” he shook his head. “I saw her at the bars, and probably a little too often. I should’ve known. I should’ve checked up on her.”
“Can’t think of it that way.”
“Why not?”
“Because even had you approached her, Elizabeth would’ve seen right through what you were trying to do,” I chastised him. “She was way too smart for us. Always paranoid, even before she started taking those pills.”
His eyes dropped sadly. “I still should’ve recognized what she was doing,” he said. “She was still taking painkillers even years after that injury. And not just taking them to kill the pain, but also to—”
I shushed him with one slender finger pushed against his kissable lips.
“None of this is your fault, remember? This was on her. This was on Elizabeth.”
His frown faded as I used his own words against him. We lay quietly for a few long minutes, listening to the sounds outside. The whir of autumn insects. The sound of a distant boat motor, humming around the lake.
“Why’d you come back?” I asked abruptly.
“Hmm?”
“Well you went away to college. Accounting, I heard. Or you were studying to be a business major.”
“So?”
“And now you’re here again, at North Glade.” I rolled over, my eyes lingering helplessly on his beautiful torso. All those delicious lines and ridges… I shook my head as I tried to focus.
“So what do youdohere?”
Oddly, he didn’t answer right away. In fact, he looked downright uncomfortable.
“Surely you’re not still slinging produce at the Safeway.”
He laughed nervously. “No. My days of coring pineapple and washing broccoli are long since over.”
