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But I didn’t have to, did I?
The revelation hit me with a jolt of exhilarated relief. I didn’t have to hideanythingfrom her. She knew about the investigation; she knew just how bloody and violent my life had become. I’d locked up my feelings for her to keep her safe from everything else going on around me, but she was mixed up in that now. She was already involved in the dangerous part. Staying away from her and pretending not to care didn’t serve any purpose at all.
A weird sense of freedom swept through me. My throat constricted just for a second as I figured out where to start.
“Maddie, I’ve been thinking about you constantly since that night, no matter how hard I triednotto. You’ve always been on my mind, every single day.”
Maddie blinked at me, hurt flashing across her face so blatantly that my stomach flipped over. Her voice came out taut. “Then why have you been treating me like I’m nothing? Like it was all some horrible mistake you couldn’t wait to get past?”
The pain in those words tore apart my sense of relief with a gut punch of horror. Had I really hurt her that much? I’d known she’d been confused and wanting answers, but I hadn’t seen—or hadn’t let myself see—just how much the situation was killing her.
She’d become so impervious in high school, taking on everyone and everything that was wrong with the place. I’d assumed she’d handle my asshole behavior with the same unshakable strength, that I couldn’t have meant that much to her. But she was shaking now, literally—a tremor running through her body as she waited for my response—and all I wanted to do was wrap her up in my arms as if that could heal the wounds I’d inadvertently dealt.
She wouldn’t want me touching her, though. Not after everything. And I couldn’t fix this mess with a simple embrace anyway.
I ran my hand over my face, my insides in turmoil. “Maddie… You’reeverythingto me. That’s why I stayed away, even though all I wanted was to be with you. It terrified me that you could become a target of whoever went after your dad… and maybe it was partly selfish too, because I didn’t know how you’d react if you found out all the things I’ve gotten involved in.”
Maddie stared back at me, the skepticism on her face like a knife to my chest. “You didn’t just stay away. You’ve been horrible to me.”
I swallowed thickly. How the hell did I make this up to her? “I know. It was the only way I could stop myself from showing you how I really felt. Because as soon as I let down my guard, I knew I wouldn’t be able to keep you out of any of this. So I pushed you away as hard as I could… but I never wanted to hurt you. Fuck, I was trying tostopyou from getting hurt.”
Maddie’s mouth tightened. “I’d rather have had some stranger trying to murder me than be iced out by someone I used to think I could trust. Someone I cared about. I don’t even know how much to believe you now. How can I know you’re not saying all of this as part of some other plan to get what you want?”
I flinched inwardly, because I couldn’t deny that she had a point. As I groped for an answer, her words echoed in my head.Someone I used to think I could trust. Someone I cared about.
We’d had something back then, before I’d started pushing her away. That night in the basement bathroom, she’d wanted me as much as I’d wanted her. So maybe I could show her just how much she’d mattered to me without her thinking I was crazy.
Or maybe she would think I was crazy, but at least she’d know. She’d know everything.
“Actually, I can prove it to you,” I said, and held out my hand to her. “I can show you just how much you’ve been in my mind the past few years. Would you come with me?”
CHAPTERSEVEN
Madelyn
The low-rise concrete apartment building Logan parked outside wasn’t anything spectacular, but as I got out of his car and looked up at it, the occasion felt momentous. I’d known he and the other Vigil guys shared an apartment off-campus, but I hadn’t known where it was, let alone seen it before. And he was going to take me right into their home.
His confession in the Vigil office had left my stomach wobbly. As I followed him to the lobby door, I still felt off-balance. What was I supposed to make of his claims and the intensity with which he’d delivered them after the way he’d chided and berated me through so much of the last couple of weeks? Even right before he’d told me how much I meant to him, he’d been accusing me of only caring about sleeping with Slade.
It was hard to imagine what he could show me that would convince me to trust him.
Logan led the way through the lobby to the elevator wordlessly. Our feet thudded across the cracked linoleum floor. The elevator took us up to the top—third—floor with a little lurch that set me off-balance in a much more literal way. I grabbed the railing along the back wall.
“It’s not the fanciest place, but everything generally works,” Logan said. “In almost two years, we’ve only gotten stuck in here once.”
I just had to hope that this wasn’t my unlucky day, then. Right now, I couldn’t think of anything much worse than being stuck with my stepbrother in a tiny elevator car for hours.
To my relief, the elevator door opened on cue, and Logan stepped to the apartment just down the hall, pulling a key ring from his pocket. He unlocked the door and pushed it wide for me to go in ahead of him.
The main living space didn’t offer much sense of the guys’ personalities, other than they’d all obviously preferred to stick with practicality and comfort over anything flashy. The sofa looked a bit worn but was long and covered with plump cushions. The basic TV stand across from it held a mid-sized flat-screen and a couple of game systems underneath. A four-person table of scuffed maple stood near the open-concept kitchen, where a surprising array of shiny pots and pans hung from a ceiling-mounted rack.
I nodded to them. “Are those just for show, or do you guys actually cook?”
Logan smiled crookedly. “Mostly just Dexter. He uses them a lot, but he takes such meticulous care of them you can hardly tell. When he’s got free time, he likes to experiment in the kitchen—throwing together new recipes like he’s some kind of mad scientist. But hey, most of the time the food turns out great, and Slade and I get to reap the benefits.”
The affection in his voice as he spoke about his friend eased my nerves a little. Logan might have been a jerk to me, and he’d been kind of a jerk to Slade too about our hookup, but hedidstill have a caring side to him.
“My room’s over here,” he said, beckoning me to one of the four doors that branched off from the main room—a bathroom and the guys’ bedrooms, I assumed. “What I need to show you—it’s on my computer.”
