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She pulled back slightly. "I don't need the world, Logan. I just need you."
***
By the time we got back to the bonfire, Heidi was gone. She'd called a friend to pick her up, but wanted to make sure that Amanda knew how sorry she was for the way she’d acted. She’d told the others that she'd call me. I wasn't too fazed. It wasn't me she had to apologize to.
"It's fine," Amanda told them.
"It's not fine," I said. "She should apologize to you."
"Logan." She said my name like I was a kid that needed calming down. "Her heart's in the right place, she just let her emotions take over."
Cam raised a beer. I nodded. He threw it, but it landed a few feet in front of me. Amanda stood to pick it up the same time Lucy quipped, "Weak, babe. I'm so ashamed of you right now." She shook her head.
"So," Jake started. "I take it you're back for good?"
"Yup," I answered. "Or, for as long as this little lady will have me." I kissed Amanda on the cheek.
"Oh no," Micky laughed, then looked at Lucy. "He has turned into Nicholas Sparks."
"Right?" Lucy all but yelled. "I told you."
Amanda's body shook with her giggle.
"Who the fuck is Nicholas Sparks?" Jake asked.
"The Notebook?" Cam answered, his tone serious. "How do you not know The Notebook?"
Jake huffed, "What the fuck is The Notebook?"
Cam gasped like girl. "The Notebook!" he yelled, as if repeating the words would somehow make Jake understand what the fuck he was talking about. "What is wrong with you?"
We laughed.
"It's really good to have you home, man," Jake said. "But if you leave like that again, I'm getting on every plane possible and finding you, and when I do, I'm gonna beat your ass. I'm not even close to kidding."
You could always tell when Jake was angry or serious; his accent got stronger.
"If I ever do it again, I give you permission to do so. But trust me, there's no way it'll happen." I held on to Amanda tighter. "I have way too much to lose. I won't go through that again."
***
We ended up leaving before midnight. Lucy and Cameron had promised they’d take her brothers to a carnival the next day. They invited us along. I knew Amanda would want to. She couldn't say no to the food or the Ferris wheels. Jake and Micky had to leave; they were flying out early the next morning to see Micky's non-aunt's new baby—or something.
"Do you miss your old car?" she asked from the driver's seat of my truck on the way to Dad's.
I shrugged. "Not really. When I was sixteen, a Mercedes was the greatest thing in the world. Now, I just want to be able to get from one place to another. Money could be much better spent on other things."
She grabbed my hand and placed it on her leg. I loved it when she did shit like that. "Yeah?" she asked. "Like what?"
"Like . . . I dunno, for example; malaria. It's the fourth leading cause of death in third-world countries. For ten dollars you can buy a net that helps prevent it, maybe save a kid’s life, you know? Do you know what that means? That means the money spent on my first car, could've bought ten thousand nets. That's ten thousand potential lives I could've saved. I'm not saying that I'm not thankful to my dad for buying the car, or that I don't appreciate how hard he works for that monetary success. And, I mean, you know my dad as well as I do, he doesn't do it for the money. I don't know, I just don't think enough people our age know about shit like that."
She didn't respond, just continued to drive in silence. The occasional street lamp lit up her face. Her brows were drawn, her mind deep in thought.
I squeezed her leg once. "What are you thinking?"
She glanced over at me, as if she'd forgotten I was even here. "It feels like I've fallen in love with you, for the first time, all over again."
***
"This place brings back memories," she said quietly. We were lying in bed in the pool house, side by side, on our backs, holding hands.
"Yeah, it really does."
She turned on her side to face me. I did the same. "Good or bad for you?"
"A lot of good, a lot of bad. Both, I guess."
She nodded slowly. "Me, too."
I moved closer to her, and then flipped us so she was on top. She sat up, her legs folded on either side of me. Her fingers traced the dips of my abs. She had her wrists full of bracelets. I examined each one carefully. "Surely you can't sleep with eleventy-three bracelets on?"
She giggled. "Eleventy-three?"
"Lucy's brother, Lachlan, swears it's a thing."
"Is Lachlan the one that got me to go out with you?"
I laughed. "Yup."
"Good kid." She started removing the bracelets and setting them on the nightstand.
"He's my favorite." I watched her remove them one by one. The last one stood out; it was brighter and thicker than the rest. I'd seen it before. "This looks familiar."
She took it off and examined it quickly before placing it with the others. "Yeah, your dad gave it to me. It's Tina's—his high school sweetheart."
Now I remembered. I'd seen it in pictures of her.
I picked up Amanda’s hands and ran my thumbs on the inside of her wrists, right over the marks. I gazed up at her, her eyes intently fixated on where my thumbs were skimming. I lifted them and placed a kiss on each one. Her breath caught. I felt her body tense above me.
