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“Yeah?”
“No matter what happens, I have your back. Okay?”
My fingers tense around the doorframe.
I stare at the man who all but raised me. Not only that, but fucking saved me in so many ways to count, I don’t know where to start.
Throat suddenly dry, I nod.
“Him being here, back in your life…it doesn’t have to change anything.”
My eyes narrow, because it almost sounds like he’s…warning me.
“You saying I probably shouldn’t go hunt him down and ask if he wants to be besties?”
His mouth tightens at the corners, bleaching his lips, and it feels like a long moment before he finally responds. “All I’m saying is if it’s true and he doesn’t remember… I can’t imagine it would take much to change that. You get what I’m saying?”
Clenching my back molars, I nod. “Don’t poke the beast. Got it.”
In other words, stay the fuck away.
He nods back, short and sweet, then throws his hand on the gear shift. “Now go celebrate. You kicked ass tonight, kid. Penn State’s gotta be foamin’ at the mouth right now.”
I give him a small salute. “They better be.” Seeing as I’ve got a full-ride there next year, and don’t plan on wasting my rookie season warming the bench.
Throwing the door shut, I turn around and head toward the gap in the fields that lead toward where all the commotion comes from.
Behind me, I hear Dad get back on the road, his tires kicking up gravel.
Heading in the direction of the party, I replay what he said. Everything he revealed about Aston tonight.
Even if it’s just hopeful thinking, my mind keeps snagging on that one little tidbit.
“Aston repressed a lot…blacks out…episodes.”
I think about that awkward little wave he gave me tonight when I was leaving the field. The wary curiosity alighting his gray-green eyes as he looked me up and down.
And then I remember the last time I saw those eyes. That face that seemed so…normal compared to what I recalled, the one frozen in time in my mind. So unlike the monster I built him up to be.
Sometimes, like now, I can still hear that childish laughter. Him singing…
The giggles laced with hysteria as he rocked back and forth.
Sometimes I can still remember the blood that coated his hands, his face, his half naked body. The way it splattered everywhere as he sunk the jagged shard of glass in Rick’s chest. His stomach…
Over and over and over again.
He was just a kid, for fuck’s sake.
My gaze finds my hand, the one scarred, as my steps slow.
So was I.
4
ASTON
Three Weeks Later
