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My heart drops into my stomach. It’s so soon. I knew this conversation was coming, but I had hoped that I would know what was going on between Hayes and me before it happened. Now I’m at a crossroads, and I have to choose…
The dream job I’ve wanted since I was a little girl, or the guy who has my heart in his hands but can’t tell me if he’s going to keep it or throw it away.
Owning a bar,you see a lot of people celebrating their twenty-first birthday—especially when your co-owner went viral and they come to see him specifically. Before Laiken came back, each time a group would come in with sashes and tiaras, and the one in the middle shrieking that she’s twenty-one, I would think about her birthday coming up.
I’d wonder what her plans were going to be. Who she would spend it with. What her first drink would be. Even just Mali coming to the bar would remind me of it, being as they were only born three days apart. The fact that I wouldn’t be there to share it with her plagued my mind on an almost daily basis.
She’s back now though, and that changes things. As long as she doesn’t vanish in the middle of the night again any time soon, she’ll be here to celebrate it—and I will be the one to pour her first legal drink.
“Cam,” I say as he comes around the corner.
He stops and looks at me. “Yeah, what’s up?”
I think about my own twenty-first birthday, and how it ended up becoming the shitshow that started this all. I don’t want that for her. Or for Mali. This time, we’re doing it right.
“I wanted to swing an idea by you,” I tell him. “It’s about Laiken and Mali’s birthday.”
The smile that stretches across Cam’s face tells me he’s in before I even tell him what it is.
THE FIRE BURNS HOTin front of us. The crackling of the wood mixes with the sound of the waves crashing against the shore. I honestly think I could stay right here, in this moment, and never tire of it.
Owen and Lucas are each shotgunning a beer, racing to see who is faster while Aiden times them. Mali and Cam are off to the side and wrapped up in their own secret conversation. At first, it looks like they’re arguing. But then he leans in and whispers something into her ear and any anger she was feeling goes right out the damn window as she smiles at him, shaking her head slowly. There are a few customers hanging around, but I barely even notice them.
How could I when Laiken is sitting across from me?
She’s messing around on her phone, sipping from a Starbucks cup that I’m almost positive she and Mali spiked before they came here. But if I don’t know about it and I didn’t serve it, I can’t get in trouble for it.
Innocence by ignorance.
I’ve been driving her insane. Not intentionally, of course. I’ve been driving myself insane, too. But she keeps trying to figure out what’s going on with us, and no matter how much I think about it, I can’t figure out what to tell her.
I wish it wasn’t so complicated. That I could block out all of the anxiety that filled the holes in my life that she left behind. It’s not like I’m trying to play with her emotions. I just don’t know if I can trust her again—and the six weeks she’s been back hasn’t been enough to show me that she’s not going to leave again.
But every day, I feel like I get a little bit closer to breaking down the wall I built to keep her out.
My phone dings on my lap and I look down to see a text from Laiken.
Stop fucking me with your eyes.
I chuckle, glancing up at her for a second to see her grin teasingly. Okay, we can play this game.
Would you rather I actually fuck you instead?
She huffs and I can see the way she shifts in her seat in my peripheral vision.
Yes, please.
Right on the bar? Let everyone hear how you beg for me?
Groaning, she throws her head back against the seat and bites her lip. I look up from my phone and directly at her, raising my brows for only a second in a silent question. And when she gets up and starts walking into the bar, it’s not even a full second before I’m up and following behind.
Because I’m right back to where I was—addicted to her and slowly giving her the power to break me all over again.
AS MUCH AS I’VEtried to leave my mom out of my problems, there’s no one better to ask about this topic than her. The answer I need from her is one that I’ve wondered on and off throughout the years, but never more than right now.
Right now, the answer means so much more than it ever would’ve before it.
“Hey, Ma?” I say when I finally get up the nerve to bring him up. “Can I ask you something?”
