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The practice is grueling, but nobody dares bitch about it, not when we all know what’s on the line.
By the time I drag my quivering body to the locker room, the place is already half empty. I make myself go to the bathroom and take a shower. Pressing my palms against the tiles as the cold water crashes at my back, I close my eyes, the image of Jade flashing in my mind.
Even after hours of running drills, she’s still in my head, as alive as ever.
Her pale skin and deep circles under her eyes. The way those big baby blues looked at me across the room, the sorrow hidden behind them. I did that. I put that look in her eyes, and there is nothing that I can do to make it better.
You kill everyone you love.
Shoving away from the wall, I turn off the water and grab the towel. The pain meds have started to wear off, and that throbbing is back in full force. I make my way back into the almost empty locker room, the process of dressing slow and grueling. It feels like forever until I’m in the car, heading to the apartment.
Parking the car, I get out, grabbing my duffle bag from the back seat, my eyes fall on the sweater in the corner. I pick it up, letting the soft material slide between my fingertips; that familiar lavender scent still clinging to it makes my stomach knot tighter. Still, I bring it to my face, inhaling it deeply.
Jade’s scent.
Soft and sweet, a complete contradiction to the strong woman that she is. A walking contradiction.
She probably left it the last time she was here, the last ti—
I let my hand drop, my fingers tightening around the soft material as I shove the memory back, back, back.
Running my hand over my face, I tilt my head back, inhaling the icy night air, but her scent… still lingers.
Italwayslingers.
I’m about to march inside and find another kind of oblivion when I see it. The light shining through the window I used to sneak through. The shadow standing there. Watching. Waiting.
A lump forms in my throat as her gaze falls on mine and holds it.
I’m not sure how long we stand there, watching each other. It could be seconds, or it could be hours.
That ache inside of me growing stronger, restless.
She was the only person who knew how to calm it. The only person who knew how to bring me peace.
But now that she’s gone, there is only a hollow left.
Somebody must call her name because she turns around, breaking our stare.
And I use that moment to slip away.
CHAPTERTHIRTY-THREE
JADE
“I can’t keep doing this.”
“Prescott,” I try to reach for him, but he pushes my hands away and takes a step back with a shake of his head.
“I don’t want to keep doing this.I don’t want to keep seeing Gabriel’s face every time I look at you.” He takes a step back. “Every time we go to chemo? I remember all the times I sat next to him.” And another one. “Every time you’re sick, I see my brother. Seeing you like this, it brings back so many memories, and I can’t keep doing this, Jade. I can’t keep onhurtinglike this.” And another one. “Don’t make me hurt like this, Jade.”
My knees buckle underneath me, finally giving out. Tears stream down my cheeks as he walks away, and this time, I’m not strong enough to let him go.
“Don’t leave me,” I whisper. “Don’t be like him. Don’t leave me.”
I startle awake, gasping for air. My heart is beating like crazy in my chest, my breathing ragged. I run my hand over my face, trying to even out the rapid rise and fall of my chest.
The same dream has been haunting me for days, ever since Prescott broke up with me.
