Since I’ve only been home for a little while, I haven’t seen Ash. Or Dad, for that matter. Mom told me they were together in his office when I got home, and I wasn’t about to disturb them.
Deciding I need to answer Ash, I send him a reply. Why?
He immediately starts typing, the gray bubble appearing.
Meet me outside? By the pool?
Sighing out loud, I answer. Sure.
I run a brush through my hair and make sure I look presentable. I don’t even want to talk to him. We have nothing to say to each other. Talking to Rylie, seeing how upset she was over what happened to Ash and how he was ignoring her, confirmed that I needed to leave him alone. Let the past stay in the past. We never amounted to much back then, and we’re certainly not going to amount to much now.
He even said so. He never liked me that way. Rylie was just seeing things.
I hate that her words bothered me, but they did. They still do. It’s almost worse that she said it versus hearing it come from Ash’s mouth. All this time I thought he felt the same way I did about us. That our timing was never right. That’s what I always believed.
But no. He doesn’t like me that way. He never did. Proving that everything he said to me was a lie. He’s still an unfeeling asshole. Considering his circumstances, I shouldn’t be surprised. He’s trouble.
Or troubled, as Mom puts it. And who needs that?
Not me.
Realizing I don’t really care what I look like when I go talk to Ash, I toss the brush onto my vanity and leave my room, making my way down the stairs and to the door that leads from the kitchen to the backyard. The pathway lights are on—they always are, they’re powered by solar—and I can see Ash stretched out on one of the lounge chairs, looking very comfortable. As if he belongs here.
Well, he doesn’t. I need to talk to my parents and find out when he’s going to leave. I already know Jake doesn’t like having him here. He said as much on our drive to school this morning. He’s afraid Dad’s going to forget all about him and focus on Ash. I can’t imagine our father doing that, but who knows? Stranger things have happened.
“Took you long enough,” Ash calls when he spots me.
I remain quiet until I’m standing at the foot of his lounge chair. I rest my hands on my hips, glaring at him. “You can’t yell like that. You might wake someone up.”
He raises his brows. “Like who? Your parents’ bedroom is in the front of the house. I’m sure they can’t hear us. And I doubt your sister or brother care.”
Ava would totally care, the little sneak. Jake would just be pissed. For some reason, he views Ash as the enemy. I think he’s just jealous of him. “My little brother is sleeping.”
Beck can sleep through anything. Not that Ash needs to know that.
“Oh. He won’t hear us.” He waves a hand at the lounge chair next to me. “You should sit down.”
“Why?” I cross my arms “I have homework to finish.”
“Fine, let’s get right to it.” He leans back, giving me a chance to really check him out, and I swear he looks worse than he did this morning. All the bruises have become darker, and the cut above his eye is now stitched versus bandaged. “You promised you wouldn’t tell anyone what happened to me, or where I was.”
“I didn’t,” I start, but he cuts me off.
“You told Rylie.”
I clamp my lips shut, staring at him. He looks…pissed. “She’s your girlfriend, Ash. She came to me crying, she was so worried about you. I thought you would want her to know.”
“I wanted no one to know. What part of that did you not understand?” His voice is cold. Like ice. His expression is like stone. “You promised. I thought I could trust you. And you blab your mouth to the first person who asks.”
“I didn’t blab my mouth, you asshole. I told your sobbing girlfriend, who was going out of her mind with worry over where you were by the way, so she would calm down. All she wanted was to know you were all right, and you didn’t have the decency to answer her texts. Which is some straight-up bullshit, if you ask me,” I tell him, swallowing hard. Blood is pounding in my head, in my ears, I’m so pissed. I can’t believe he’s calling me out for this when he’s the dick who couldn’t bother to tell his poor girlfriend he’s alive.
“A promise is a promise,” he says solemnly. “And you broke it.”
I gape at him, my mind scrambling to come up with something to say. He’s being ridiculous. Can he not see I did the right thing?
“I guess I shouldn’t be surprised,” he goes on, looking away from me. “Everyone breaks their promises eventually, right?”
“I thought…” I start, but he whirls around to face me, rising to his feet, positioning himself so he looms over me, making me feel smaller than I already am.
“You made a fucking promise, Callahan. You said you wouldn’t tell anyone, yet you told Rylie, who now won’t stop texting me. She wants to see me, she wants to take care of me, she wants to come over, and honestly? I don’t need her shit right now. I don’t need anyone’s shit. I’m trying to figure this out, and I’m in fucking hiding. Did you know my mom’s asshole boyfriend claims he wants to press charges against me? Isn’t that funny? If Don finds out I’m here, the cops will show up and cart me away to jail. He already turned in the drugs he found in my room to the police. I’m fucked.”
Drugs? What sort of drugs? I can’t ask that right now.
“Rylie would never tell him…”
“No, but she could tell someone, and then they tell someone, and it goes on until they find my ass. Now I’ll have to go somewhere else. And I’ve got nowhere else. This is it.” He reaches out, poking the center of my chest with his index finger. And that one little jab freaking hurts. “You. Fucked. This. Up.”
He has a lot of nerve, blaming all of his problems on me. I guess he’s right that I shouldn’t have told Rylie anything. I should probably feel bad, but I also can’t help but think he’s acting like a complete asshole.
“The police will probably come here anyway, since everyone on the team saw you with my dad,” I point out, but he doesn’t even flinch. God, I hate him. “I was trying to help you.”
“You’re never a help. Ever. More like you’re a giant pain in my ass.”
“Fuck you!” I shove at him, and he goes stumbling backward, teetering on the edge of the pool deck. He’s about to fall, I know he is and I reach out, taking one of his hands, and instead of keeping him upright, he tugs me right along with him.
Straight into the water.
Oh, and it’s cold. Shockingly so. Once Labor Day passes, we usually stop using the pool for the year, with the exception of Beck, who’ll jump in when one of his little friends dare him to, which is basically every other weekend.
I pop up out of the water first, gasping, the water streaming down my face. Ash appears only a few seconds later, making these snorting sounds that concern me at first, until I realize…
He’s laughing.
“What the fuck, Callahan? You pushed me in the pool!” He sounds shocked. Maybe even a little…
Impressed?
“And you pulled me in right along with you,” I mutter, reaching up to push my hair out of my face. I never look good in a pool. Some girls can pull off the slicked hair, strutting around in a bikini look, but I’m not one of them. I’m short and a little pudgy in the middle, and my boobs are so damn big. My hair always goes everywhere, usually streaking across my face in a knotted mess, and I swear, I really do wear waterproof mascara, but I always end up looking like a raccoon with thick black rings under my eyes.