But I don’t want to make a promise I can’t keep, either.
Instead, I tell him, “If you do, it won’t have a damn thing to do with Sherlock.”
His lips curve up as he looks out at the water, but it’s not a smile. It’s too cynical to be a smile. “Yeah, sure it won’t.”
“It won’t,” I say firmly, looking at him until he looks back.
“I don’t care if it’s tomorrow or a week before graduation, Riley, if I find out you’re with him, we’re going to war. And if I go to war with him, it’s not going to be a showcase of stupid fucking high school pranks. If I go to war with him, one of us is going to get arrested.”
His words ignite a spark of anger in me. “I told you, I’m not going to be with him.” Not wanting to sit here any longer, I push myself up off the bridge. “There are a lot of differences between you and me, Hunter, but here’s one of them. When I came over to your house as soon as you came back, heart in fucking hand, and asked you not to be with Valerie, you did whatever you could to hurt me even though you didn’t even like her. I might actually like Sherlock if I spent time with him. And if I did hang out with him, it wouldn’t be out of spite. It wouldn’t be to hurt you. It would be to see if I genuinely liked him. But I’m not going to open that door because I know doing so would hurt you. And you don’t deserve that consideration from me, you really don’t, but I’m going to give it to you anyway, because that’s who I am. Because I do love you, and when you love someone, you don’t hurt them on purpose.”
Hunter stands, too. “If you love me so fucking much, then let’s make it known to everyone. I know you don’t forgive me yet, I get that, but I’m not going to stop putting in the work if you agree to be mine. I will get you past this, Riley. But I need you to give me a fucking chance. If you have one foot out the door, that’s one thing, but two feet? Two feet out the door is really fucking hard to work with when all of a sudden there’s another guy sniffing around. If it were any other guy, I probably wouldn’t be worried, but…”
He stops.
I see realization dawning on him.
He sighs to himself, then looks up at me. “Not him,” he says, echoing the request I made of him that fateful day in his back yard.
That’s so fucking unfair. Asking more of me than he was willing to do himself.
I don’t want to hurt Hunter, but I am tired of the emotional tug-of-war. I know he won’t relent, but I know I won’t, either, and I don’t know where that leaves us. Torturing each other for the rest of the school year?
Maybe I shouldn’t be the bigger person.
Maybe I should end this before we end up hurting each other even more. Force him to let me go, once and for all.
I know how now.
Just like he knew how.
Last time, he broke my heart on purpose.
If I had any sense, maybe now I’d break his.
A knot of emotion gets lodged in my throat. It feels like pain and regret. It tastes like loss.
I knew loving him would be hard, but I didn’t know it would be this hard.
“I don’t want you to go to war with him,” I say.
“Then don’t make me.”
Tears burn behind my eyes. After the day I’ve had, I am mentally and emotionally exhausted. “If I just asked you to let me go… would you?”
Hurt flashes through his eyes that I would even ask, and my vision blurs as tears well up.
“No,” he says, almost regretfully, like he knows what that might mean.
It’s the answer I expected. If I’m being honest, any other answer would have disappointed me.
We’re completely fucked, both of us.
“I’ve gotta go,” I say softly, dashing a stray tear off my face and bending to retrieve my book bag.
“Riley.” His hand closes around my wrist, stopping me from fleeing like I so desperately want to. “Don’t go.”
“I’m tired, Hunter.”
“Come to my house,” he says, his warm brown eyes traveling the length of my body before returning to my face. Despite the heaviness of this day, his eyes gleam with a touch of playfulness since he’s trying to coax me. “We can take a nap.”
I’m tempted to go with him. To let him bury our problems, chase away my sadness. To get tangled up in the sheets with him and pretend that’s a world we can live in.
But it’s not.
Hunter and I don’t work in the real world, we only work when we’re alone.
“I can’t spend any more time in your world, Hunter,” I tell him, my voice so small and sad, I’m not even sure he can hear me. “I don’t belong there.”
Hunter takes a step toward me. His eyes flash with something harsh and fierce. He grabs me and pulls me into his chest like he can protect me.
He’s the one I need protecting from, though. He’s the natural disaster that wrecks me every time he gets too close.
Pushing his fingers into my hair, he cradles my scalp to keep my face pressed against him. Then he kisses the top of my head and says fiercely, “You belong wherever I am, Riley.”
I shake my head. “No, I don’t.”
His grip on my hair eases ever so slightly. He reconsiders, then says, “Then maybe I belong wherever you are.”
I don’t know what he’s thinking, but I don’t care, either. I’m tapped. All I want to do is go home and crawl into bed for a few hours before I have to go to work.
Pulling out of his embrace, I sniffle and tell him, “I have to go.”
“Riley,” he calls out as I turn to head toward my house.
I stop, but I don’t look back.
“Just… stay away from Sherlock, all right? I’ve known the guy for a long time, it’s easy to get caught up with him. Don’t do something you’ll regret just because you’re mad at me.”
If only he had taken his own advice, we wouldn’t be here right now.
I’m not going to make him any more promises, though.
Without a word to acknowledge he said anything, I slide my bag on my shoulder and take off down the path toward my house.
Chapter Fifty Three
Hunter
After a long, miserable fucking morning, I leave the footbridge and head home.
The wheels in my head are turning the whole way there. They don’t stop once I get there, either. I know what I have to do, I just need to make sure Sherlock stays away from Riley while I figure out how to do it.
He’s not fucking right for her, but he is a hell of a distraction.
I don’t want our relationship to take any more damage than it already has, but that picture of them today just about killed me. If Sherlock touches her, I’ll lose my fucking mind.
I won’t love her any less. I certainly won’t want her any fucking less. But I will lose my goddamn mind.
I’ll tear him apart, and with Riley between us, I know she’ll get hit with the shrapnel. She already did that night at the party, and that wasn’t an all-out war, it was just a jolt to my fucking system.
I don’t want to hurt Riley any more. I’ve hurt her enough for a couple of lifetimes. I’ve done more damage than I even intended.