He stretched both arms in the air and raised his head toward the glimpse of sky showering down through the opening in the treetops. It was as if someone had carved a sanctuary of artistry into the center of the woods just for him. Even the glare couldn’t pull my attention away from him. The sole performer on a handcrafted stage as unique as he was.
How much longer could I pretend I wasn’t in love with him?
Riley shielded his head from the sun and peered to the edge of the grassy field, where an uneasiness kept me locked in place. His face fell. “What’s wrong?”
“This is obviously a special place for you. I’m not sure I belong.”
“Emma.” His mouth quirked. “I invited you, remember?”
“I know, but . . .”
He picked up a leaf from the ground. Head down, he made his way toward me, sneakers rustling through the grass. He lifted my hand and set the leaf inside it. “I want to share this with you. All of it. It’s beauty, serenity. Help you see what I see.”
His fingers lingered against mine. A trail of warmth traveled up my arm and across my chest. Forcing in a breath, I dropped my gaze to the treasure in my hand. A medley of burnt oranges, auburn reds, and golden yellows blended into childhood memories. After all these years, it still astounded me how a single leaf could embody the splendor of an entire forest.
Instead of absorbing the vibrant fall colors, Riley kept his eyes on me.
The leaf’s momentary diversion vanished without any chance to reclaim it. I pulled my hair to the side, shifted the coat he’d lent me. “What?”
Riley rubbed his neck. “You’re not making this very easy for me.”
“Not making what easy?”
He rolled a branch on the ground with his shoe. “Holding back hope,” he said quietly.
Hope for what? I couldn’t ask. Not with the vulnerability written on his face. The same vulnerability conquering my heart. I fled to the boulders and studied the moss’s bristly texture, desperate for a diversion. “How’d you find this place?”
He headed toward me again. “By accident, actually. I was stuck on a song and needed to take a step back from things, you know? So, I grabbed Jake and we kept driving until I saw that trailhead. Jake must’ve caught the scent of some poor squirrel. You should have seen the number of scratches I had from plowing through all the underbrush and tree limbs to catch up to him.”
He ran a finger down his forearm, where he probably had some scars under his long sleeves. “But it was worth it. One step onto this secluded clearing, and I knew I’d found something special.”
He looked right at me, every inch of him teeming with emotion. “It’s funny. You always find the most extraordinary things when you’re not searching for them. But once you’ve found them, it’s hard to let them go.” He lowered his head. “Even if you know you should.”
He had no idea. I searched for my voice, which I’d lost somewhere within the collapsing space separating Riley’s body from mine.
I shuffled backward. “Who else have you brought here?”
Did I really just ask that? I gnawed my lip, not sure I wanted to know the answer. The way girls ogled him in public, he could have his pick from a list lined down the street.
Riley toyed with the hem of his pullover. “Only you, Emma.”
The wind rippled over the leaves, his words over my heart.
“I assumed . . .”
“Assumed what? That I didn’t mean it when I told you you’re special?”
The entire forest paused, awaiting my response. I snapped a branch off a fern, stroked its feathery leaves, and prayed for even an ounce of serenity to return.
Riley drew me around by my hand. “You’ve been hurt before. I can see it.”
“That’s what happens when you give your heart away.”
A mixture of compassion and sorrow creased his face.
I wanted to hide, prevent him from looking at me the way others had. But I couldn’t run from him anymore than I could from my past. “It’s my own fault. In high school, I let myself get caught up in the ideal of love. Turns out it was only a competition. Guys competing for the sexiest trophy girlfriend. Girls willing to give anything for affirmation. Even their self-worth.”
I chucked the branch into the forest and cringed at the way I’d played the game of seduction. Maybe I’d played a part all my life. One role after the other, trying to find approval. Trying to be who others wanted. “It’s kind of sad, but the longer you give in to the label people place on you, the easier it is to believe. No wonder they expected—”
Riley’s hand fell from mine. “Expected what?”
“The only thing they saw when they looked at me.” And I’d been stupid enough to give in to their empty backseat promises. Offered them everything, believing I’d found the kind of love my parents had.
“I thought college might be different. Hoped I’d find what Dad taught me to dream for, but the first half of freshman year was a complete disaster.” I braided the fringes on the end of my belt and dodged Riley’s gaze.
“If I wasn’t already letting Dad down enough by having zero idea what career to choose, then I had to go and top it off with falling for a charming upperclassmen who ended up being ten times the jerk my high school boy friends were. The worst part is, I knew better.”
A deep inhale expanded across my shoulders. “But I got my head on straight by midterm, buried my heart again. All that practice being strong for Mom kicked in. I poured myself into my studies, got on the dean’s list, and stopped tripping over relationship roadblocks. Simple as that. You can’t get hurt if you can’t feel, right?”
Riley’s jaw constricted. “It’s not your fault, Emma. Passion blinds people. I should know.” He looked at the sky, pinched the bridge of his nose, and exhaled.
“Your dad wouldn’t be disappointed in you wanting to believe the things he taught you to hope for. You deserve someone who’ll treat you right. Someone with self-control, who will put you above his own desires.”
The vast blue of the sky filled his eyes when they met mine again. “Don’t give up on that dream, Em. One day, you’ll find it.”
A weighted gravity came over him—his expression, his voice, his movement. A gravity that cut through my feigned confidence and nearly pulled me to the ground with a realization I couldn’t keep ignoring. Despite everything I’d just said about guarding my heart, I stood there, holding it in my hands in front of the man I loved.
Jaycee’s words echoed between each pulse. Tell. Him. How. You. Feel. I swallowed, my mouth turning to cotton. “Being with you . . .” Breathe. “. . . Riley, you help me to have faith to dream again. To believe the risk is worth taking.”
Riley’s gaze jerked away from mine. “You give me more credit than I deserve.”
I stretched forward. “And you don’t give yourself enough.”
He turned toward the fir trees and shook his head. “What if I’m not the guy you think I am?”
“Is this about your past? Because whatever happened, it doesn’t matter. You’re . . .” Every word I’d said to Jaycee pounded in my chest, raced to my lips. Words that would expose how much I loved him. Needed him. Words that stayed lodged in my throat. I plucked off another fern branch and tied it in a knot as tight as my insides felt. “You’re different from other guys.”
An edgy huff clipped off my response. “You’re wrong.” He turned again. The pain in his eyes bore straight into his voice. “You don’t know what I’m capable of.”
My heart wept over the lines of turmoil etched across his face. I moved toward him, but he held his hand up to stop me.
He raked his fingers through his hair and released a long breath. “I never resented my dad more than the year he dragged us to Nashville. While he was out trying to convince agents he had enough talent for a record deal, my mom had to work two jobs to make ends meet. That left me to keep an eye out for Melody and Jasmine.”
Riley kicked a loose rock into the woods. “We rented an
apartment in the only part of the city we could afford. Our landlord was a total skeezeball, but Dad insisted we stay on his good side, not do anything to get us kicked out. It was hard enough restraining myself when I saw the creep hit on my mom. But when I caught him with Melody, I lost it.” He balled his hands into fists at his sides.
“Every ounce of fury I had in me—all those years of pent-up anger toward my dad, all the emotion I’d stifled for him—took over. I heard the guy’s rib break with the first punch, but I couldn’t stop. Nothing mattered. Not the amount of blood. The broken bones. Even his wounded yells. I didn’t stop swinging until some neighbors wrestled me off him.”
It felt like someone had me locked in the same wrestling hold, the air trapped in the vacuum of guilt Riley must’ve still carried from a mistake he’d made all those years ago. Guilt I would’ve done anything to take away.
I crossed the boundary line he’d erected earlier and rested my palm on his unshaven cheek. “You were protecting your sister. She was just a little girl.”
“That doesn’t justify losing control. You didn’t see what I did to him. Who I became. I could’ve killed him.”
“But you didn’t.”
He looked away and knotted his fingers in the back of his hair.
I angled my face under his. “You’re wrong. About what you said earlier. I know exactly what you’re capable of. Fighting for those you love and believe in. Putting them above yourself. Living with transparency, passion—”
“That’s the problem.” He laughed sadly. “At least my dad had one thing right. I should keep my passion buried. I’ve seen what it does to people. Myself included.” His strong, confident features languished behind the image of a boy who lacked his father’s acceptance. “I try, Em. Try to be who I’m supposed to. But sometimes . . .”
“Being passionate isn’t a flaw. It doesn’t discount your value. It adds to it.” Couldn’t he see that?
His glassy eyes found mine. “You don’t know how much I wish that were true.”
“It is.” My hand drifted to his shirt. “I’m not saying what you did to that guy was right. I’m saying grace is as much a part of life as passion is.”
His chest rose and fell underneath my palm, breaths deepening with the way he looked at me. A damp draft blew across the field. He tucked one side of the Columbia coat he’d lent me inside the other, his touch providing enough warmth on its own.
Was this how Mom felt about Dad when she first fell in love with him? Willing to risk everything to be close to him? Loving him more than she understood? Enough to offer her heart completely?
I set my fingers over his, drew his palm toward my lips, his body closer to mine, and leaned in. My heart, my mouth—nothing withheld. His forehead furrowed at my touch. He shrank back, inhaled, taking my heart with him and leaving a cold realization in its place.
He didn’t want to kiss me.
His fingers traced over a frayed tear along the front of the coat he’d given me, his expression equally as torn.
“I’m sorry, Riley.” Please tell me I haven’t ruined his coat and our friendship.
“It’s always been there,” he said, voice painfully soft. “Some tears are harder to hide than others.” His hand dropped from the coat. “Don’t ever settle for anything less than your dad’s dreams for you.”
He backed up, paced toward the trailhead, and stopped. He turned and met my gaze then, but something had changed in his eyes. “I promised I’d get you home before it got too cold.”
His words chilled far more than the dropping temperatures. Had I imagined the way he looked at me? Misinterpreted? I squeezed the sides of his coat tighter across my torso like a tourniquet to keep the truth I feared from reaching my heart.
He didn’t want me.
chapter fifteen
Preservation
Parked in front of my apartment, the car’s overworked engine echoed the churning in my stomach. The automatic unlock clicked into the same silence that had drawn out the ride to campus past what I could bear.
Riley rounded the bumper. The walkway to the front door seemed to stretch farther than the drive home had. What could I say to the guy who pulled away when I almost kissed him?
Head down, he stalled on the stoop. “Emma, I—”
The door blew open behind us. A red-eyed, sniffling version of Jaycee’s four-year-old nephew bounded from inside. Jaycee and her sister scurried after him, Trevor right behind.
“Enough with the whining, kiddo.” Sabrina stopped beside us, a once-neat bun half-unwound down the back of her neck. She massaged her temples. “Sorry. We’re overdue on naptime.”
I squatted to Marc’s level and brandished the best private eye look I had. “Hmm. Freckled cheeks. Chocolate mustache. Looks sorta like the Marc Toberty I know.” I leaned in and took a whiff. “Smells like him too. But I think we might have an imposter here.”
Marc dragged his runny nose over his sleeve. “Miss Emma, it’s me.”
Arms folded, I tapped my foot. “I don’t know.”
“It’s me! See?” Hands in the air, he twirled in a circle, and I had to bite my lip to keep from giving in to his cuteness.
“Well, there’s really only one way to be sure.”
He must’ve known what was coming. With a running start, he tore off down the sidewalk, giggles erupting. I scooped him up and tickled him under his flailing arms. The raspberry I landed on his chubby neck almost out-rang his high-pitched squeals.
“Now, there’s the Marc I know.” I tapped his chin. “See, aren’t giggles way more fun than tears?”
Cheeks reddened, he caught his breath and nodded.
I winked at Sabrina. “All better now.”
She shook her head. “Thank you. You’re a gem.” She squinted at my face. “Ooh, sorry about the chocolate. Luckily, it didn’t get on your clothes.” She waved on her way to the driver’s side of her Volkswagen while Jaycee helped Marc into his car seat.
Riley drew close and wiped the fingerprint-sized chocolate residue from my cheek. “You have a way of touching a boy’s heart, Emma.”
Trevor’s gaze ping-ponged between us. A minute later, he patted Riley on the arm. “You staying for dinner? Em can make you her specialty. Frozen meal in a bag.”
“Hey, don’t knock my frozen meals. They’re a classic.”
Riley rubbed a knuckle over his jawline. “Tempting, but I should get going. There’s a song I need to work on tonight.”
Trevor clasped his hand. “Next time, bro.” He intercepted Jaycee on her way to the porch and steered her into the apartment, leaving Riley and me outside. Alone.
Riley’s gaze fell on my coat. His coat. I started to shuck it off, but he stopped me, his hand over mine. “Keep it.”
Why did he have to make my heart beat like that?
He stowed his hands in his pockets and dragged his shoe up and down the front of the stoop. “Emma, what you said today . . . being with you . . . I . . . I had a nice time.”
Was he trying not to hurt my feelings? Nice but not enough. I swallowed the sting. “What are friends for, right?”
He looked backhanded. His shoulders followed his crestfallen stare at the ground. “Right. I should get going, then.”
I managed to nod. Words wouldn’t come out even if I tried.
Riley’s taillights bled into the distance, and for the second time that night, my heart stopped.
In the stairwell, I took off Riley’s coat—his scent, the warmth he provided, the feeling of his arms, the memory of today—and folded it into a tight, compact square. I shut the door and leaned into it, my grasp on the knob the only thing keeping me standing.
“Everything all right?”
My lids blasted open to the sound of Jaycee’s voice coming from the couch.
Trevor took one look at me and broke into a karaoke version of Taylor Swift’s “Love Story” in perfect falsetto.
“Really, Trev? How old are you?”
“Twenty-two,” he sai
d right before busting out another of Taylor’s singles.
“How do you even know the words to that song?”
He tossed his arm around Jaycee. “Have you ever taken a road trip with my fiancée?”
She swatted him in the chest. “Hey, if I gotta listen to Dave Matthews Band, you can listen to Taylor Swift.”
He scooted forward, hands out. “See, Em? Love’s a give and take.”
“Wow, we are so not having this conversation right now.” I tugged off my boots. They could be useful weapons, even if they were flats. “Riley and I are just friends.” He’d made that clear enough.
Trevor exaggerated a head roll. “Right. I always come home from hanging out with a friend all flustered and having difficulty breathing.”
The leather boot crinkled in my hands. “You’re seriously trying to get yourself smacked, aren’t you?”
Jaycee set her coffee mug on the end table. “All right, babe, give her a break.”
“Thank you, Jae.” I glared at Trevor. “Glad to see my friend sticking up for me.”
“Oh, c’mon. You know my badgering is out of love. I’ll stop. I swear. At least for now,” he amended with another obnoxious grin. “Honestly though, sometimes you can really be blind. I know you have to figure it out for yourself and all, but we’ll be on the sidelines if you need us to kick you into reality.”
“Thanks, Trev. I can always count on you for a good kick in the rear.” But the only reality check I needed was the reminder that I shouldn’t let my heart escape any further than I’d already let it roam. Hadn’t I learned anything?
Evidence of Jaycee’s trip to the grocery store greeted me from the kitchen counter. Four bottles of flavored liqueur bookended the coffee pot. I opened the freezer and caught a domino ripple of boxes spewing out. Classic. I punched in the minutes on the microwave. “One frozen dinner coming right up.”
Tray in hand, I ducked past the living room, hoping to bypass Trevor this time.
“Oh, Em, wait.” Jaycee sprang up from the couch, a business card in one hand, a book in the other. “Miriam gave this to me a week ago. It’s contact info for an internship possibility. One she didn’t get, I guess. Since you already have one, I stuck it in my book to give to you later but ended up totally forgetting about it. I’m so sorry.”
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