Sucking in a breath, I finally meet those blue eyes. The ones that gazed at me as we danced at prom. Those cerulean, almost translucent blue eyes that watched as I gave myself to him and only him, for what I thought would be forever. Bowen’s eyes had looked at me through all the most important moments of our young lives … and now, he barely swung them my way.
“Oh.” He stops short once he sees it’s me that he’s jumped out of his chariot to rescue.
What he meant to say is, “oh, it’s you,” but the disdain in his tone still gets his message across.
I’m not sure where it all went wrong. My memories of that time are still fuzzy. All I do know is that we crashed and burned, both physically and in our relationship. And I ended up losing the love of my life for reasons he still won’t reveal.
“My car broke down,” I offer weakly, stating the obvious because I don’t know what else to say.
Bowen looks at the smoking hood and walks past me, not even a flicker of kindness thrown my way. He pops the hood and disappears. After a few seconds, I round it, not able to stand here in his presence if he won’t even speak to me.
“It’s fine, I’m calling for a tow. You can go.”
He ignores me. “I’m not a mechanic, but I’d say your radiator is busted. Is this … someone else’s car?”
The way he says it, he might as well ask if I’m seeing someone because his tone is so accusatory. As if he’d even care, which is the strangest part.
“It’s new. I bought it last week.”
“Someone took advantage of you.” Bowen’s gaze is unimpressed.
This treatment makes me want to cry as does almost every interaction with my ex-boyfriend. From high school sweethearts to practical strangers … it was tragic.
And now, it was getting old. Jeez, it was far past old. It was ancient.
“I said, I’m fine. I’ll handle it. You don’t want to help, so go.” My tone has more bitterness in it than I thought I could possibly direct toward him.
Just as the words leave my mouth, the first of the rain starts to fall. Steadily pattering down onto us and the cars, I hold a hand up to cover my head. It does nothing, however, to remediate the sputtering under the hood of my car.
Bowen looks at the smoke, at me, and up at the rainy sky … and sighs loudly.
“I can give you a ride.”
No please, no real caring about the statement, no courtesy. “Yeah … I think I’ll pass.”
My sarcasm must have pissed him off. “Get in the car, Lily.”
The nails digging into my palms bite with pain. “I said I’m fine. Don’t do me any favors now, Bowen.”
Overhead, the sky cracks with lightning, one I can almost feel the electricity of on my face.
“I’m not leaving you out here to fry. Or worse, drown. Get in the car. I won’t be the one blamed if you die.”
His words shock us both to stillness … and I realize he didn’t think about what he was saying until it was already coming out of his mouth.
Because once upon a time, he had almost killed me.
I move before I can think again, running to the passenger side of his car. Bowen follows, a burly figure getting soaked as he angrily stomps through the rain.
The rain sluices the windshield as we drive in silence, the wipers batting it quickly, only for the watery curtain to appear seconds later. It might be cold and damp outside, but inside the cab of the truck, the humidity of our attraction, the chemical way we’ve always been pulled to each other … it’s scorching me.
This night isn’t unlike that night ten years ago, the one that changed both of our courses forever. Rain, lightning, darkness closing in and country roads that bend too easily. Him in the driver’s seat, me in the passenger seat. Some old Tim McGraw song on the radio.
Except we weren’t those kids anymore, the ones who were wild and in love and thought the world couldn’t tell them boo. Those teenagers had their whole lives ahead of them, and they expected to be living them together.
“Thank you,” I croak out.
The truck passes the sign for Fawn Hill, Bowen navigating us through town. He ignores my sincerity. “You still stay with your parents?”
Of course, he wouldn’t know that I bought my own place, finally, last year. We don’t know each other anymore.
“No, I have a townhouse on Conover.” I smile.
“I know the development.” He hasn’t looked at me since we got in the car.
Part of me was hoping he’d say he was proud of me, that he’d always believed I could be independent of my political father. But, like always, he says nothing.
Fawn Hill is deserted, most people are sitting down around the dinner tables with their families at this time. I take advantage of the darkness that’s set in … to stare at Bowen as he drives.
The set of his cheekbones, his eyebrows, his jaw … they’re all filled with so much fury.
As he pulls the car onto the one lane road that leads around the circle of my townhouse community, I direct him to a stop just outside my door.
When he only grunts a goodbye, I melt.
I forget that I wasn’t the only one who lost everything in that accident.
My hand reaches for his face, my fingertips feeling over the rough of his barely there beard. It’s more like five-o’clock shadow and is the exact same shade of the neat cut of his locks. The move must shock Bowen because his head whips to me, and the minute his eyes lock onto mine, I’m clued in on the tiniest shred of vulnerability.
He’s opened the door just a crack, and I search his expression, finding only pain, and it breaks my heart open. Bowen always seems to know how to make my heart weep.
“I’ll say it for the thousandth time, but I hope you hear me. I don’t know what it is I did to make you hate me so much, but I’m sorry.”
I slide out of the passenger seat and slam the truck door in frustration. The prickly sense of old scar tissue being cut open again stays with me for the rest of the week.
Book Two in the Nash Brothers series is coming April 2019! Be the first to see the cover and read the blurb by signing up for my newsletter!
About the Author
Author of romance novels such as Red Card and Privileged, Carrie Aarons writes books that are just as swoon-worthy as they are sarcastic. A former journalist, she prefers the stories she dreams up, and the yoga pants dress code, much better.
When she isn’t writing, Carrie is busy binging reality TV, having a love/hate relationship with cardio, and trying not to burn dinner. She lives in the suburbs of New Jersey with her husband, daughter and dog.
Please join her readers group, Carrie’s Charmers, to get the latest on new books, as well as talk about reality TV, wine and home decor.
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Also by Carrie Aarons
All of my books are currently enrolled in Kindle Unlimited.
Standalones:
Down We’ll Come, Baby
The Tenth Girl
You’re the One I Don’t Want
Privileged
Elite
Red Card
As Long As You Hate Me
All the Frogs in Manhattan
Save the Date
Melt
When Stars Burn Out
Ghost in His Eyes
On Thin Ice
Kissed by Reality
The Flipped Series:
Blind Landing
Grasping Air
The Captive Heart Duet:
Lost
Found
The Over the Fence Series:
Pitching to Win
Hitting to Win
Catching to Win
Fleeting (Nash Brothers Book 1) Page 19