I nodded, shifting slightly in the desk chair, my heart tugging at the mention of his name.
“He kept texting me. Kept reaching out. Just… checking in. Sending little things that made him think of me. Pictures, quotes, flowers. Sometimes it was a joke, sometimes it was nothing at all. But it meant everything. He was the one thing I held onto when the loneliness felt unbearable. He even came to see me.”
A sigh slipped from my lips as a smile followed. Just moments ago, my anger at him had simmered, but now, it was overtaken by something softer. A sweetness. A longing.Love.
“Then, I came home,” I said. “I thought coming back to Faircloud would help with the self-discovery, that maybe I’d find peace in something familiar. Or that the town had changed. Or maybe I had.”
And Ihadfound different… just not in the way I hoped.
“I came back angry—not just at Buck, but at Faircloud too. At everyone who fed the gossip, gave me those pitying looks. I threw all my hurt onto them instead of facing what was reallygoing on inside me. And do you know how I chose to stick it to them?”
“How?” Theo asked, eyebrow raised in wary curiosity.
“By going on a date with the one guy Iknewwould stir up the most talk, the new city guy. Isn’t that just stupid?”
They didn’t answer, but I could feel their hearts softening toward me, understanding what I hadn’t been able to admit to myself back then.
“I thought if I dated someone from outside, someone so unlike Buck, it would prove something—show them that I wasn’t the problem. Thattheywere.”
The irony wasn’t lost on me now.
“He was from the city. Didn’t grow up here. Didn’t carry the weight of my past. I thought that would make everything easier. That he’d be my clean slate.”
But I still hadn’t stopped to feel. To process. To grieve.
“And that brings us to tonight.”
My voice grew clearer. Stronger. Like my mind had finally caught up with my heart. I wasn’t trembling anymore. I was speaking—reallyspeaking—from a place I hadn’t touched in far too long.
“I gave Miles a chance. We went on one date, just one. And it was awful. Horrible, actually. I should’ve ended things that night. I should’ve said no, walked away, shut the door before it even cracked open. But I didn’t. I got out of that limo, and instead of shutting it down, I just… thought about it.”
“What made it so awful?” Penny asked softly.
I hesitated, the memory clawing at me from the inside.
“First, he was rude to the wait staff. Like,embarrassinglyrude. Snapping his fingers. Talking down to them. It made my skin crawl.” I paused. “But that wasn’t the worst part.”
I wrapped my arms around my torso, instinctively soothing the invisible wounds.
“On the way home… he tried to touch me. Tried to take it further. I told him no, repeatedly, but he kept pushing.”
The room went still. It felt heavy. Stayed silent.
My breath hitched, but I pushed through it because Ineededto speak this out loud.
“I got out of the limo. Alone. Shaken. But I didn’t tell anyone. I brushed it off, convinced myself it didn’t matter. That I was overreacting. But I wasn’t.”
And saying it now? It mattered.
“That is absolutely awful,” Penny said, her voice sharp with fury. “I’d kick his ass too. No wonder Logan reacted the way he did.”
“I’m not usually one for violence,” Aspen added, her jaw tight, “but he deserved more than just the punch Logan landed.”
I wrapped my arms around myself, bracing against the part I hadn’t shared yet.
“That… wasn’t even the worst of it.”
Their expressions shifted, eyes narrowing in confusion and dread.