In This Moment(64)

My mouth silently forms the words before I realize what I’m doing. I’m sorry.

Dry-mouthed, white fingers clenching my thighs, I wait for her reaction. One. Two. Three. I take a deep breath and count again. It’s like I’m bleeding out onto the club’s patio and waiting for Mrs. Kearns to notice.

One. Two. Three. Deep breath. One. Two. Three. Before I can take another breath, Jillian’s mother flutters her eyes, wraps her arms around her body and walks away.





CHAPTER FIFTEEN





Cole



I blink against the bright sunlight to make sure that I’m not seeing things. I’m stretching out with the team on the grassy lawn in the center of the track. Today we’re hosting an informal invitational—just a chance for the division teams to showcase what they’re capable of. I sure as shit hadn’t planned to push myself, but then Aimee surprises me by actually showing up.

“Isn’t that your girlfriend?” Quentin elbows me just below my ribs.

With hungry eyes, I swallow and watch her make her way up the stands. She’s wearing a pair of shorts and a plain white top that molds to her chest like a second skin. The air is heavy with humidity so she’s piled all that hair of hers on the top of her head in a messy bun and a few strands have fallen down to play with her neck. When she sees me, she smiles a wide, toothy grin and waves.

Quentin shakes his head. “She’s got a killer body, man. Be sure to give her my number when she finally figures out what a shithead you are.”

I don’t know if I’m pissed because he’s looking at her or if it’s because I’m not really allowed to call her my girlfriend since that’s a label that has yet to be approved. “She’s not my girlfriend. And don’t fucking stare at her. It’s rude.”

“Not your girlfriend?” Quentin cocks his head to the side. “But she is your girl, right?”

I pull on the back of my neck and frown at him. “Yeah, I guess…”

“Then chill, man.” He hooks his arm around my shoulders. “The rest is just semantics.”

Maybe he’s right. I want to believe it.

I’m up in the third heat. Kicking out my legs and rotating my ankles, I settle in at the start. I can feel the tingle of Aimee’s eyes on me and my heart pounds harder than ever. When the high-pitch signal sounds, I push off and I swear that my feet sprout fucking wings.

As I cross the finish line going full out, my body completely jacked-up, I know without seeing the digits on the clock that not only have I easily trounced the pack, I’ve just run my fastest time. It’s mayhem. The guys are on me all at once, yelling and slapping me on the back, hooting in my ears. Pushing back, I lift my eyes to the stands and find her. She’s jumping up and down and clapping like everyone else and this crazy, awesome feeling zips through me and it’s all I can do not to hop the barrier to the bleachers and go to her.

Much later, after I win in the finals and we celebrate with a large pizza and a bottle of warm champagne that I stole from Adam, I watch her while she sleeps. She’s cocooned between my arms and the pillow with the soft light from the TV playing across her features. Using one finger, I trace the faint jagged line of her scar. I kiss each of her eyelids. Her sooty lashes flutter and she mumbles but she doesn’t wake up. I smile and kiss her again, just craving her skin and everything that is inside of this moment.

I wish that she could stay like this—peaceful, no trace of the fear or sadness that she wears around during the day. I hate what she told me last week about the pills and the fucking car. I keep thinking of her voice and how small she had seemed curled up on the seat of my truck.

Suicide. It’s goddamn terrifying. I can’t wrap my head around the fact that this beautiful, brilliant girl ever considered ending her life.

“Hey you,” she murmurs, blinking her eyes open. She lifts her arm and runs her finger from the top of my forehead down the center of my face. “What are you thinking about? You look so sad.”

I grip her wrist. I am sad but I don’t want to tell her that. “Didn’t you have anyone else after Jillian died?”

Her eyelids fall closed and she’s quiet for so long that I start to think she’s fallen back into sleep. Then, she swallows purposefully and I know that she’s still awake.

“No,” she says finally. “I didn’t need anyone else until Jillian died.”

I’m quiet, thinking. Aimee’s arm relaxes over my chest and she wraps her leg over mine. When her breathing has evened out and I know that she’s gone back to sleep, I pull her body closer and breathe in the scent of her hair. “Now you have me.”