Page 67 of Tulips and Lost Time

“What?”

“You’re still you, Luc! It’s like we’re still in high school. You have Sassy and Belle and Katie and whoever the hell else rotating on your roster. But you feel the need to comment on me dating one guy? One, consistent, trustworthy person.”

“I feel the need to comment on him because according to you, he controls you, and according to my fucking sisters, his nickname is Ten.”

Shut up! Shut up. Shut up!

“Ten?” I press. “Really? You sure as hell took my go see the world for everything it was, huh?”

She shoves my hand off and turns away with a scoff. “Jealousy is not a valid reason to throw a fit, Luca. You didn’t want me, remember? You chose this life.”

“I didn’t choose this dude! I sacrificed my own fucking happiness in favor of what I thought was best for you! I sent you away, so you could experience something other than small town life, so you could open your eyes and see what’s available. So when you came home, you could see me and still know I’m the best man for you.”

“Oh, sure!” she laughs, maniacal and mean. “So I was to toddle off and do as you asked. And in the meantime, you could still see your roster and have the time of your life.”

“I haven’t been sleeping around!” I lose my temper and shout too fucking loud. Brutally aware an audience is the last thing we need, I firm my jaw and bite down on my words, leaning in and grabbing her hip to keep her close. “I haven’t been with a single person since you left, Bear. Not one, single, fucking, person. Because I love you. I was waiting for you.”

“Not one?” Her eyes soften, flickering between mine as she searches for truth. “Three years, Luca. And you’re telling me you haven’t been with a single person?”

“That’s what I’m telling you. Until yesterday, I?—”

“Until yesterday.” She nods, accepting my words with pain slashing through her eyes. “Until yesterday, when you decided you were done proving a point you didn’t even tell me to pay attention to. Until yesterday, when you snuck into the city, spied on me out on a date with my boyfriend, then you… what? Raced back to town, picked up the closest, loosest chick you knew, and went crazy working through three years of frustration? Because poor you, Luca. You’re so fucking hard done by.”

“It wasn’t like that! It was?—”

“And then, what? This morning, you’re walking home from your hookup. And Britt is walking home from hers. And like a totally normal, healthy family, the two of you decide to?—”

But then her eyes widen. Her cheeks pale.

She gets it now. Her brain smashing her with the realization that makes her skin green. “Britt?”

“Bear, stop?—”

“Britt!” She presses a hand to her stomach and heaves. “Holy shit. Holy shit, Luc, you… and Britt?”

“Please, Kari.” I cup her cheek and try to bring her eyes up to mine. “Please just take a second to?—”

She slaps my arm away with a ferociousness that has the sound reverberating along the street, then she shoves me back when I try to charge forward. To stop her. To keep her here.

“You slept with Britt!” She snarls, low and poisonous in the back of her throat. “Are you fucking serious, Luca!?”

“Please, just stop and listen for a minute.”

“I can’t believe she would do that.” She brings her hands up and scrubs at her face until I’m sure she’ll leave marks. “She went to bed with you willingly?”

“Kari—”

“Does she know about us?” She steps around me, angling toward the house. But she doesn’t start that way. She doesn’t take off and leave me behind just yet. “Did you tell her about our history?”

“No, I?—”

“Don’t.” She turns back and looks me up and down. For the first time ever, she regards me the way she would the gum on the bottom of her shoe. “I never mentioned us. And you never mentioned us. Britt was seduced by the man who has the power to ruin lives. It’s hardly even her fault.”

“Kari—”

She slaps my hand away again, spinning toward the house. “I have to live with her, Luc. Whether in the city, or back here. There’s no need for this to ever be mentioned.”

“Kari!”

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