I went straight home without picking Trent up from my mom’s. I needed some time to think. I also needed a drink, and I didn’t like to drink around Trent, even if he was sleeping. I swallowed hard as I drove past Lexie’s cabin and noticed all the lights were off. She was either not there, which made my heart seize in my chest, or she’d gone right to bed.

If she wasn’t there, was she with Tristan?

I immediately pushed that thought out of my head. I had to think,reallythink. I couldn’t risk coloring my thoughts with anger and jealousy and that’s exactly what would happen if I thought about Tristan.

He’d been my best friend since we were in middle school, and the betrayal was almost as bad as breaking up with Lexie. It was a double whammy, and it felt like I’d lost everything all at once.

But my father had told me he’d seen them kissing. He’dseenthem. What reason would he have to lie to me about that? He knew it would cut me to the core. Sure, he’d never really liked Lexie, or Tristan for that matter. He’d said they were beneath me, that both of them were from what he considered “the wrong side of the tracks,” but he’d only wanted me to be happy.

He had known how happy Lexie made me. He’d also known that Tristan was my best friend.

Hadn’t he?

Maybe I needed to talk to him. God knew I needed to talk tosomeone.Instead of drinking myself into a stupor, I called him. It was late, after midnight, but he picked up right away.

“What are you doing awake?” I asked him when he answered.

“Don’t sleep much these days,” he admitted.

I wanted to say I was sorry to hear that, but in that moment I was glad he was up.

“I need to talk to you, Dad. Can I come over?”

“Always, son. Is everything okay?”

I paused. “Not really,” I confessed.

“Oliver—”

“I’ll be there soon,” I said, cutting him off. I didn’t want to have this conversation over the phone.

I broke all manner of traffic laws getting to my father’s place. He was standing on the porch, smoking a cigar, when I arrived.

“I thought you stopped smoking,” I said as I walked up the steps.

He sighed. “I only have one a week.”

“Still. It’s bad for you.”

“Don’t I know it,” he chuckled, looking at me. There was something in his eyes I couldn’t quite name. “What’s going on, son?”

“Do you remember when you told me that Tristan and Lexie were seeing each other behind my back? That you had witnessed them kissing?” I asked, cutting to the chase.

“Of course I do,” he muttered, sitting down on the rocking chair. I sat perched on the porch railing across from him.

“You said you saw them, right?”

“Oliver...”

“Dad, you have to make me understand,” I said, my voice breaking. “Because I’m going crazy. You saw them, right? Kissing? On the terrace?”

“Listen, son. Lexie, she wasn’t the right girl for you. Or at least I didn’t think so, back then.”

“She wasn’t the right girl because she was unfaithful,” I said flatly, but my father wouldn’t lookat me. “Right, Dad?”

“I didn’t see them,” he said finally. My eyes widened so big I wondered if they’d bulge out of their sockets.

“Youwhat?”