Page 94 of Riptide

“You’re telling me this because the person you left me for has now left you,” I say, and even I can hear how disconnected my voice has become.

He has the nerve to nod, like it’s some kind of shared understanding. Like I might feel bad for him.

“It made me realize what I gave up.”

“No, Ryan,” I say, the words sharp but smooth. “What it made you realize is that you don’t know how to be alone.”

His mouth pulls tight, jaw working as he tries to recalibrate the narrative, to twist it back in his favor like he always used to do. “I still know you,” he says. “You and I...we had something real.”

“And now I know better,” I volley back. “Now I understand the difference between being loved and being kept around for convenience. Between someone choosing you and someone only reaching for you when everything else falls apart.”

He takes a step forward, and I move away, not wanting him to try to touch me. But I feel it all the same—the way the space in the room shrinks, the way the air thickens with the weight of what he’s trying to claw back. “You’re seeing someone,” he says, eyebrow lifting. “That guy…he’s a student, isn’t he?”

I say nothing, but I don’t need to. He sees it in my face, I’m sure.

His eyes narrow. “How long before the university finds out?”

“You don’t get to stand in my home and make veiled threats,” I tell him, nostrils flaring.

“Oh, they’re not veiled,” he sneers. “If you think I’m going to sit back and let you—”

“What?” I ask. “Be happy?” I spin around, running a hand through my hair.

He looks at me, stunned silent for a second.

I keep going, because now that the words have started, I want them all out. “You left. You chose someone else. You handed me our life in pieces and walked away, and now you think you can come back because you don’t like what the silence feels like.”

“It’s not just about that—”

“It is exactly about that.” I don’t raise my voice this time, but I feel every word in my bones. “And don’t stand there, pretending this is some act of redemption. You’re not here because you miss me. You’re here because you hate being second choice.”

His hands curl into fists at his sides, and when he speaks again, there’s venom in it. “So what? You’re just fucking students now? That’s what you’ve stooped to?”

The anger comes fast and clean, like one hit on a drum.

“I’m not going to be working there for long,” I say, not for his benefit, but because it’s the truth.

His expression shifts. “What does that mean?”

“It means, Ryan, I know how to treat the people I love with respect, and I prioritize them in a way that you never did for me.”

And maybe I could walk away here, but I don’t. Because I want the truth to stand.

“It means I’m in love with someone else, and tonight, I quit my job so I can be with him.”

The silence that follows is absolute.

He stares at me like he’s trying to recalibrate the world, like he’s looking for the version of me he left behind, but he won’t find him here.

Because that version is long gone.

And I don’t miss him.

Chapter forty

Finn

Therainstartsjustas I hit the edges of campus, fine and misting and completely at odds with the wildfire raging under my skin. My hands are tight around the wheel, my heart lodged somewhere between my ribs and my throat, and the only thing I know for certain is that if I don’t tell him what this is, or what he is to me, I’ll regret it for the rest of my life. I’m done waiting. I’m done pretending like this isn’t real just because it’s scary. And yeah, maybe I didn’t say anything when I should have, maybe I left too quickly, too quietly, but that doesn’t mean I’m not all in.

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