Page 119 of Green Flag
“Don’t make this about me,” she snapped, scooting back on the bed. “He groomed you. Oh my god.”
“I’m okay,” I said. “It wasn’t because of my age— I was mature for my age—”
“Don’t,” she rasped, avoiding my eyes as her thoughts seemed to race. “Are you actually making excuses for him?”
“No, no,” I said, unsure as to why I had said that. So she wouldn’t make the same mistakes as me? So she knew it was different?
“Your mum was in the hospital!” she cried. “You spent…you spent the summers at his. I wasn’t allowed to go because… oh mygod.”
She held me then, throwing herself across the bed to wrap her arms around me and squeezing me tight. “I’m so… I’m so sorry, Ever.”
What did she have to be sorry for? She couldn’t have known. She was eight at the time.
No one would have known.
Because I’d been mature for my age. Because I’d thought he loved me.
I didn’t love Luca Mendes, but I could picture it — what it would feel like to be consumed with adoration for someone and receive it too.
And I hadn’t thought about it until then, but it was a different feeling with Luca. A feeling that made my smile secretive, afeeling that crept in at moments that didn’t have any business being about him.
It wasn’t full of concern or doubt. It wasn’t a dependent need.
It was excitement and joy and… I really liked Luca Mendes.
Fia’s tears hit my shoulder, and it was only then that I realised she was shaking in my hold.
I’d been thinking of her as young and emotionally out of her depth. Reckless and completely unready for any kind of responsibility but here she was showing me all the emotional maturity I hadn’t expected.
“Fee, I’m okay.”
“Dad doesn’t know, does he? How old you were?” She shook her head into my chest. “Of course he doesn’t. Pedro wouldn’t be alive.”
He certainly wouldn’t be walking onto the StormSprint tracks if Dad knew. He wouldn’t be walking anywhere.
“He shouldn’t be alive.”
“Don’t you go getting prison time, now,” I said and brushed back her hair through my blurry vision.
“I wouldn’t get caught,” she said as if I were stupid, wiping her tears as anger took over. There, the maturity slipped.
She might play netball and have five languages under her belt, but I doubted either of those skills would help her, firstly, commit murder or, secondly, get away with it.
“What does Luca think? He could easily kill him.” When I didn’t respond, she frowned, deep in thought. “Does he know you’ve been messaging him?”
My body locked up. I glanced up and she had the dullest look on her face, daring me to deny it.
“It’s not like that,” I whispered.
She breathed in deeply, her voice sharp with betrayal. “He messaged you last night. I saw it on your phone.”
She closed her eyes when I didn’t reply and a single tear slipped out.
“He came to StormSprint…” Her eyes jumped up to mine, watery and alarmed. “Was that to see you?”
“It was—”
“Did he see you?”
