Page 126 of Show Me How
“Gah!” She brings her hands to her hair, nearly ripping at it. “You’re dumber than you look, Shade. I thought I was bad, but you take the cake.”
I scowl, scratching roughly at my unshaven jaw. “Insulting me won’t bring her back.”
“No, but maybe it will encourage you to go do it yourself. Because honestly? I’m disappointed in you for rolling over like this.”
“Don’t, Bryce.”
“Don’t what? Slap you with the truth? Jesus, you’ve fallen for that girl, and instead of telling her that, you let her leave!” she yells, exasperated.
I step forward, my chest heaving. “She needs to make her own decisions. If I told her that I loved her, she could have stayed because of that and not because it’s what she truly wanted. Millie has lived for other people her entire life, Bryce. I want her to choose herself again.”
Bryce pauses, her throat pulling taut with a swallow. I lift my brows, waiting for her to speak.
“Did you just hear yourself?” she asks cautiously.
It hits me then. I let my chest absorb the impact of those words. It settles, feeling right in a way I couldn’t have ever expected. A chuckle slips from me, one heavy with disbelief and lingering frustration. Shoving a hand through my hair, I meet Bryce’s fiery stare.
“Tell me what that changes because I still need her to be the person I know she can be and choose what’s best for her,” I declare, stubborn to the core.
Inch by inch, Bryce’s ice melts. “She deserves to know and have all of her options laid in front of her before she chooses, Shade. I’d bet the only reason she went with her dad was because she didn’t know staying here and being with you was an option.”
“How wouldn’t she have known that? Would telling her I loved her have made that much of a difference? I’ve already moved her into my place, and fuck—I offered to apprentice her this morning.”
“Those are things any of us would have given her, Shade. They don’t necessarily declare love.”
“Fuck.”
“You can’t let her stay away. She’s . . . it’s not right to let her go without trying,” Bryce mutters, staring me dead in the eyes. “And that guy with the god-awful ring? He’s not her future. Don’t let him be.”
“Shelly’s going to tie me up and set me out on the lake in a canoe when she finds out Millie’s gone.”
“Maybe. But only if you stay and let her find out.”
“What are suggesting I do, then, Ice?”
Bryce lifts her chin, smirking. “First, we get your head out of your ass and back where it belongs, and then we come up with a plan.”
MILLIE
My mother has hardly let me out of her sight since I got back home yesterday.
She’s taken my bedroom door off its hinges and has Chadwick staying in the room across the hall. Despite the fact that he owns his own home, he’s been unofficially moved into mine. I shouldn’t have expected much else, considering the way I left things.
The wedding has been the topic of discussion since the moment I sat on the private plane. First, it was the fallout I caused that took weeks for my father to resolve, then the clear guilting of how my actions forced the legal team to rework all of the paperwork that was set to be signed after the ceremony that day. They’re all things I don’t care about, but I sat and listenedanyway, too lost in my own thoughts to begin to think of what I should say in defense of my actions.
There’s no real excuse, though. Not one that neither my parents nor Chadwick would consider relevant in this situation.
I stare at my ceiling, lying in a coffin disguised as a bed. The clock showed that it was past ten in the morning the last time I checked. My freedom is a mirage, but at least I’m alone right now.
Beneath my pillow, I hold my phone, keeping it hidden. The few texts I’ve received since leaving Oak Point yesterday have come from Lacey, and it’s clear she doesn’t know I’m gone yet. Shelly doesn’t text, really. I’ve debated sending one to her anyway so she hears it from me and not someone else in town.
I haven’t, though.
My chest feels tight, pained. The sharp pain in my belly with every memory of Oak Point brings tears to my eyes that I let fall, unable to help myself. Being here is wrong. This house feels like a tomb instead of a home now that I’ve felt the warmth of a real one.
He hasn’t texted or called.
I keep holding out hope that he will. That Shade will be the one to reach out and tell me to come back. It’s unfair to expect that of him, though. He doesn’t owe me a life with him, even if I’m sure that’s what I want.
