Page 75 of Shattered

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. Mason is a creep. I’m sorry I didn’t fire–”

“That's not why I’m crying,” Sam corrected him.

“Why are you crying, Sam?” Callum had his hands cupping her cheeks and she knew he could feel the slight tremble in her chin.

She contemplated not answering. That's what she would normally do. She would either change the subject altogether or walk away. But she knew she couldn’t do that. Not with him.

Fuck it.

“Remember how I told you I have a scholarship that pays for school?”

He nodded his head. “Yeah.”

“I think I just lost it.” Her voice broke. She was a mess. A snotty, bubbling mess. The hiccups seemed to mingle between every other word. “I’ll have to postpone my senior year and then I may lose my shot at getting into med school. My entire life is about to fall apart.”

“Sam,” he whispered her name as he brought their foreheads together. “What can I do? What do you need?”

She laughed. It was an absurd moment to laugh. Especially when she could barely string two words together. But what she needed was absurd in itself. What she needed was twenty grand to pay for her next two semesters and she doubted he would have that to freely hand out.

“Something you can’t give me.”

“How much money was the scholarship?”

She eyed him before she wiped the leftover tears from her face.

“Callum.” She shook her head.

“I have more money than you would think.” She could not believe he was going there. She wouldn’t even let Kristin help her with rent and Callum was trying to offer her tens of thousands of dollars. Why did he have to be so damn perfect and nice and kind? Why did he have to hate the one other man in her life that she truly loved like family? “I wasn’t kidding when I said we did well from the shops, and this restaurant was a phenomenal business decision. I have just been stuffing cash into my savings for months.”

“No.” She jumped off his lap. This was something she couldn’t accept.

“I want to help you.” He stood to face her.

“Not likethat. Please. Don’t offerthat.”

“Sam.”

“We are just friends.” She started to walk toward the door.

He stepped in front of her. “Friends help each other out when they need it.”

“Not with twenty grand, they don’t.” Her voice was too high and her heart was pounding. She couldn’t let him offer her anything. Because if she took something from him, she would no longer be just Sam, she would be his new charity case. She would get nothing but pity from him, and that was something she would never be able to stomach.

“Is that how much it is?”

“No. Yes, butno. Absolutely not.” She was speaking too fast in desperation to get away.

“What’s the name of the scholarship? My mom works with the university now, maybe she can help?”

She shook her head. There was no way she would give him that information. If he knew the name then he could look them up and find out they only funded orphans with no families. Then their entire dynamic would change. Then he would truly pity her.

The room had begun to close in on them. She took a deep

breath and tried to slow her breathing, but nothing worked. This didn’t make sense. She didn’t panic. She was able to control herself. She could control this.

But she couldn’t. Not now. She couldn’t control her scholarship, and she couldn’t control all the feelings for Callum that kept making themselves known despite the fact that it would never go anywhere. She couldn’t control the way just looking at him made her happy, or the way his smile caused something in her stomach to flip upside down. She couldn’t control that his laugh was damn near perfect, or how he commanded attention whenever he walked into a room. She couldn’t control how he was in her every dream, her every thought. She couldn’t control his hatred toward Christain. She couldn’t control it.

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