Page 46 of Purity

“I don’t think seagulls reflect much on morality, but I guess I shouldn’t speak for them.”

I open my mouth and close it. What was I going to say about morals? It was there just a moment ago, rising to my tongue, and now it’s gone.

His deep chuckle makes heat wash over my skin. When I whip around, he’s looking at me with an almost pained expression. “I’m sorry.” He sucks in his lips, but his chest still shakes. “You’re just so cute. You should see your face. If I were a dick, I would take a video.”

A warm smile rises to my mouth. He’s so sweet for bringing the edible today and helping me work through my contract when he’s clearly going through his own stuff.

“I shouldn’t even be high,” I say. “Not when you’re sad.”

He reaches out and picks at a weed poking out from a crevice in the rock. “I’m not sad.”

“Of course you are.”

“No.” His gaze stays fixed on the little leaf between his fingers. “I want him to get what he deserves for destroying my mom’s life.”

My gaze shifts to the bright blue sky, and my murky thoughts grow sharp and focused. I see Cole’s mom, calm and a little demure, but not destroyed. “Did she tell you that?”

“What?”

“That he destroyed her life?”

“God, no. She doesn’t do that. She would never burden me with their marital problems. She didn’t even want me to tell her what happened in Arizona.”

Ah, Arizona. The trip he went on with his dad a few months before I met him. He’s only ever told me about it in scattered pieces.

“What happened exactly?” I keep my voice very soft. “I feel like you censored a lot of it when you first told me.”

He laughs humorlessly, and it’s a brittle sound that makes me want to hug him. “I caught him in the act. I actually saw him fucking another woman. It was…” he shivers, “…disgusting.”

He jumps a little when I set my hand on his arm. “And probably traumatic,” I say.

“I don’t know. I hardly remember it.”

Because you were traumatized, and that’s how some people cope. Thank God, I’m not so high that I let that slip out. He’s trying be tough about this, and I’ll let him put on the show, since he’s probably doing it mostly for himself. If he were ready to share his true feelings, he would have done it with me already.

I lift my hand and run my fingers up his arm and onto his shoulder, surprised at my boldness. I don’t think it’s the weed chocolate. It’s something else. Something shifted between us today.

It feels like a new beginning.

“I would have been traumatized if I were you. My dad was my hero when I was seventeen. It would have broken my heart to see him doing something like that.”

“You’re an angel.” He grabs my hand and squeezes it before interlocking his fingers with mine. He lifts it to his lips and presses a soft kiss against my skin. “But I think it was good that I found out the way I did. I became much more realistic about love and relationships after that.”

“What do you mean?”

“I don’t think romantic love is real. It’s all based on attraction, and that fades over time.”

I frown. “You think that just because it faded for your dad?”

“I think it fades for everyone, and they all pretend like it doesn’t.”

A tingling ripple runs over my skin. I always thought his whole “I-don’t-do-relationships” thing—which Mari claims only the worst fuck-boys say—was just a symptom of his youth. I thought for sure he would start to feel differently once he got out of college and was ready to settle here in Santa Barbara.

What does this mean for us?

His tender smile pulls me out of my reverie. “Is your brain getting a little fuzzy again?”

I shake my head. “I was thinking about all the couples I know who’ve stayed married until death.”

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