Page 259 of Heartache Duet

I shrug, look down at my hands. “I am happy.”

“You’re also a liar.”

“Mama,” I whine.

“He’s at Duke, right?”

“Who?”

She rolls her eyes. “You know who. Connor.”

I shrug. “I think so,” I lie. I know so.

“You know I can see Cameron Stadium from my window.”

My eyes widen. “You can?”

“Uh huh,” she sings. “Wouldn’t it have been great if you had gotten into Duke…”

I stare at her, right into her eyes, and she stares back, waiting. She knows… she knows everything. “How did you…” I whisper.

“I heard everything you had to say to each other the night we left. Damn near broke my heart, Ava. But what could I do? You’d made a choice, and you were doing it for me, and I love you for that, but now… now I’m here, and I’m happy, but I’m not as happy as I could be…”

My heart settles into my stomach, tied there by the weight of what I know is coming next. “You want me to go to Duke, don’t you?”

She smiles like mothers are supposed to smile at their children. “I need you to go to Duke, Ava. I need you to start living your life.” She reaches up, cups my face in her hand. “And I need you to start believing in magic again.”

FORTY-SEVEN

connor

“Sorry I’m late,” I rush out, eyeing Austin sitting behind the desk at his family’s junkyard. “My training session ran late.”

Austin rolls his eyes. “As if I care.”

I grab my employee card from the shelf and clock in, then highlight the time I got in and make a note that I was late. I don’t want them paying me for the time I wasn’t here. “What are my jobs today?”

“Your job is to look pretty,” he mumbles, tapping on the keyboard. He pauses, looks up at me. “Oh, wait. You do that anyway.”

I chuckle. “These insults are getting old, Austin.”

“I’ll stop when my bitterness does,” he retorts, his shoulders lifting with his shrug. “And it’s quiet today, so there’s not a lot to do.”

I heave out a breath, calm my racing heart. I hate being late, especially for his parents. They’ve been so generous with giving me a job and letting me stay at their house for the summer, and the last thing I want is to disappoint them. I lean against his desk, arms crossed, and ask, “Hey, you think I can take you and your parents out for dinner sometime this week? I just want to say thank you for letting me crash with you.”

Austin shakes his head. “Man, my parents are just happy I’ve made a friend. You don’t need to do anything for them.”

“But I want to.”

“If you insist, sure, but nothing fancy, okay? We don’t own ties.”

“Neither do I.”

“You wear a tie every game day.”

“That’s different.” He eyes me warily while I pull up a chair and sit next to him. “Austin.”

“Yes?” he drawls.

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