Page 2 of Say You Love Me

Rylee doesn’t let her finish and pulls open the door. “It’s all good. I had company.”

When he looks back at me, I swear there’s a touch of sadness in his eyes. Poor kid. He strikes me as one of those people who have a lot of acquaintances but very few friends. Not real ones, anyway. Not the sort that you can pour your heart out to as we’d done over the past few weeks.

But that was then.

That was the Finity who was stuck, the Finity who needed a restart at life. The Finity who stared at the ceiling for hours on end until a boy with dark curls decided they would be friends. But as soon as I walked out the doors, I wasn’t that Finity anymore.

Rylee tears his gaze away and clambers into the passenger’s seat. As the car pulls back onto the road, he sticks his hand out the window and waves but I don’t return his farewell. In fact, I barely notice it because my gaze is glued to the approaching car, a silver Calais hugging tightly to the dark road. Reaching into my bag, I quickly pop a breath mint. Hudson doesn’t know I’ve taken up smoking. He doesn’t need to know. It’s something he wouldn’t understand. He would consider it weak. It’s something he’d tried once and only once. It would repulse him, and the last thing I want to do was repulse him.

It’s been weeks since I’ve seen my husband, but even back then, I barely noticed him. We should have found comfort in one another but I was too wrapped up in my own misery to have any room for his. And now I’m nervous. It seems stupid having my hands grow sweaty over the approach of the man I’ve been with for years. It wasn’t that long ago that we’d celebrated our wedding anniversary. We’d laughed and drank champagne in the place that it all started, his family’s holiday home on the shores of the lake. We’d been happy then, celebrating life, celebrating us. Neither of us knew it would soon all change.

Getting to my feet, I clutch the handles of my bag with white knuckles as the car pulls to a stop. I can’t deny the pounding of my heart as his door swings open. In the few short steps it takes to walk over, he doesn’t look at me. He keeps his eyes trained on the ground, his hands shoved deep into the pockets of his jeans. He stops a few paces away and only then does he raise his eyes.

Swallowing my nerves, I lower my bag and take a step forward, unsure whether to walk over and embrace him.

He takes a step back, his eyes falling to the ground again as though it pains him too much to look at me.

“Hi.” Silently I beg him to look up.

His jaw flexes as he grits his teeth before flicking his gaze my way. “You ready?”

I merely nod. Tears threaten to rise as I scan his face, searching for any sign of forgiveness. I long for him to pull me close, bury his face into the crook of my neck and breathe deeply like he used to. I miss the way he used to inhale me, as though I were more invigorating than air itself.

Scolding the butterflies that flutter their wings against my chest, I pick up my bag again. Hudson nods as I stride past, his jaw still flexing with discomfort. He stays like that for a while, merely staring at where I was standing, before twisting his shoes into the gravel and getting in the car. Leaning forward, he toys with the radio, flicking through the stations as though it matters.

My eyes fix on him hungrily, scanning his features. He’s always been an attractive man, but now he is rugged and handsome in a way that has only gotten better with age. He has a strong jawline with just the right amount of stubble. Tousled hair. Furrowed brows. Piercing eyes. My heart does summersaults as I internally beg him to look at me.

But he doesn’t.

“You got everything?” He glances at the mirror in preparation to pull back out onto the road.

“I think so.” My voice is low, just a whisper, even though the sound of it is deafening in my head.

I clear my throat. Hudson keeps his eyes trained on the road. His fingers toy with the steering wheel, dancing over the leather cover as he half-heartedly hums along to the tune playing on the radio. It isn’t a tune I know.

Even though I sit still, my insides are a jumbled mess. All I want is for him to gather me in his arms. I want to feel the security of him, the comfort and the familiarity. I need to know he’s forgiven me, but instead, I can feel the animosity rolling off him in waves. His back is too straight. His fingers dance too forcefully. The left corner of his mouth jerks in and out as he toys with it, chewing and releasing.

Part of me wants to scream, ‘how did this happen to us?’ But the other part of me already knows and has accepted it is my fault. One day we were lovers, friends, partners. And the next, we were strangers.

Already the memories of how it used to be are fading. That’s how intense his hatred is; it overpowers the memories of before. The memories of how we met, how we loved, how we laughed. But deep down, I still cling to them, hoping against all hope that we can return to the people we were before this nightmare began.

chapter two

THEN

~

FINITY

There’s something about the water at night. The darkness of it, the unknown. It always makes my heart beat just that little bit faster. It makes me wonder if there’s something below, watching my feet sway back and forth as I gently make whirlpools in the dark liquid.

Dragging my feet through the water, I flick them upward, tossing droplets into the night air and reminding myself that it’s harmless.

Nothing is lurking in its depths.

The air is hot and humid. Boats tied to the marina rock in the slight breeze. The reflection of the lights shimmer over the surface. Leaning forward, I cup the cool liquid in my hand and rub it over the back of my neck. It drips down my spine and stains my shirt.

On this day, twelve years ago, I found out my father had died. The day of his actual death was three weeks before, but that wasn’t when it became real. It wasn’t the day I ran away here, to the one place I felt closest to him.

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