Page 158 of Faking It With the Small-Town Bad Boy

willow tree disintegrate.

It’s just a tree.

There’s still a knot in the base of my throat where I feel like I may

vomit again.

“Start walking home,” Percy spits. “You’re not welcome here.”

Ryan rolls his eyes, pressing his hands into his front pockets causally.

“You may be renting a room here, but she owns the house, band-boy.

Let her pick.”

“Pick what?” I ask, shaking my head. “You drove drunk to my house

in the middle of the night and destroyed a staple that has been in my

family for generations, Ryan! My father and I had sat under that tree

every night for years around a campfire. My mother would pick vines

off that tree to use in floral arrangements when I was young. You are

just so selfishly careless that you can’t even stop to think that maybe

you should apologize!”

He flicks an uncaring look at the tree, still surrounded by firefighters

who are wetting down the piles of soot and ash in the field. “Sorry, I

hit a tree. It’s not like I held a lighter to the trunk, Leah. Shit

happens, okay? It’s not like I drove my car through the shop.”

“You may as well have,” I moan. “What are you even doing out here

in the first place? What do you want now? It’s like every time I turn

around, you’re speeding up my driveway with something new.”

“I wanted to talk, ladybug,” he says, his eyes shifting to Percy for a

moment long enough to track, before returning to me. “Can you get

up, and we can go inside to talk?”

I tremble slightly, Percy helping me to an unsteady stance. Still, I

lean on the railing and him combined before I feel the blood in my

legs pumping correctly again. Wiping my eyes, I know it’s useless to

kill these tears. They’ll just come back and multiply.

Percy keeps my hand in his possession, and I lean into his chest

---