Page 106 of Forever Yours

She clasped her hands in her lap. “Ask away. I’m an open book.”

“This isn’t the question I want to ask, but how old are you?”

“Seventeen. I’ll be eighteen next month. I’m a senior at West Ashley.”

“Nineteen,” I said. “Are you close with your mom?”

April inhaled deeply and bit her bottom lip. “She, uh… she died when I was five. Car accident. Drunk driver.”

Now I felt like shit for asking. “I’m so sorry.”

April leaned back against the door. “I wonder what my life would’ve been like if she had lived. Would Dad not be a major asshole? Would I not be invisible? I think he hates me because I look like her… and there I go again with the word vomit.”

Wanting to share something of me, I told her, “My mom left us because, and I quote, ‘I can’t be a mother to a gay.’”

Her mouth fell open. “What a bitch. I knew there was a reason why I didn’t like her.” She looked toward the house through the front windshield. “I know we just met, but if you need anything, let me know.”

“Thanks. Same goes, seeing as you’re now my little sister. I get to play big brother and be all protective and shit.”

I found that I liked that idea. I had always wanted a sibling.

Her laughter filled the small space. “Deal. Are you ready to go in?”

Not really, but I couldn’t put it off any longer. I reluctantly opened the car door.

“I need to introduce you to my best friend, Jessi. You’d love her.”

The walk up to the front portico was filled with apprehension. My palms started to sweat, and I put my stuff down on the porch so I could wipe them off on the backs of my shorts.

April got out her keys and unlocked the cherry red door.

Was that a sign? Red was a duplicitous color that rode the spectrum between good and bad connotations. Courage, love, passion on one end; anger, danger, and violence on the other.

“Home sweet home,” she said as I crossed the threshold—

—and came face to face with my biggest fucking nightmare.

CHAPTER 31

There were those moments where time literally stood still. Your body was frozen and unmovable, but your brain was functioning just fine and was able to process the fuckery going down around you. It felt like an out-of-body experience made of dark emotions. Hatred. Rage. Violence. And they were all aimed directly at the shell-shocked man gaping at me in the foyer.

“Oh, hey, Justin. I thought you weren’t arriving until tomorrow.”

April shut the front door, the sound as sharp and punctuated as a bullet being fired from a gun.

The universe was fucking with me. It had to be. Because there was no way in hell it would be so cruel as to put me in the same room with the man who attacked me.

His name was Justin.

I didn’t know how I would feel if I ever came face to face with my attacker again. Fallon had told me not to worry. That I didn’t have to look over my shoulder. He had taken care of things. I never asked. I didn’t want to know. I didn’t want what happened to define who I was. Control my life. Turn me into a person I didn’t recognize. I’d seen how Julien’s grief changed him. That grief and guilt he carried bled into our relationship, became my burden to bear, chipped away at the love we had fought so hard for. It almost destroyed us. It almost destroyed me.

April set the car fob on the foyer table, oblivious to the bomb that just detonated right in front of her. My fists clenched at my sides. Justin took a step back.

Unaware that I was standing there, Mom approached Justin, all wide smiles. She hooked her arm through his. It was a familiar gesture. One of acceptance and friendliness. She wouldn’t even give me a goddamn hug.

“Justin, honey, would you like for me—” Mom froze when she saw me.

No hello. Just shocked eyes as she clung to Justin’s arm.

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