Page 13
I just wish I could remember.
“I’m going to work, but Aaron said he’d drive you home,” Amy tells me, and my blood ices.
“I’ll walk,” I say instantly.
Aaron peers down at me, his offensively long lashes fluttering. “I’d sooner carry you home,” he says, eyes flicking to my knees. I don’t realize until then that they’re trembling.
“I’m fine,” I say, rejecting the mental image of being carried across town princess-style.
“Sure, sunshine.” His frosty eyes soften, and he waits for Amy to walk out of earshot before continuing. “Maybe you should go home and rest now. I can go shopping for you.”
I stare up at him, baffled. His expression is insistent, almost desperate. He’s clutching my grocery list tight in his fist. “Don’t infantilize me,” I snap, making a swipe for it. He hikes it over his head, forcing me to dance on my tiptoes to try to seize it. “I’m not some helpless baby. Besides, I like shopping for my family. It’s the least I can do to make up for everything. All the fainting episodes and hospital bills and leaving them to fend for themselves…”
The frustration unravels in Aaron’s face, and the spark in his eyes dulls, like his life force is trickling away. “Okay,” he says, lowering his hand. Immediately, I rip the grocery list from his grip. “But you’re unsteady, so I’d like to come with you.”
“Are you my mom?” I mutter, storming toward the sidewalk to begin my trek home. Judging by the wobble in my legs, it’ll take about twenty minutes. Or so I think, until Aaron slides in front of me so abruptly that I nearly collide with his snug black shirt. I stagger back with a scowl, hugging the list.
“Don’t be annoying,” I order. “Or I’ll—”
“You’ll what?” Aaron asks, that familiar “delight at my expense” creeping into his voice. “You’ll break up with me again? You’ll call me troublemaker and scallywag until I cry?”
All the blood in my body is in my face, thick and boiling. “I hate you,” I snap.
Aaron’s mischievous smile fractures, and his pale eyes flood with sudden, unexpected grief that hitches the breath in my lungs. “I…I understand,” he whispers. “That’s okay. I have enough love to carry both of us.”
His words shouldn’t mean anything to me. Yet they strike a chord so deep within my rib cage that I feel the reverberation through my body. It leaves behind an awful ache rooted in my bones, so powerful that when I blink, my eyes are swimming with tears.
“Sorry,” I hear myself breathe. “I didn’t mean it.”
Aaron grazes his face, which promptly twists with guilt, like he didn’t mean to show me his pained thoughts. He steps forward and nudges my forehead back with his index finger, causing my neck to arch so I can look up at him. “Riley,” he says in that soft voice, the one that stands in contrast to everything I know about him. “Don’t apologize for things outside your control. Please.”
“But…” Frantically, I massage the burn out of my eyes. “You looked really hurt, so…”
Aaron’s hand slides down the back of my head, his touch featherlight to avoid aggravating the healing bump. “That’s one of my favorite things about you,” he says. “You just told me you hate me, and now you’re about to cry because I’m upset.”
“I won’t cry,” I say, trying unsuccessfully to sound sharp and irritated.
“It’s okay if you want to.” His touch skims along the curve of my neck, then drifts over my collarbone, his middle finger falling into the divot of the bone. “I think it’s beautiful that you care so much about the way you make others feel. Even people you don’t like.”
His palm centers on my chest. I hope his fingers aren’t pressing deeply enough to feel my heartbeat.
“As if I could let you go,” he mumbles.
This must be how he did it. How he lured me in. By speaking sweet, honeyed words until every functional aspect of my brain was drenched in them, unable to form coherent thoughts. Paired with my deeply embedded fear that I’ll never find someone willing to tolerate my lifestyle…
This is why I latched on to Aaron, isn’t it?
I doubt he’ll let me walk away, so I push his hand off my chest and fling open his passenger door. “Let’s go,” I say, blinking away residual wetness.
Aaron gives me an unusually sympathetic smile that only twists and gnarls my understanding of this situation. Whenever I think I’m encroaching on the truth, he looks at me a certain way or says something to unravel my progress.
He climbs into the driver’s seat. I make sure to buckle my seat belt.
He takes me directly to the grocery store.
“Don’t think this puts me in your debt,” I warn him as I clamber out and beeline for the shopping carts. “I didn’t ask you to be here.”
Aaron beats me there, snagging one and rolling it into the store. “Have you considered that I just want to spend time with the person I love?” he asks with a pointed, entertained look.
