Kate despises me, which I’ve told myself I welcome. Despising means distance. And distance means safety. If you’d watched the people who were your world slip into a car and never come back, if one small choice meant their death and your life irrevocably altered, you’d value safety, too.
As I step up to the front door of the Wilmots’， I catch my reflection in its window glass and grimace.
I look as rough as I did an hour ago in the bathroom mirror. It’s not just the narrowly avoided migraine that’s to blame—I slept like shit last night. I never sleep well, but last night was unsurprisingly worse, after running into Kate.
Angling my face up and to the side, I examine my reflection, the purple-green bruise that’s bloomed on my jaw where Kate’s hard head knocked into it. I debated shaving the dark stubble that hides it well. If I didn’t shave, there would be no questions, no concern that I covet as much as I recoil from.
But if I did shave and the bruise was evident, Maureen—Kate, Jules, and Bea’s mom, a mother to me, too—would not only see it and fuss over me, but also demand an explanation.
And then I’d just have to tell her Kate was wandering the city at night, all alone, with her headphones on, like a stubborn sitting duck, when she plowed right into me.
Obviously, I decided to shave.
Gripping the handle, I ease open the front door. Like it or not, I have to face Kate again. At least this time I won’t be caught off guard.
“Boo!”
“Goddammit.” I spin, heart pounding, and face Kate. Glaring at her, I start to shut the door, but the wind takes over, dragging it out of my grip before it closes with an echoing thud.
Kate stands with Puck, the ancient family cat, propped on one shoulder, stroking his long white fur like a conniving villainess. Mahogany hair piled messily on her head, like always. Devious, sparkling blue-gray eyes flecked with sage. She bats her lashes innocently. “Oops.”
“Oops, my ass.” I hike the bag containing my food and wine contributions higher on my shoulder. “Like that was any less intentional than any of your other jump scares.”
“Poor Christopher. Did I scare you?”
My jaw clenches so hard it creaks. “You didn’t scare me.”
Too much.
Suddenly, she steps closer. I take a step back. Keeping distance between us is second nature.
Kate frowns. “Would you stop? I just need to say something and then we can part miserable ways.”
“Say it already, then.” My jaw clenches again. I can’t take being close to her, seeing the freckles dusting her nose, the fiery flash in her eyes. My gaze drags down her face, disobeying my commands, taking stock of her. The long line of her neck. The stretch of her collarbones—
That’s when I realize her right arm is tucked in a sling.
The same arm she was holding tight to her side last night.
I frown, an unwelcome sensation tugging at my chest. We bumped into each other pretty roughly last night—I have the bruised jaw to prove it—but it shouldn’t have been bad enough to put her shoulder in a sling. I could tell she was hurting from our collision, but she swung her arm around, showed me it was fine . . .
Then again, I know the games she can play. I came prepared with my bruised jaw. Kate’s got her sling. Maybe she’s not hurt but instead planning on faking it in front of her mom, casting me as the bad guy.
Then again, if she did that, she has to know I’d tell her mom how we ran into each other—Kate wandering the city, unaware and in her own little world with her headphones blocking off any sound, any warning of danger coming. Maureen would lose it.
So, I can only deduce she’s actually hurt.
Not that I care.
If I cared about Kate and the risks she takes, pinballing her way around the world—traipsing along cliffs’ edges while her thoughts are a thousand miles away, making friends with strangers who could be serial killers for all she knows, sleeping alone and unprotected in hostels, losing her wallet, forgetting to eat, dropping her phone so many times it’s deplorably cracked and unreliable—I’d lose my goddamn mind.
So I don’t care. I refuse to. It’s that simple.
“Christopher.”
I blink. I haven’t heard a word she’s said. Instead, I’ve been staring at that damn sling pinning her right arm to her body, my thoughts spiraling. My chest feels painfully tight. “Say that again.”
“Try actually listening this time,” she snaps. Stepping closer, she glances both ways, looking to see if anyone’s coming. Voices waft from the kitchen in the back of the house, where Thanksgiving meal prep is in full swing. “I wasn’t exactly honest last night,” she says. “I did mess up my shoulder.”