Suffer Love (20 page)

Anger at Kat bubbles up to join my anger at this man standing in front of me, and it all boils over. “And I do? This is all your fault. You know that, right?”

“Hadley. Stop.”

“No. I've spent months
stopping,
trying to forget what you did. What you did to us and her and me. I'm so tired of it. I'm tired of you pretending like this is fixable!”

“You won't even try. Neither of you will. At least I'm trying.” His voice has that dangerous, quiet quality it used to get when I got in trouble as a kid. And that's all this is to him—me being a brat. Surely I'll snap out of it one day and come back to him.

“Mom wouldn't have left if it weren't for you. None of this would've happened if you had just kept it in your goddamn pants.”

His mouth drops open. Before he can say anything else, I turn my back on him and head outside, pacing in circles in the driveway. The day is cool and crisp, the leaves beautifully dying in bright reds and yellows. I take out my phone and look at Sam's text again, choking down tears and doubts in one gulp. I tap the message box and start typing.

Can I see you later today?

I hit
Send
. I tell myself that I don't need him.

But he's the only person I want right now.

I wait for her on the tiny merry-go-round at the park across the street from my house. The air smells metallic, all cold weather and rusty swing chains. I lie down, my back pressed on top of the freezing, dingy red metal while my feet pull me in a lazy circle.

My stomach rolls right along with the rest of me, but it's got nothing to do with the merry-go-round. Livy tried to get me to eat something before I left, but I couldn't even choke down a swallow of water. I keep running through last night in my head, scrounging for that precise moment I should've stopped everything and taken Hadley home. But I can't find it, and honestly, I don't look all that hard. Now with every cell in my body anticipating seeing Hadley again, I'm an effing mess of excitement and terror.

A soft sound brushes over the bits of recycled rubber that make up the floor of the playground. I stop my revolution and sit up too quickly. My vision blackens for a split second and then clears, revealing Hadley in a thick cream-colored cardigan over a black T-shirt and perfectly tight jeans. Her hair is loose and long and all but screaming at me to run my fingers through it.

She stops a few feet from me, her hands shoved in the pockets of her sweater. She looks down at her boots and pink splashes over her cheekbones. My gut stutters as I stand up.

“Hi,” she says, so quietly I almost don't hear her.

“Hi.”

“Hi,” she says again through a deep breath.

I smile in response, relieved to see she's as uncertain as I am. Not upset or angry or regretful. Just a good old-fashioned ball of nerves. But then we stand there for what feels like hours in silence, and doubts creep in again.

I should tell her it was all a mistake.

Because it was.

Wasn't it?

“Wanna swing?” I ask.

She looks up and tilts her head at me, studying me through narrowed eyes. Impulsively—maybe insanely—I reach out and take her hand from her pocket, sliding my fingers over her palm to lace with hers. “It's just swinging, not an invitation to elope.”

She laughs softly and lets me pull her to the green plastic seats swaying in the breeze. Soon we're airborne, climbing higher and higher into the sky and grinning at each other stupidly as the altitude seems to scrape away all the tension.

“Okay,” I say, pumping my legs to gain more speed. “You ready for this?”

“For what?”

“On three, we jump off and see who lands the farthest away from the swings.”

“No way!” She laughs as she soars backwards, her hair creating a dark curtain over her flushed features. “You're taller. You'll automatically win.”

“Yeah, but you're lighter. You'll fly farther.”

“All the more reason I'd rather not risk breaking my kneecaps.”

“Just bend your knees a little when you land.”

“I haven't jumped off a swing since I was, like, eight.”

“That's sort of the point.”

“No.”

“Come on, Hadley. Let go a little.” Rather than push her any more, I launch myself out of my swing and land with a
thwunk
on the crumbled rubber. My legs buckle and I go down, my body piling up in a heap of elbows and knees.

“Are you okay?” Hadley yells, still in motion.

I let out an exaggerated groan and shoot her a thumbs-up. “Your turn.”

“No, Sam.”

I roll myself up to sitting and prop my elbows on my knees. “You're really just going to let me win? I'm a privileged white male in America. Don't you think I have enough advantages already? Come on, St. Clair. Kick my ass.”

She arches forward and then pushes back again. I watch her, totally mesmerized. The effect is weirdly hot as she gains more and more height. Then she's flying, her body a graceful line, arms in the air like a bird on the wind before she lands on all fours.

She's a least a couple feet farther away from the swings than I am.

“Atta girl,” I say.

She laughs and flops onto her back, her chest rising and falling steadily.

“I haven't done this in forever,” she says, staring at the sky.

I lie down and roll my body in her direction. It takes me three rotations to reach her. “What? Been to a park?”

“Played.”

I stretch myself out next to her and realize I haven't either. I can't remember the last time I did something fun for the hell of it. Felt the wind in my hair and laughed at nothing and acted like a dumb shit just because I could.

I prop myself up on one elbow and look at her. The coppery sun ignites her brown eyes so they almost glow, her lashes a black fringe around them. She smiles and blinks heavily, her pulse rapid in the hollow of her throat, matching my own. I reach out and tuck a lock of her hair behind her ear. I try to slide my fingers down the long strand, but her hair is all tangly from the swing ride. I pull, but her damn hair has suddenly morphed into a thousand tentacles.

“Ow.” She grimaces and I feel my ears burn red, but of course she's grimacing. A complete imbecile is glued in her hair right now.

“Sorry . . .” I tug gently and she inhales sharply. “Okay, I'm seriously stuck.”

“Here, let me.” She pushes my other hand away and locates the knot around my finger. She unravels the snarl of hair, obviously trying not to laugh.

Finally free of me, she pulls her hair over one shoulder and then tucks her hands under her head. She looks at me and gnaws at her lower lip,
still
biting off a laugh.

Uh-uh.

I lift my brows, smirking, and she releases a single giggle.

I lean toward her again.

Really. Slowly.

The closer I get, the more her lips curve upward. I stop an inch from her mouth and hear her breath hitch. I don't move any closer. I don't move farther away, either.

“Seriously?” She twists her mouth into a cute little knot.

“What?” I slide my thumb over her flushed cheek, and she shivers. “Did you want me to do something other than hover over you awkwardly?”

Her hand sneaks under my jacket and bunches around the hem of my T-shirt. Her cool fingers tease my hip.

“Hey.” My body arches away from her a little. “That tickles.”

“Two can play at this game, Mr. Bennett.”

Her sweet breath fans across my mouth and I almost lose it right there. I slide the hand near her face down to her throat and around the back of her neck. Her eyes flutter closed briefly, but then she slips her hand even farther under my shirt, letting it trail up my back.

I stifle a groan and let my lower lip brush hers. Through some superhuman display of self-control, I don't kiss her. Not yet.

“Give up?” she whispers.

“Nope.”

“You enjoy this torture, then?”

In answer, my mouth feathers over the corner of hers, first one side, then the other. She squirms underneath me. Then I trail over to her earlobe and tug it gently between my teeth, feeling maniacally triumphant when she emits a little squeak.

That sound totally does me in. Hand cupping her chin, I pull her face toward mine and finally press my lips to hers. I tease her mouth open and taste her. She tastes me back and that same heady mix from last night—something both soft and fierce—nearly smothers me.

She's just hooked one leg around my hip, wrapping me in pure freaking heaven, when my stomach growls against hers. She freezes, her mouth open on mine. Then she starts laughing. I let out a frustrated groan and bury my face in the slope where her neck meets her shoulder.

“Hungry?” she asks, still laughing.

“I don't know what you're talking about.” She shuts up when I kiss her neck, literally some of my best work, but then my stomach whines even louder and she busts up again.

I roll off her and pat my gut. “Insistent little bastard, isn't he?”

“I have some cupcakes in my car.”

I perk up at that. All my nervousness vanished with the first touch, and now my hunger—at least for something other than Hadley—takes over. “Yeah?”

“My dad got them this morning, but . . .”

I swallow around the sudden boulder in my throat. “Hadley, if you want to talk about—”

“I'll go get them.” She pretty much catapults herself to her feet, pulling her sweater down over her hips and jogging away before I can say another word. Her form gets smaller and smaller in the late afternoon light until she reaches her car parked on the street.

When she gets back, her bag slung over her shoulder, her expression is a mask of impassivity. I don't ask about her mom. Maybe that makes me an asshole, but it's pretty obvious she doesn't want to talk about her family. God knows I don't.

An exhausted-looking woman with a brood of four redheads arrives and takes over the playground, so we retreat to the picnic area at the edge of the park and sit cross-legged on top of a wooden table. Hadley pops open a box from the Green-Eyed Girl and offers me a chocolate cupcake the size of my hand. I devour it in two bites and start in on my second before she even gets the wrapper off her first. When she takes a big bite, chocolate frosting glazes her upper lip and chin.

“Messy much?” I ask, and try to thumb off the icing.

“Hey, I like it there.” She swats me away.

“Yeah? It's sorta cute. Like a little prepubescent-boy-stache.”

“I think you need one.” Before I can react, she swipes a handful of frosting off an uneaten cupcake and smears it down my entire face.

My jaw drops in shock. A big glob of sugary goo falls off my nose and catches on my lower lip. I scrape it off with my forefinger and hold it up. “You did not just do that.”

“Do what?”

She smirks at me like she's the cutest damn thing on two legs. Which she probably is, but that's beside the point when there's more frosting on my face than there is skin. Just as she opens her mouth to take another bite of her cupcake, I take aim and flick the icing off my finger. It smacks her squarely on the forehead.

After that, it's all-out war. I grab two more cupcakes and scramble to my feet, running to take cover behind a big oak tree. She stalks after me, a cupcake in each hand, and pelts me with little cake bullets that end up in my hair and all over my shirt. I barrel toward her and she squeals when I hook my arm around her waist and stuff a whole cupcake down the back of her sweater. The entire battle, I'm laughing so hard I can barely breathe. At one point, I'm pretty sure Hadley snorts some chocolate up her nose.

“Okay, okay! Truce!” I hold up my empty hands in surrender.

“Oh, thank God.” She shakes out her fingers, sending tiny crumbles of cake flying to the ground.

I wipe my palms on my jeans. When I get them clean enough, I close my hands around the sleeves of her sweater and pull her closer so I can kiss a spot of chocolate off her cheek.

She laughs. “Tasty?”

“Mm-hm.” I really just want to start licking every dot of icing I see on her, but considering there are now two wholesome families running around on the playground, I force myself to resist.

“We're a complete mess,” she says, trying to slick some frosting out of my hair. “I think I have some napkins in my glove compartment.”

We make our way to her car and wipe ourselves down with a bunch of scratchy brown napkins from Starbucks. Glancing across the street, I see my mom's car in our driveway. “I should go. Livy's probably starving and if I leave it to my mom, she'll be eating condensed soup or some shit like that for dinner.”

“Oh, right.” She looks down at her feet, worrying at her lower lip. “I need to go too.”

There's a cold clench in my gut. I look toward my house again and try to figure out if there's any way I can smuggle her inside without my mom noticing. I squeeze my eyes shut, pissed off all over again at the crap between me and Hadley that she doesn't even know about. All the shit I can't hide from, even under a mountain of chocolate cupcakes.

I slip my hand to the nape of her neck and kiss her forehead. “This was really fun.”

She nods and tilts her head up to meet my eyes. “It was more than fun.”

“Amusing?”

“Pleasant?”

I shake my head. “Enjoyable?”

“Convivial?”

“Nice one. How about blissful?”

She laughs. “Are you trying to out-synonym me, Sam?”

“Oh. Yeah, actually I am.” I scratch at my chin, scraping off some more icing. “Livy and I do this sometimes. Sorry, it's sort of a habit, I guess.”

“Sounds like something I would do with my dad,” she says quietly, squinting into the setting sun.