❝ You make this messed-up world look so much more beautiful. ❞ Gathering me in his arms, he pulled me close -- his lips seeking mine hungrily.
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The only thing Summer Hale has ever wanted was to live peacefully away from her secrets...
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It's not like it ain't a habit Thinking 'bout "what if" too much Like what if I mess this up? — Slow by Shy Martin
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I was sitting by the edge of Gray's bed, fumbling with my fingers. He was standing in front of me with his eyes boring into mine, and I fought the pang of uneasiness as I stared up to meet his gaze. The intensity radiating off him was worrisome. It was like he wanted to say something but didn't know how to broach the subject.
"I can't do this anymore," he said with an edge of coldness in his voice.
I swallowed hard. "What do you mean?"
"Us."
"Gray, what happened was not your fault."
"Not my fault?" he echoed, disgust coating his voice like poison. "Someone who hates my family paid the bartender to drug you."
I opened my mouth to protest, but no words came out. The silence slowly gnawed at my insides as the air between us intensified. He rubbed his face, releasing a frustrated sigh, then he walked over to his bookshelf and rummaged through it, grabbing a few large books before coming back to stand in front of me.
"You wanted these."
He dropped them on the bed.
I blinked in shock. It was the yearbooks from 1983 to 1990, the ones I had been waiting for. "How did you know?" I asked quietly.
"I found out when I went through the files in the office," he shared, his tone clipped and controlled. "The copies you wanted were already sitting at a corner for god knows how long. I asked why they hadn't given it to you yet, and apparently, my father instructed them to hold on to it until the six months were complete."
I sucked in my bottom lip, knowing where this conversation was headed.
The truth was far more complex.
Not everything is as it seems.
I picked up a yearbook and flipped through it, scanning every page, every picture, and every article. My hand stopped at a particular page, and my finger traced the woman in the picture.
