There was no point in calling. He wouldn't answer my call . . . he never did anymore. I wouldn't know what to say the day he finally did. Because he was lost and I was weak, and I hated myself for more things than he would ever know.

9.

Present Day

Aurora

"We need to talk."

Jentry's sudden appearance in my closet that evening should have scared me considering he hadn't been in the apartment when I'd come home, and I hadn't heard the front door open or shut, but it hadn't.

I'd felt him long before I heard him.

As odd as that was, I had felt him. My entire body had come alive, making it feel as though I were lying in the coolest of flames for long, confusing seconds before he'd spoken.

Hot and cold. Hard and soft. All Jentry-always Jentry.

I refused to think about how often Declan scared me just by rounding a corner or entering a room when I wasn't expecting him. And for Declan's sake, I wanted to ignore the pulling I felt deep within me. The reaching for the man behind me.

What an impossibility.

I finished pulling on my shirt and pretended not to notice the way my skin covered in goose b.u.mps, knowing his eyes were on me. "I'm leaving to go hang out with Declan."

"We can talk here or there. Your choice."

I paused from slipping into my sandals. I hadn't known Jentry had planned on coming. I hadn't known when I would see him again at all. "I thought you were gone."

"I went to help out my dad at work. They've gotten behind on some things in the office and on one of the locations."

I finally turned to look at him, and my chest filled with air I hadn't known I'd needed just seeing him standing there: arms folded over his chest as he leaned against the door frame like he was completely at ease even though his expression showed he was anything but. "No. I thought you were gone."

I'd come home to find the guest room set up almost exactly how I'd had it before Linda had taken and brought back everything, and all traces of Jentry had been removed.

His eyebrows lifted slowly. "Why would you think that?"

"Your bag was gone."

He uncrossed one of his arms to gesture to the wall behind me. "Mom said your washing machine was broken. I took my stuff to their house this morning to wash my clothes since I already had to go there to pick up my car."

I let out a huff but wondered why what he said surprised me. Before I could tell him that the washer and dryer were working just fine the last time I had used them, Jentry's confusion transformed to frustration.

"You really think I would just leave you?" His voice was soft, but the dark tone spoke volumes.

"Why wouldn't I? It's what you do."

"Leave? You think that's what I do?" He laughed edgily and rubbed at his jaw. "I had a f.u.c.king job, Aurora."

Tears burned my eyes, and I hated that they were there for this man when there were so many other things to cry for right now. I hated that he could see my pain for him at all. "Yes, you had a job. You still left. You left me after that night even though you knew you had already wrecked my heart. Then you left me to deal with the devastation of seeing you after that weekend. And when I needed you the most during these last weeks, you weren't there!"

"I couldn't leave, Aurora! I couldn't f.u.c.king leave without risking being arrested for it!"

His admission made me pause for a second before I was able to continue. "That doesn't matter. You still could've been there without physically being here!"

Jentry pushed from the wall and stepped closer. The intensity that rolled off him as he approached me made it feel as though he were already gripping me though there were still feet between us. "I smashed my G.o.dd.a.m.n phone after that call from you-the only call I've ever gotten from you. Your number was obviously gone when I got a new phone, and I didn't hear from you after that. I had no way to get a hold of you."

"Why would I have contacted you after that? I thought for sure you hated me like everyone else did, and when I didn't hear from you again for nearly three weeks, it kind of confirmed it!"

His brow pinched. "Hate you? Why would- This wasn't your fault."

A short laugh burst from my chest, but it sounded more like a cry. He had no idea just how much it had been. "If I had just-"

"Don't," he said suddenly. "You can't think like that."

He reached for me, but I shot my hand out in a silent plea for him not to. I was already shaking from keeping myself from him. I didn't want to think about what I would do if he touched me now.

The past was standing right in front of me, begging to be seen. As if I had ever stopped seeing him. As if I had ever pulled myself from the embers of that night. That night was a dance of flames that had no ending, only respites. One touch from him and those embers would roar to life again, burning hotter and higher.

I wanted it.

I couldn't allow it. Not now, not with everything going on.

I dropped my head and took quick steps to leave the closet, but Jentry's arm shot out to stop me, his hand curled against my waist possessively.

"Aurora-"

"Don't. Please don't."

He ignored me and pulled me against him so my side was pressed to his chest. My body trembled as those flames got higher. But with the flames that guilt grew and grew, threatening to cripple me.

"You hurt, I hurt," he reminded me. "And, Aurora, seeing you like this and not being able to fix it is killing me. I'm sorry for what happened. I'm so d.a.m.n sorry, and I'm sorry I wasn't here sooner." Each word was laced with pain, echoing the aches in my heart and my soul. "But you are out of your mind if you think it was easy for me not being here. I have regretted letting you go, every minute of every f.u.c.king day. If I could do that first night all over again I would, and I would've been there for you. I would have been here."

The tears that had filled my eyes finally slipped free at his words and the memory of that night. "But you did let me go, and no matter how much we beg time to reverse, it won't."

His body deflated against mine as regret leaked from him. "No, it won't. But I'm here now. I'm here, and we're going to get through this."

So much indecision and confusion wove through me. Wants and needs at war with one another as they had already been for an agonizing amount of time.

My heart had bled out through each battle until I'd made a life-changing decision, a decision that Declan and I didn't speak of, and one that Jentry still didn't know. Now any move I could make from here on out would be the wrong one. I was sitting in a minefield, waiting.

Just waiting.

"I tried to forget that night," I whispered before I could stop myself. "I tried to forget you, but somehow you embedded yourself so deeply into my soul in just one night, that forgetting you-forgetting that night-was impossible. I don't need a lifetime with you to know that no one and nothing will ever compare to what's between us. But it's too late for anything involving us even if it's just us getting through this, because that night and you are now some of my biggest regrets."

He released me as if I had burned him, and didn't try to follow me as I walked out of the closet and left the apartment.

10.

One Month Ago

Jentry

I stepped onto the back porch of the beach house that night and walked toward the far end as I placed the cigarette between my lips to light it. I took one quick drag, then a longer pull, holding it in and savoring the way this simple act calmed me, before I let the smoke curl from my lips as I exhaled slowly.

I'd been pacing in the bedroom ever since Declan and Rorie had gone to theirs an hour before. Each pa.s.s through the room left me more agitated as I thought about him touching her again.

I'm a sniper. I don't pace . . . ever. But this weekend and that girl had pushed me to start.

I turned on instinct, letting my eyes drift over the other houses and the darkened beach that came all the way up to the porch, and stilled.

It was too dark to make her out from this far, but I didn't need light or the distance to disappear to know that the figure I could see sitting on the beach was her.

There's no mistaking the girl who destroyed your entire being.

I'd thought she called to me that first night. I'd thought she was a drug that was too pure to resist . . . and that was before I'd ever touched her. The way she had called to me that night was nothing compared to now.

She was light and I was dark.

She was bliss and I was a man dying.

Need was too weak a word to describe what was coursing through me.

Because I had left a part of myself with her that night, and I knew I would never be whole again until I had her. It was as if she'd forced a piece of her soul into me, and taken mine in return.

She could keep it. I didn't want it without her.

I was walking down the beach toward her before I ever realized that I'd left the porch. With how our last couple of conversations had gone, I knew I should turn around and go inside.

For Declan, I knew I needed to.

Because no matter how much I tried to push her away, it was impossible to stop myself from saying things I'd thought of for ten months now.

I saw her stiffen before I even got to her, and I wondered if she could feel it, too. This awareness that I was closing in on where I'd left my soul.

She looked over her shoulder as I got closer, and the expectant look in her violet eyes made me think that she could.

At the last second before I sat next to her, she recoiled. "What are you doing?"

I finished settling in next to her and gave her an amused look, though I had no idea why her question sounded so horrified. I removed the cigarette from between my lips and huffed. "Sitting. But I thought that would have been obvious."

Her eyes stayed locked on my mouth as I spoke, then slowly traveled to where my hands were resting on my knees. The disgust on her face made sense seconds before she blurted out, "You smoke?"

I didn't move or respond as I watched emotion after emotion pa.s.s over her face. Disgust, realization, shock, denial, disgust again, confusion . . .

"I would have thought that was also obvious. Before tonight."

"Why?"

I pulled in one last drag, then gestured behind us before pinching off the cherry. "Considering I don't hide the fact and go outside a lot, I thought it was known."

She shook her head quickly. "No. Why do you smoke?"

A sharp laugh burst from my chest. "Uh, I don't know. No one's ever asked me that."

"That's what I smell . . ." Her voice trailed off, lost in the sound of the crashing waves. A soft, humorless laugh fell from her lips. "I feel so stupid."

I placed the cigarette in my pocket, then resumed my original position. Holding my hands out for a brief second for her, I waited until she was looking up at me again to say, "Gone. Care to elaborate why you feel stupid? Because if it's the fact that you slept with someone who does something that clearly disgusts you, let me remind you that we didn't play twenty questions first."

Her eyes widened, and even in the dark I could see the way her cheeks darkened before she dropped her head. "No, that's not . . . no. I just-I've thought it was cologne all this time."

My chest vibrated with a silent laugh. "Good or bad?"

She didn't respond, but her expression and the look in her eyes when they flashed to mine told me all I needed to know. "How long?"

"Since the first tour. A few of the guys smoked these, and sitting near them and just breathing it in used to calm me. Eventually . . ." I trailed off and lifted a shoulder. "They have cloves in them. That's what you're smelling."

The corner of her mouth lifted, then fell into a frown. Like she wasn't happy that I'd just explained why she liked the smell. "And you just came home from your . . ."