Give Me a Reason (Redemption Hills 1)

The teasing drained from my best friend’s face. “I think you do, Eden. I think you’re just afraid to reach out and take it.”

Emotion clogged my chest, and I had to look away, into the distance. I inhaled a cleansing breath and tried to keep the tears from brimming to my eyes.

A tender hand wrapped around my wrist, dragging me back to the here and now and out of the past that seemed as if it would never let me go. I swiveled my gaze to Tessa. To my best friend who’d been there for me forever. Through my joys and my sorrows.

“What if it hurts?” I wheezed the question, unable to hold back the heaviness of it. “What if I take a chance, and he doesn’t take one on me?”

What if he didn’t feel the same? What if he wasn’t spun up right then, wondering what it would feel like to give in?

What if he was as horrible as he claimed and destroyed me in the end?

Tessa’s lips tipped in affection, and she reached out and played with a lock of my hair that whipped in the gentle breeze, her voice as soft as the whisper of the wind. “And what if you don’t try, Eden? What if you never let yourself feel again? What if you spend the rest of your life guarding yourself from experiencing what you want, what you need, because you’re afraid, and you miss out on all the things waiting for you to take hold of them? What if you keep this beautiful heart from the rest of the world? What if you don’t take a chance? What then?”

My throat burned with it. With sorrow. With hope. “He and I are…”

“Opposites?” She grinned. “All wrong? He’s everything you shouldn’t want?”

I jerked an agreement. “I don’t even know him.”

And I had a feeling the list she’d checked off went much deeper than that.

That he was dangerous.

That there was a real part of him that was bad. Wicked. Unjust.

That his life was at odds with everything I wanted for mine.

All except for the way he was with that little boy. Except for the way he made me feel. The way he made me believe in something he kept insisting wasn’t there.

“Don’t let anyone tell you who you should love or what you should want, Eden. You get to decide that, and don’t you dare forget it. He may or may not be the one…”

She gestured her chin in the direction of the empty street before she flitted her eyes back to take me in. When she did, the blue was overflowing with emotion. “But you won’t know that until you try. Until you open yourself up. Until you go after what you want.”

I chuckled out a soggy sound. “That’s the problem…I don’t know what I want.”

“Liar,” she razzed, grin playing across her whole face. She leaned toward me and mock-whispered, “You want cake.”

I choked over a shock of laughter. “You’re ridiculous.”

Tessa tugged at my hand, walking backward as she started to haul me back toward the school. “You wouldn’t want me any other way. Now come on, your daddy asked if I’d seen you…he wants to talk to you.”

Crap.

It’d been more than a week since he’d come to my house saying he missed me. When he’d begged me to let him take on the burden. It’d been two days since I’d completely ignored that and taken all the cash I’d earned and put it against the outstanding debts.

Oh, was he going to have questions.

I had the urge to jump in my car and go hide under my covers. Maybe come down with a sudden, severe flu.

Tessa threaded our fingers together and pulled me up to her side as she swiveled around. Swinging our hands between us as she started to lead me back toward the offices in the main area of the school, she leaned in and murmured, “But I’m not letting you leave until you admit it…tell me you want cake.”

She was relentless.

Redness streaked to my cheeks, and I barely peeked her way, letting the confession slip from my tongue. “Okay. Fine. I might want a tiny taste.”

She gasped and slammed a hand over her heart. “You hooker.”

Playfully, I shoved her. “You jerk.”

She laughed like crazy until she sobered and took my hand again, pulling me close to her side. “I love you, Eden. I just want you to live again. Larger and freer than you did before. For your heart. For your happiness.”

I nestled my head on her shoulder and held on tight.

Faith brimming up from a spot I’d once thought dead. “I want that, too. So much.”

I was just terrified I was looking for it in the wrong place.

I was setting myself up for heartbreak. I knew it. I could feel it shivering around me, a low rumble of thunder in the distance as a storm gathered on the horizon.