These Thorn Kisses (St. Mary’s Rebels 3)

I loosen my fingers around the glass and put it aside. “I’m leaving.”

At this, she grabs my arm. “But I just got here, Con. And I…”

“And you what?”

Her brown eyes turn pleading. “And we never got to finish our conversation. From yesterday.”

Right.

The conversation.

“Well then, you better get to it,” I say, keeping my voice casual. “Because you were already fifteen minutes late.”

“I’m not —”

“Or maybe not. Because I think you got to the gist of it yesterday anyway.”

Helen studies me. “Why are you being this way? Why are you making this so difficult? Why can’t we be friends? All I want is to be friends with you, Con.”

I clench my jaw. “We both know that you don’t.”

“Con, please.”

“We both know that every time you text me, call me, ask me to meet you somewhere, you’re not looking for a friend to go on coffee dates with.” Leaning closer to her, I look down at her, her slim attractive body clad in a tight red dress. “If you were, you wouldn’t be wearing that. It’s for me, isn’t it? Tell me what Seth said about you going out wearing this dress. Is that why you were fifteen minutes late? Because he wouldn’t let you go?”

Her lips purse and her fist tightens on my arm. “If you must know, Seth wasn’t home. He’s working late tonight. And I was fifteen minutes late, Con, because I was trying out dresses for you. I was trying to look nice for you.”

“Well, I’m flattered.” I look her up and down again. “You went to a great deal of trouble for me. And you do look nice.”

She does.

Helen has always looked nice.

Fucking phenomenal actually.

That was the first thing that attracted me to her. Back when I was seventeen and a horny teenager. And I’d seen her at the restaurant where I worked. She was there with her friends and I was the guy bussing tables.

I never thought that I could touch her.

She was far too shiny for the likes of me.

She was a rich princess from Wuthering Garden and I was a lowly commoner from Bardstown who did odd jobs to help out his mom with the bills and had a perfect striking record on the high school soccer team.

But I did.

I did touch her because for some reason, the princess wanted me to.

She wanted the commoner.

And like an idiot I thought I could have that. I could have the one shiny thing in my life.

“So why don’t you stay for a while?” she asks. “We can have a nice dinner, talk about things. I miss you. I’ve missed you all these years. You were my first thought when I came back. You know that.”

I do.

Because she contacted me when she came back. She called me up a year ago, out of the blue, to tell me that she was back from New York and that she was getting married. She was kind enough to invite me to her wedding as well.

I refused.

I had no plans of going to her wedding. I had no plans of seeing her at all.

She was my past — an intense but very short-lived relationship — and up until her call, I’d buried her. I’d put her in a cage somewhere deep down in my body, where I keep all my broken dreams.

Although I did end up going to that goddamn party. I did end up seeing her and she saw me too. But before she could come talk to me — and from the looks of it, she was going to — I left.

And I’m going to leave now as well.

“I don’t think we have anything to talk about,” I say, standing up from the bar stool. “Because you can pretend as much as you want, Helen, but we both know what you want from me, from this. Why you keep calling me and texting me and inviting me over to restaurants and your house when Seth’s not home. We both know that if anyone had seen us together yesterday, a student, a teacher, or whoever the fuck, they would’ve drawn the right conclusion. They would’ve concluded that we’re seeing each other behind your husband’s back. Because that’s what you want. You want me to fuck you behind your husband’s back. And I’ve already told you I’m not going to.”

With that, I go to leave. But she doesn’t let me go.

In fact, she tightens her hold on sleeve of my sweater. “If you want to be crass, Con, then fine. Fine. I do want you to fuck me. I do want that. And why is that so wrong? We have a history together, you and me. We were going to get married. You promised that you’d marry me. You promised that when we got to college, when we got to New York, we could be together. You were going to be this big soccer star and I was going to be your wife. But you left me. Like always. You left me. You broke your promise to me and ran back to your family at the first opportunity.”