Trouble (Dogwood Lane 3)

“Can I get a rain check?” I ask.

“Ha.”

He studies me as if he isn’t sure I can handle this task. I can’t. I try to get that point across as strongly as I can, but when he smiles, I know I’ve failed.

“I’ll tell you what,” he says. “I’ll give you a road map. Will that help?”

“Will it end with a solution?”

“Yes.”

“Then it will help. Gimme.”

He takes another bottle of beer out of the fridge and opens it. “Option one: go fuck Alexis. Perfect way to nuke this entire situation. Avery will never talk to you again.”

I wince. Not an option.

“Option two: admit you can live without her but want to be on decent terms. Go home. Finish painting or whatever you’re doing that has you covered in white paint. In a day or two, someone will hit you up and you’ll go do Penn things with them and your life will be back to normal. You’ll see her at work, and you’ll be the old you.”

I don’t want to be the old me. Not really. The old me didn’t have Avery.

“Option three: decide you can’t live without Avery in your life. Go to Harper’s and hear her out. Consider that maybe this was complicated for her, too, and that you want to give her the benefit of the doubt just like I did the night you wrecked my truck.”

“I didn’t wreck it. A deer did.”

“Anyway,” he says, “if you take option three, you’ll have to suck up any embarrassment or fragile-male-ego syndrome you might have. Approach this option with the understanding that maybe she’s not feeling too great about this either.”

For the first time since I left my house, enough adrenaline has emptied out of my veins for me to think back clearly.

There were tears in her eyes. Was she crying? Did I make her cry?

Fuck.

My stomach feels heavy and rotten as I picture her pretty face twisted up. I run my hands down my face as I wonder if she’ll even talk to me now.

“Now the choice is yours, but I have to go to Dane’s. They’re home and Neely is down with the stomach flu, so he needs help getting the car unpacked.”

We head to the door. Matt follows me to the driveway. I start to climb into my truck when I stop.

“Hey, Matt,” I say as he approaches his vehicle.

“Yeah?”

“Not to be all girlie, but thank you.”

“It’s called having class, not being a girl, you idiot,” he says. “And you’re welcome.”

“You could’ve just said you’re welcome.”

“Bye.”

I turn on the engine and grip the steering wheel. My gaze lands on the dice tattoo on my arm. My stomach flip-flops. I’ve looked at this ink a million times since I got it, and it always brings me a certain feeling. That’s different today, and I hate it.

I can’t do this forever. I have to figure it out.

Sitting in the driveway, waving at Matt as he backs out beside me, I think about everything he said. There’s really only one option.

Jerking the truck into reverse, I pull out onto the road.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

AVERY

I tried.”

My reflection is blurred by the steam from my shower. I wipe it off again, but it just steams right back up, kind of like my eyes have done for the last hour. I blink them clear, and they fill right back up.

Crying makes me mad. I hate it. I’m so good at not doing it. It goes with the territory of having your feelings continually hurt—you learn to not cry. The fact that I’m crying now, or on the verge of it, is really freaking annoying.

I give my teeth a quick brush before heading into the hall. Harper is watching television in the living room, some show about a hot veterinarian who rescues animals in destitute conditions. I wonder vaguely if there’s an equally hot people doctor who rescues humans who are stuck in the same routines over and over.

Maybe I tried too hard, I think as I head into my bedroom. Maybe my attempt at being real with Penn scared the crap out of him.

Getting dressed, I mull the incident over again.

He was fine until we kissed. No, he was better than fine. He was the Penn I’ve gotten to know.

What on earth made him pull a one-eighty and basically kick me out?

I sit on the edge of my bed and dry my hair with a towel. The friction feels good, therapeutic, even, and I keep going long after it’s dried.

“And I was worried I wasn’t being fair with him,” I say. “What a joke.”

I’m tossing my towel into a laundry bin when I hear a soft knock on my door. I feel bad for not wanting to talk about this to Harper because I know she’s worried, but I don’t really know what to say. Penn rejected me. I don’t want to say that out loud.