Restraint (Mason Family 1)

“What do you want me to say?” I ask, playing coy.

“Oh, my gosh, Blaire. Holt. Talk to me about Holt Mason. I know you’re not this dense.”

My cheeks split into a grin. I sit on the bench and feel a warmth spread throughout my body.

As much as I don’t want to admit it—to Sienna or myself, for that matter—being able to talk about this with her is … nice. I’m not sure how much to say or what I should say or if I’ll regret it in a week when I’m back home and Holt is nothing but a memory, but it’s fun for now.

“I’m still in Savannah,” I say.

“Nana told me. I mean, I guessed as much, but she said she talked to you last night and confirmed it.”

My jaw drops. “You didn’t tell Nana about Holt, did you?”

The idea of my grandmother knowing I was sleeping with a man I just met is horrifying. My sweet little Nana would probably burst into flames.

I slink down on the bench and wince.

Sienna sighs. “I know this girl thing is new to you, but the first rule in the Girl Code is no snitching.”

“That’s also the first rule in prison.”

She scoffs. “See? That’s your problem right there. You know more about prison dynamics than you do having a friend.”

“You might be right,” I say, sitting back up. I shove that idea from my brain and focus on the task at hand. “You didn’t tell Nana, right? I need a straightforward confirmation.”

“No, Blaire, I didn’t tell your grandma that you were seeing a well-to-do, wealthy, kind man while you’re on vacation. The horror.”

“Well, thank you. That was nice of you.”

Her laugh is embedded with disbelief. “Okay. Let me guide you through this process.”

“What process?”

“The process of gossip!” She laughs. “This is the point when you tell me all the sordid details from last night. And don’t leave anything out.”

My face flushes at the idea of Holt doing sordid things to me. Lord, how I wanted him to. But my body settles down at the reminder that he didn’t do anything of the sort.

I sigh.

“Why are you so invested in this, anyway?” I return a nod to a woman and her son as they walk by. “Don’t you have better things to do?”

“You’re being serious?”

“I’m always being serious.”

“Good point.” She blows out a breath. “I … I like this side of you. I like getting to know you like this. Sure, we’ve chatted about Walker’s broodiness and Nana’s fried chicken, but that’s on a familial level. I like getting to know you like girls get to know girls. We bond over boys.”

“Huh.”

I get to my feet and mull over her words. We bond over boys. That sounds tragic. That sounds like quicksand under the foundation of a friendship.

“Surely, you’ve had one friend before,” Sienna says. “You can’t have been on this island your whole life, right?”

“I had a sleepover or two growing up.”

“Or two?”

“The girls I went to school with were …”

I struggle to find the words to describe them. I’m afraid she’ll take it personally.

The girls were obsessed with boys. They made fun of me for my grades. Then my glasses. Then my boobs.

“I had one good friend in college. It was short-lived,” I say, feeling myself auto-detach from the topic.

“Okay. That’s a starting point. What happened?”

“Jack.”

His name tastes bitter as it rolls off my tongue. The detachment that started to flow through my veins as I mentioned Lacie fully flows at the mention of my ex.

“Jack? Who is Jack?” Sienna asks.

Would it suffice to tell her I don’t think I ever knew?

My heart tugs as I think of Jack Williamson. Therapy taught me that the sensation in my chest isn’t for him, but for the time we spent together and what it represented to me—something it definitely didn’t represent to him. The pain, though, that’s because of him.

And for me.

I’m hit with a tidal wave of emotions. Guilt, shame, anger—it’s all there and so heavy. But it’s the sadness that swamps me, coming in like a tsunami and eroding the strength I’ve summoned since then. It’s a complete and utter devastation for the naïve young lady I once was who was irretrievably broken in the course of ten months. The me who lost both of my parents in a tragic accident. Who became the head of her family despite not having one iota how to do that. The woman who then lost her boyfriend due to her dejection. The girl who just needed a friend but lost her best friend too.

Then nearly, her own life.

Tears wet the corner of my eyes. I blink them back.

“Jack was an old boyfriend,” I say. “We broke up, and he took my best friend, my only friend, with him.”

“He sounds like an asshole.”

“He is. Or was,” I say with a shrug. “I like to think that he grew up and did better. That he and Lacie had a good life, and I was worth the trade-off.”