Total pages in book: 74
Estimated words: 69910 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 350(@200wpm)___ 280(@250wpm)___ 233(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 69910 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 350(@200wpm)___ 280(@250wpm)___ 233(@300wpm)
“You don’t need to…” I want to say he doesn’t need to earn my forgiveness, but my throat is too hot and thick to get the words out. I want to tell him I’m not holding on to years of hate and resentment. I want to let it go. I want to make a life for myself, not have it made for me.
“I’ll have the papers drawn up back home. I’m going to leave with my dad. I’ll make sure whatever very tenuous, slippery, and elusive peace we’ve found here doesn’t just evaporate.”
What? He’s coming back to Dedind? When did he decide that? Just now? Before this?
“What will you do with the house? What about Bitty Kitty?”
“If we drive, she can come with me. I’ll get a housesitter to take care of the place while I’m gone.”
“That’s really not necessary. I…we could just sign the paperwork.”
“I know we could, but I want to come back. I’ve been gone for a long time. It’s my dad. It’s your dad. Both companies are family-run.”
I don’t want to leave you again.
I can hear it. I feel it as though he actually said it, and the unspoken words tear me apart.
“Okay…just as long as you know that I can’t accept anything more than a share sale for the company. That will be more than enough, and it will be very much appreciated by me and everyone else there. I’d enjoy the peace for our dads, too, if it could be managed. And…and I’ll always think about what you did for me out here or what you tried to do and wanted to do.”
“I’ll always think about that kiss,” Apollo whispers.
I wince on instinct but then force my face placid to hide any trace of emotion. I want to be the old me—the old Patience who wasn’t afraid to say what she was thinking. I haven’t been that fearless girl in a long time. “I’ll probably always remember it too. Even if it should never have happened.”
He gives me that ghost of a smile—the one so charming and sweet that it makes me want to change my mind. I want to taste that smile on his lips. I kissed him. My childhood best friend. My fake husband. I freaking kissed him, and I don’t wish I could invest in a brain scrubber, a mind eraser, or a time machine to undo it.
We’re going back to Dedind, probably at different times, but we’ll be there together.
I know Apollo thought our time out here would be different. So did I. But it hasn’t been the worst. Far, far from it. Does that count for anything at all when I’m still leaving?
“Can I walk you back to the house?”
Why do I feel like that’s Apollo’s way of not taking no for an answer?
I nod. If it gets any thicker out here, the mosquitoes might legit carry me off or suck me bloodless. I need my blood if I want to figure out what I’m going to do with my life from this point forth.
CHAPTER 13
Patience
Jesus. Apollo never said he liked me, but we kissed.
Now that I’ve been thinking about it, I have to wonder when it happened.
It’s perfectly normal to have a childhood crush on your childhood best friend. Kids feel love differently. That would be cute. But now? You can’t feel something like that for someone you don’t even know. And Apollo? He’s known me for a hot minute. A few days. He can’t like me that way. He can’t even feel proper infatuation. He’s confused. He feels this sense of duty and obligation, and it’s all mixed up with the sweetness of childhood nostalgia and the burden of a promise. Even just thinking he finds me attractive is enough to send me spiraling in ways I don’t want.
I need to talk to my dad about going back home, which also means talking to him about the business and the shares. He’s not going to like it, so I’m going to have to help him see reason. It seems like a good conversation for the plane as we fly home together. This wasn’t the vacation he thought it was going to be, and he hadn’t taken a break in years. Neither of us has. That alone makes me feel guilty, never mind anything else.
When I got back to the house, he was already in his room. John was holed away, too, so at least there was a modicum of silence in the house.
Apollo walked back with me, and it was the most awkward walk of my life. We were both so quiet even though our thoughts screamed and echoed like wounded animals in the night. He didn’t come in with me. He said he was going to stay out there for a bit, and since I’m not into betting—I wasn’t, even before the whole stupid poker game that changed my life overnight—I’m not going to say I bet he’s swimming out there.