When Sky Breaks: Burn & Break Duet Book 2

4. Sky

The world shrinks,fading around me. Before I go nuts on Trek in this very public place, I examine the man I haven’t seen since I loaded my car up for college.

Trek’s not a boy anymore. Handsome with auburn hair cut in a modern style atop his head. His cheeks have hollowed with age, and scruff lines his jaw like he hasn’t shaved in a few weeks. I bet the girls go crazy over that and how he now fills out his clothes properly. No more lanky legs in skinny jeans the boys used to wear. He’s broad-shouldered and has grown several inches too.

I try hard not to miss him as I narrow my eyes and harden my voice. “Why are you here? How did you even know where I’d be?”

He shifts his gaze to where Phoebe and Graham sit.

“Phoebe? She told you I was here? Why?” I’m stunned as a flare of betrayal bites into me. Meddlesome Farris should be her name. “I’m gonna kill her.”

Johnny slides his hands down my arms, and I flinch, startled he’s still here, witnessing this bullshit. “How about we go back to the table? Maybe your friends can clear this up for you. And me.”

His tone grates my already sensitive mood. He doesn’t seem excited about being blindsided at a bar by a person he didn’t know existed.

I never told him about Trek. Doing so meant telling him more about my sordid past, and the point of casual is not having to. Then he had to throw in the whole boyfriend comment, further delineating lines I had already mocked up to perfection.

“Fine.” I shake loose Johnny and stalk through the throng of people to our table. Phoebe looks up at that exact moment and widens her eyes once she notices who trails behind me.

Graham scrunches his brows as she lays a hand on his arm.

“Oh hey, Trek. Uh. Didn’t think you’d be coming out tonight. That wasn’t the plan.” Her palpable cringe brings more ire to the surface.

“Phoebe, why? What plan?” I say, moving her drink over a little too forcibly. I flick what sloshed out off my hands and wipe them on my jeans.

“Just hear him out. It’s important.”

Trek guides me to face him by the elbow. “I didn’t want to do this here, but you haven’t been answering your phone, and Dad wouldn’t tell you himself. Have you listened to the last voicemail I left you?”

One second away from losing my tightly veiled temper, I shrug him off and cross my arms. “What do you think? No, I haven’t. I haven’t opened anything you’ve sent me either.”

Letting out a deep sigh, he glances at Phoebe. “We’ll be back. Sorry to ruin the mood, but it couldn’t wait.”

Phoebe nods, and a rush of trepidation extinguishes some of my anger. I don’t believe for a second that Trek would show up at a bar just to talk to me about forgiving him. This feels different. Ominous.

Icy fear trickles down my spine. What could he want?

Johnny’s tall frame stands to the side, his calculating eyes assessing the situation like he would in a treatment meeting at the hospital. Except he won’t have all the facts. I refuse to drag him into this.

Relief briefly flashes in my chest at the possibility he won’t want to be in this mess with me. It means all my walls can stay properly erected for as long as I need. However, I reach out to grab his hand, and he swings his gaze to mine, searching for answers. “I’ll explain later, okay?”

He flexes his jaw with a stiff nod, shoving his hands in the pockets of his sleek dress pants so I’m forced to release my hold on him.

Lifting his chin at Trek, Johnny says to me, “Go on. Sounds like you need to take care of something big. I work tomorrow evening, but I’ll be waiting for your call.” He leans in and kisses my cheek before turning and striding through a wall of people and out of the bar.

Trek tugs on my arm, and it takes an army of resolution to look at him. There’s worry swimming in his features. My stomach sours and all the alcohol I consumed threatens to come out.

“It’s quieter outside,” I say, letting him pull me through the crowd as I try to keep up. One guy extends his arm in a drunken stupor, and Trek brushes him aside, issuing a “fuck off” before we reach the outside door.

The lingering humid air sticks to our skin as we leave the air-conditioned bar and pass by a line of people waiting to get in.

The parking lot Trek leads me to is quiet, much like my silence as I follow. Until I know what this is about, I don’t speak. But my heart pumps wildly with a deep-seated fear I won’t like what he has to say.

Finally, he stops under a street lamp next to my car and slumps against it, his hands shoved deep into his jeans pockets.

“Trek. You’re scaring me with this show of whatever it is.” On the verge of vomiting, I rub my arms to ward off the goosebumps while I wait for him to lift his head and tell me what the hell is going on.

“You gotta come home with me.”

Instantly alert and sober, I stumble forward and grip his arms, digging my short nails into his hard biceps. “Why? What’s wrong? Is it Dad?”

Trek jerks his head up and down and straightens, sniffing before replying. My vision blurs before he utters the words no daughter ever wants to hear. “Dad’s sick, sis. He has cancer and he needs us—you home.”