When Sky Breaks: Burn & Break Duet Book 2

16. August

“Shortcake?”

Her wide eyes snap to mine when she hears that all-too-familiar nickname, and I clamp my lips tight, blood pounding in my veins.

How—why is she here?

My heart rattles in its iron cage. My palms itch with sweat and the desire to cup her flushed cheeks. The ground holds me captive as I gape at the ghost from my past.

When I crossed county lines two years ago and drove back to this town, I knew there would be a moment where I’d have to face what I did. But Sky never came home. She left for college and never returned.

Until now.

It would be stupid to think it’s because she heard I was here. That’s just my starving heart talking—the hunger and ache are bottomless.

She’s home because of Foster. I knew the moment he got diagnosed, she’d come back.

My idiotic plan was to pretend everything was fine if I ever saw her—pretend I didn’t shatter her heart, that I wasn’t responsible for taking away the one thing she loved most. But it’s impossible now that she’s standing in front of me.

There’s the bitter hope she moved on, met someone worthy of her, maybe got engaged, or had a kid. We’re still young, but she deserves to have the happiness I could never give her, even as the idea twists my gut and hollows my soul.

You try losing the one.

The girl you’d do anything for but failed miserably. Missing her every day, every night, knowing you were the one who walked away, who lit the match, who destroyed everything important to her.

Try losing her and then seeing her again.

That’s the dark side of love. The shadow lingers, aware of its sins, but can’t let go of the one thing that might save it.

“What are you doing here?” she asks, a little breathless.

Her voice is soft, but the rest of her isn’t. Sky’s rigid, the muscles tensing in her hands. All we do is stare at each other, chests heaving in choppy breaths.

God, she’s so beautiful. Gone is the little Sky I knew. In her place is a stunning woman. Creamy skin with a leftover bronze from the summer and a sweep of blonde hair I could touch all day. But her once brilliant baby blues show the cost of time. They’re etched in a bone-deep sadness.

I clear my throat and finally look away from her to the flowers still bunched in my hands.

Why am I here?

I go for the truth for once.

“Trying to make amends.” However, it’s not just Chase’s grave I’m visiting, but that’s a conversation for another day.

“You visit Chase?” Her question is strangled, much like my emotions as I roam over her face.

I glance away before I crumble at her feet. “Whenever I can, yes.”

Her body language shifts, and blistering tension flows from her to me. The air hums with an awareness as if the dead are watching and waiting at the veil. I ache to hold her, to comfort her, to tell her I’m sorry. Time hasn’t dulled my feelings. Not at all.

“I don’t know if I can do this,” she mumbles and breaks our stare, heading for the cemetery gate.

My heart lurches. I can’t let her go.

“Wait!”

She stops, facing away, her head down. I hate that I did this to her, made her go back into her shell.

“Let’s go somewhere and talk. Please.” The plea isn’t pretty—it’s desperate. But I can’t let her go. Not yet.

She turns and lowers her lashes at the neatly trimmed grass at our feet. I don’t know if she’ll run, but now that we’re both in the same place, we can’t go on existing like this. Like we weren’t two people who loved each other down to the marrow of our bones.

“I have a house. I mean, I built a house. We can talk there. Dinner, I can make you dinner. Tomorrow night,” I stutter out.

Another minute passes, and the deafening silence nudges into me like the sharp end of a hook. I won’t force her to talk to me. After all, this is my doing. She doesn’t owe me a damn thing.

Sky lifts her head and surprises me with a stiff nod. “Okay. But no dinner. Coffee only. At the new place that just opened up.”

Relief, however brief, flutters through my chest as she stares for a second more before spinning and leaving me stunned in the isolated cemetery.

* * *

“Ben, I don’t know what the fuck to do.” I pace the wooden floors of my house, clutching the phone tightly.

“Uh, about what?”

“Sky. She’s, she’s back.”

“Hmmm. Yeah?” He sounds weird.

“She’s here for Foster. Everyone knows he’s sick.” I pause my pacing and look out the window into the backyard before resuming my neurotic steps around the square footage of my small ranch.

“Okay. And…” Benny says, irked.

“I was leaving flowers at Chase’s grave and she just shows up! I don’t know how long she plans on staying or how much time I have. Ugh, what the fuck do I do?” Panic laces my rising voice. My scalp aches as I slice my fingers through my hair.

“Okay, for one, chill out before you have a heart attack. Two, what the hell do you mean, what do you do? Talk to her.” Says the man who settled down a year after high school and hasn’t had to deal with this twitchy feeling in his chest over a woman.

“We’re meeting at the Coffee Haven tomorrow.”

“So, she found you?” He sounds amused.

“Yeah, why?”

“Oh, no reason.”

“What aren’t you telling me?”

He sighs and my senses go on high alert. “Spit it out, Ben.”

“I may have run into her at the hardware store.”

I halt my incessant steps. “What? What did she say?”

“Nothing really. She was shopping for stuff for the haunted house. She’s helping Foster’s guys with the project this year.”

I completely forgot about the festival. “Shit. Colonel asked me to take pictures of the construction for the paper again.”

“Which means you’re gonna be seeing her a lot more as well.”

“Right, right, okay.” I try to let that settle in, but my stomach rolls.

“And maybe take a breath, chamo. It’s going to be all right.”

I cast my eyes to the ceiling. “You know that’s not true.”

“Well, I’m trying to be optimistic here for your sake.” He chuckles.

“Fuck. I’m nervous.”

“What is it you want from her?”

“I don’t know.”

Anything and everything.

“It’s pretty obvious to me by your crazy heavy breathing and mild panic attack. You haven’t gotten over her. I mean, hell, you even bought a fucking?—”

“Don’t say it. I know, okay, I know. It’s just…” I sigh and pinch the back of my neck.

“Yeah, I feel ya. You fucked up.”

I don’t say anymore. Benny knows I left Sky without saying goodbye. How I fucked her and left her. He knows I cut off all contact with anyone from this place except him. And Colonel. However, Benny doesn’t know how much I lied to her. He doesn’t know I was behind the house fire, so he isn’t aware of just how deep a hole I’m in.

“But, I’m here for you. I know how much you care about her. Just take it one moment at a time. Remember when I fucked things up with Kayla, and she left me in the doghouse for a week before we talked it through? I know it’s been years, but if you both still have feelings for each other, it’ll work out.”

I sigh, resting my head in my palm as I slump onto the back of the couch. “Thanks, man. Oh, hey, tell your mom I’ll be over in a few days to work on the spare wing.”

“Will do.”

Tossing my phone onto the cushion, I fall over the back of the couch and hang my feet over the edge. It’s going to take more than a week in a hypothetical dog house for me to make it up to Sky.

The question is: Do I deserve her after everything I’ve done?