Chapter 36
Artemis
Christmas Eve Eve at my parent’s house is exactly the hellscape I should have expected. The fire roars, but it only illuminates the cold pit forming in my stomach.
Despite the fact it’s early in the day, my father’s already halfway through his first glass of expensive whiskey, the flickering fire like a prop in a fucking villain’s monologue.
The only thing missing is the super fluffy cat draped across his knee.
To no one’s surprise, Mamá’s cat fucking hates him, won’t go near him.
“You look tired.” His words aren’t out of concern and have a hard edge to them. “Weak.”
I swallow down a sharp retort. How the fuck can someone look weak?
He pours more whiskey.
“Your grades are slipping.” He swirls his glass, nailing me with that parental stare that sees right through me. “Your performance on the ice is mediocre at best.” He gives me a thin, knowing smile that sends ice straight into my veins. Does he know? About Xavier? “Is there a reason?”
I fight the urge to shudder as my stomach drops. He definitely knows. Maybe not the details. But he knows something. He can smell vulnerability like a shark sniffing out blood in the ocean.
“Love.” He gives a casual shrug at my silence. “Love’s a stupid game that makes a man stupid, hijo. Soft.” He sneers the word like he’s allergic. “It gives the world leverage against you. You should be careful who you let in.”
Is he threatening Xavier? His tone isn’t cautious or concerned.
Something in me snaps. He’s not talking about grades, or even the stupid game I ‘love too much.’ He’s talking about Xavier, even in a hypothetical.
If he doesn’t know who he is exactly, he’s taking a shot across the bow, voicing a suspicion, about the part of me that has dared to hope I can have something good.
Something he can’t taint with his fucking last name.
I stand.
My father raises a brow. “Leaving already?” It’s still afternoon. If I leave now, well, if I don’t leave now something outside of my control might happen. And if I do, I might get to see him.
“Yes.” My hand shakes around the car keys bunched in my fist, but I don’t let him see it. “I have somewhere else to be.”
His smirk is a sharpened knife. “One day you’ll learn.
” He pauses for dramatic effect. If this was a movie it’d be here he strokes his villain cat in slow motion.
I hope he tries to pet Mamá’s cat and it claws his fucking eyes out.
“You can’t have both power and softness. You’ll lose everything trying.”
I don’t answer. I don’t say goodbye to my siblings or Mamá and Abuelita in the kitchen. I walk out into the cold, dark, silent night that feels more like freedom with each step I take toward my car.
I drive without thinking, without music, without anything but the pulsing need in my chest to get away from my father. I stop to pee, to hydrate, and I treat myself to the world’s greasiest burger in a drive thru pitstop.
I could say I don’t know where I’m going until I’m there, but the pull in my chest drags me across state lines. The internet says it’s a fourteen-hour drive without stops, but it takes closer to seventeen hours to drive through the night.
Just shy of a thousand miles. Deep in the heart of Texas. Where it seems my heart has been abducted to and is currently residing.
Every mile I leave behind feels like I’m shedding the armor my father forced me to wear. The de la Pena armor. All I want is to collapse into Xavier’s arms and not think about the world at all.
So… I drive.
Xavier’s childhood home has a warm glow from the window, the faint outline of his Christmas tree. It’s the ass crack of dawn. I don’t have a gift. I didn’t even tell him I was coming. I just… drove here.
My heart stumbles as I get out of the car. I walk up the steps with numb fingers and toes. The door opens before I can knock, or text him to say I’m here. Xavier’s standing there in soft joggers and a well-worn hoodie. His hair is mussed, and his concerned eyes go wide.
“I didn’t… know where else to go.” My voice breaks on the only words I can manage.
He doesn’t hesitate, not even for a fraction of a second. “Come here.” His voice is soft, so full of emotion I can’t decipher, I’m not even sure I want to.
And when he pulls me inside, when the door clicks shut behind us, when his warmth surrounds me, for the first time in weeks, my chest stops fucking hurting.