Chapter 14
BLAKE
Ican't fucking take this anymore.
Four days since I kissed her back. Since I dumped her off my knee like she'd burned me and paced the frozen ground like a lunatic. Since she looked me in the eye and said it felt like something.
Fucking something.
And I've been lying to Reid the whole damn time.
I've been sitting in my truck for forty fucking minutes. Parked across from her building. Haven't even let myself drive past her place since the night I came here. Since I confessed everything.
I shouldn't be here.
The thought loops and loops but my hand doesn't reach for the ignition. I just sit here like an asshole, watching the entrance, waiting for—
What. What am I waiting for.
Permission, maybe. Some sign from the universe that showing up uninvited won't make everything worse than I've already made it.
That night at the camp won't stop playing. Her cold hands on my face. The shock of her mouth against mine. The way my whole body went bright and stupid and alive for three perfect seconds before my brain caught up and screamed what the fuck are you doing.
And then Reid. Standing in the kitchen when I got home, looking at me with concern instead of suspicion. Asking if I was okay. Telling me he was proud of me.
Proud.
I almost puked right there on the linoleum.
"Rough night?" he'd asked, all gentle and careful, like I was something fragile.
And I'd lied. Not directly—I just didn't correct his assumption. Let him think I was triggered by the camp, by memories, by anything other than the truth.
The truth being that I'd kissed his girl. Or she'd kissed me. Or we'd kissed each other. Does the order even matter when the result is the same?
It felt like something.
Her voice haunts me. The way she said it—quiet, sure, terrified. Like she was confessing a crime.
Maybe she was. Maybe we both were.
Movement. Corner of my eye.
Laine.
She's in scrubs, hair pulled back, bag over one shoulder. Even from here I can clock the exhaustion—the drag in her step, the way her shoulders curve inward. Long shift. The kind that hollows you out.
The last thing she needs is to see me.
Leave. I grip the steering wheel hard enough to hear my knuckles pop. Start the truck and go. You have nothing to offer her except more complications.
My hand's already on the door handle.
Feet already hitting pavement.
Goddammit, Blake.
"Laine."
She freezes. Turns. Her face cycles through surprise, something that might be relief, then goes carefully neutral.
"Blake." She doesn't move toward me. Doesn't bolt either. Just stands there with her keys in hand, watching me. She sees too fucking much. "What are you doing here?"
Good fucking question.
I shove my hands in my jacket pockets. "I needed to talk. About—" I don't know how to finish that sentence. About the kiss? About the fact that I've been losing my mind? About the lie sitting in my chest like a tumor?
"About everything," I finish lamely.
Her jaw tightens. "Reid—"
"Doesn't know I'm here."
Something flickers in her expression. Recognition, maybe. Like she understands exactly what kind of line I'm walking.
The silence stretches. A car passes. Some lunatic bird is hollering above us.
"We could walk," I offer. Moving's good. Better than standing here staring at her like she's everything. "There's a park a few blocks over."
"Come up."
I blink. "What?"
"My apartment." She's already moving toward the entrance, not looking back. "We can talk there."
"Laine—" I catch up in three strides. "You just got off a long shift. I don't want you to feel cornered, or pressured, or—"
She stops. Turns. Those dark eyes pin me in place.
"Blake. I'm inviting you. Into my home." Each word deliberate. Weighted. "If I felt cornered, I'd tell you to leave."
I search her face. Looking for doubt. Hesitation. Fear.
Find none of it. Thank fucking christ.
"Okay," I hear myself say. "Okay."
Her apartment is small.
Not cramped—compact. Efficient. The kind of space where everything has to earn its place or get cut. Galley kitchen opening into a living area. Couch that's seen better days. Bookshelf doing way more work than it was designed for.
Plants on the windowsill. Real ones. The kind that die if you forget about them.
Everything is intentional. Chosen. Like she's been assembling a life piece by piece, trying to build something that might actually last.
I shouldn't fucking be here.
"You can sit," Laine says, dropping her bag by the door. "I'm going to change. Water's in the fridge."
She disappears down a short hallway and her door clicks shut.
I don't sit.
Instead I drift toward the bookshelf. Medical texts. Novels. Travel guides for places I've never heard of. Photo frames tucked between spines—Laine with people I don't recognize, landscapes that could be anywhere.
The same older couple in lots of them. Her parents I assume. There are little bits of them in her. Her mom's smile. Same eyes as her dad.
Not wanting her to catch me creeping, I move on to the plants.
I don't know what any of them are called, but there's one bushy fucker that's reaching for the window like it's planning an escape.
Some bright pink flowering thing I don't know the name of.
And a wide pot with a bunch of little spiny ones.
"They're harder than they look."
I turn. Laine's changed into leggings and an oversized sweater, hair loose now. She looks softer like this. Huggable.
Don't.
"The plants," she clarifies, moving past me to the kitchen. "Everyone says succulents are easy, but they're finicky as hell. Too much water, they rot. Too little, they shrivel." She fills a kettle. "Tea?"
"Sure."
She won't look me in the eye. She's nervous.
Welcome to the fucking club.
"You can sit down," she says again. "You're making me anxious, hovering like that."
Right. Sitting. Like a normal person.
I lower myself onto the couch. Try to take up as little space as possible, which is fucking ridiculous given my size.
Laine brings two mugs. Hands me one. Sits on the opposite end of the couch, legs tucked beneath her. We're still too close together. Just a little shuffle, and I could have my hands on her.
"I talked to Jamila," she says finally. "About everything. The kiss. You and Reid. All of it."
I don't know who Jamila is, but the fact that Laine told someone—that she needed to process this out loud with another person, calms my racing heart. She's been carrying it too. And I fucking hate that it makes me feel better.
"What did she say?"
Laine's mouth twists. "That I'm a mess. That the situation is impossible. That maybe I should walk away from both of you and figure out who I am without a man in the equation."
My hand clenches on my thigh. "Smart advice."
"Probably." She takes a sip of tea. Quiet for a moment. "I lied too. To myself, mostly. Pretending I didn't feel anything for you. Pretending the kiss was just—confusion, or adrenaline, or some kind of trauma response."
She sets her mug down. Stares at it.
"It wasn't."
So much for my heart calming down. The fucker's running a race.
"I know," I say.
"You know?"
"You told me. At the camp." I stare into my tea. "You said it felt like something. I haven't been able to stop hearing it."
"Neither have I." She pulls her knees up. Wraps her arms around them. "And I hate that."
The last word lands hard. Not angry. Tired. Like she's been fighting herself for four days straight and she's losing.
I feel the same fucking way.
"I lied to Reid," I say. Because if she's bleeding, I need to bleed too. "That night. He asked if anything happened, and I let him believe I was just triggered by the cold. By memories." The confession scrapes out raw. "I looked him in the eye, and I lied."
She makes a low sound.
"He told me he was proud of me." I laugh, but nothing about this is funny. "For volunteering. For helping people. And I just stood there and let him say it, knowing what I'd done."
"What we'd done," she corrects quietly.
"You didn't—"
"I kissed you first. I made the choice. You pulled away." She meets my eyes. "We both did this."
I want to argue. Take the full weight of it. That's what I do—carry shit so other people don't have to. But she won't let me, and maybe that's fair. Maybe it's worse.
Silence fills the apartment. The fridge hums. Heat ticks through the baseboards.
"Reid wants to try again," Laine says. "He's been giving me space, but I know that's what he's hoping for. And part of me wants that too. The part that remembers how good it was before everything fell apart."
"Then you should try again." The words taste like ash. "You two were good together. You made him—"
"Don't." She shakes her head. "Don't make this about what I did for Reid."
"It's true, though."
"Maybe. But right now I'm trying to be honest about something, and I need you to just—" She presses her fingers against her eyes. "Just let me get through it."
I shut up. Grip my mug. Wait.
"I love him," she says. "I love Reid. And the idea of hurting him again makes me physically sick." Her voice thickens. "So the fact that I'm sitting here, in my apartment, with you—feeling what I'm feeling—"
She stops. Swallows hard.
"I don't know what's wrong with me."
My hands twitch on my thighs. The instinct to cross the space between us, to pull her against my chest and shield her from her own brain, is a physical ache. I fix things. That's my whole fucking purpose. I take damaged pieces and I put them back right.
But I can't fix this. If I reach for her, I destroy Reid. If I walk out that door, I leave her bleeding. I'm trapped in a vice of my own making.
"Nothing's wrong with you."
"Something is definitely wrong with me, Blake." She drops her hands. Her eyes are wet but she's not crying. "Because I know what this would do to him. I know. I watched what your confession did. I saw him after you left. After we broke up. And I'm still—"
She cuts herself off. Jaw tight. Like the next word is something she can't take back.
"Still what?" I shouldn't ask. I know I shouldn't ask.
"Still here." She gestures between us. "Still wanting to be in this room with you. Still thinking about that kiss when I should be thinking about how to fix things with Reid. What kind of person does that make me?"
The same kind as me.
"You're not a bad person, Laine."
"I didn't say bad. I said—" She exhales. "I don't recognize myself right now. I had a plan. Come to Oregon. Build a life. Stop running. And I did that. I was doing that. And now I'm sitting here with my—with Reid's—"
She can't even figure out what to call me. Welcome to the fucking club.
"You're not mine," she finishes. Almost to herself. "You're not mine, and I shouldn't want you to be, and I hate that I'm even thinking it."
My heart slams against my ribs so hard I'm sure she can hear it. For one blinding second, everything I've been strangling for months surges up—want so raw and enormous it nearly chokes me.
I crush it back down. Shove it into the dark and throw the deadbolt.
Because she's not saying choose me. She's saying what's wrong with me.
She loves him. She just said it. Reid is hanging by a thread, and I'm the one who's supposed to hold the line.
Guys like me don't get the girl. We don't get the soft landing.
We get to stand in the background and hold the walls up so the people we care about don't get crushed by the roof caving in.
I've known that since the day Jared died.
"I never asked for this," I say carefully. "You know that. What I told Reid before I left—that wasn't me making a play. I wasn't asking for anything."
"I know."
"I'm still not."
"I know that too." She wipes her eyes with the heel of her hand. "That almost makes it worse. If you were pushing, I could be angry. I could shut the door. But you keep trying to disappear, and I keep—"
She stops again. Shakes her head.
"Reid wants to try again," I say. "And you love him. So let him try. I'll figure out how to—"
"How to what? Sit across from us at dinner? Watch us on the couch? Go back to your workshop and white-knuckle it for another six months?"
"If that's what it takes."
"And what about you?"
"What about me?"
"What do you get, Blake?" She unfolds, plants her feet on the floor. "In this version where you fix everything and Reid gets his happy ending—what happens to you?"
I don't have an answer. I've never had an answer for that. The plan's never included me.
And I'm fine with it. I'd let myself be sanded down to nothing if it meant she didn't have to look this tired anymore. If it meant Reid got his life back.
"That's what I thought." She's not angry. She's sad. Which is worse. "You keep writing yourself out. Like you're just—scaffolding. Like once Reid's stable, you come down and nobody notices."
"That's not—"
"It is. It's exactly what you do." She looks at me. "And I can't stop caring about that. Even though caring about it is going to hurt everyone."
The apartment is too small. The walls are too close. I can hear her breathing. I can hear mine.
"This is going to break something," I say.
"I think something's already broken." She pulls her knees back up. Curls in on herself. "I just don't know if it's us or if it's me."
"It's not you."
"You don't know that."
"Yeah, I do."
She looks at me for a long time. Then she reaches for her tea. Takes a sip. Her hands are shaking.
"I don't have answers," she says. "I don't have a plan. I just needed you to know that I can't pretend you don't exist. And I hate myself a little for that."
"Don't." The word comes out rough. "Don't hate yourself for being honest."
"Honest." She almost laughs. "I'm having this conversation behind Reid's back. In my apartment. With the man who—" She stops. Breathes. "This isn't honest. This is a disaster."
She's right. This is a disaster. We're both here, both knowing we shouldn't be, and every word we say makes this worse.
"I should go," I say.
"Yeah." She doesn't move. "You should."
I don't move either.
"More tea?" she asks after a moment.
"Yeah." My voice is wrecked. "Yeah, okay."