She pointed a finger at him. “And I don’t want some sugarcoated version, Finn. I’m not that little girl anymore. I can handle it.” She stared down at her hands, spun a ring she had on her index finger, before looking up again. “But I need someone to tell me honestly what it is about me that makes me…hard to like. I know I can be abrasive, but I wasn’t that way with you. I showed you exactly who I was, and it didn’t…matter.”
The last word caught in her throat, revealing that she was holding back a lot more emotion than she was showing, but her face remained set, determined.
Finn’s chest squeezed tight, and he set his glass on the coffee table, trying to find the right words. He reached out and placed his hand over hers. “You’re not hard to like, Bec. You were one of my closest friends. I cared about you. You’re brilliant and beautiful and tough. You were back then, and you still are now. I would’ve been lucky to have you as a girlfriend. My parents would’ve been thrilled. For a while I thought that might be the next step…”
“But?”
“But I fell for someone else,” he admitted.
“Olivia.”
He sat back, releasing her hand. “Yes, and that had nothing to do with anyone else’s deficits and everything to do with how I felt when I was around her. I’d liked girls before. I’d had crushes. And I loved you as my friend. But she”—he glanced out at the yard, catching sight of Olivia’s silhouette in the distance—“lit up everything inside me.”
The quiet admission was out before he could evaluate it or edit it.
When he looked back at Rebecca, her eyes had gone shiny.
“I’m sorry, Bec,” he said softly. “I’m not trying to hurt you.”
She gave him a wavering smile and swiped at her cheek where a tear escaped. “It’s not you. I think that’s…a beautiful thing to say. Just hearing you say it makes me realize I’ve never felt that. About anyone.”
He blew out a breath, feeling exhausted all of a sudden, and ran a hand over the back of his head. “In a way, that’s probably a blessing.”
She gave him a you’re-an-idiot look and scoffed. “A blessing. That I’ve never fallen in love like that? Gee, yeah, sounds awful. Who wants to be lit up inside? Screw. That.”
Her dry tone was classic Rebecca, and it stirred an old fondness in him, but he reached for his drink, mulling over his thoughts. “It was teen love—hormones mixed up with the thrill of firsts with a big dash of pie-in-the-sky plans that would never come true. It’s idealized stuff that screws with your head and makes you reckless.”
“So you don’t still love her?” she challenged. “That woman out there doesn’t light you up like that anymore?”
The words dug in and burrowed under his skin like sharp hooks, making him shift in his seat. He stared out at the fading light, knowing Liv was in the distance, wishing she were on her way back, but feeling Rebecca’s stare on the side of his head. “I…care about her. But I’m not in a place that I can start a relationship. My job keeps me away.”
Rebecca let out a gimme-a-break groan. “Really, Finn? You’ve become that guy?”
He turned. “What?”
“I’m not in the place for a relationship is guy-speak for I really like sleeping with you as long you don’t expect anything real from me.”
“I—”
“Look,” she said, gracing him with what was probably her don’t-mess-with-me lawyer glare. “I get that you have a job that doesn’t make things easy. But there are people in the military who are gone for long stretches who have relationships and families. So that’s a bullshit excuse.”
“I’m not going to put her through that.” His jaw clenched. “And it’s not just the time away. Liv deserves better than what I could give her. You said it yourself. You don’t know me anymore. I’m not the guy I was when I was seventeen.”
“She must see something in you,” Bec said, not backing down. “Sex with a good-looking dude is not that hard to come by. Liv’s gorgeous and smart. She could get that at any bar on any given night. She could leave here tonight and find it.”
He grimaced. “Thanks for that visual, Bec.”
“Just speaking the truth.” She shrugged. “And I’m not going to pretend Liv and I have always gotten along. Maybe subconsciously I sensed something going on between you two and got jealous. I don’t know. But I got close to her and the other girls that year after everything happened, and Liv was there for me. She was a disaster. We all were. But she was strong and fought hard to get where she is now.”
“I know she did.”
“So don’t do something to undo it,” Rebecca said.
His stomach clenched. “I’m not trying to. I’ve told her where I stand with things. She’s not looking for a relationship either. We both know this is just for the summer. She’s okay with that. We’re going into it with eyes open so that when we walk away, no one is surprised.”
Rebecca frowned as if something had just occurred to her. “What happened the last time?”
“What?”