“No,” he grumbles, scowling at the road. “But I didn’t do any of that, and he still blames me for it. You don’t seem to care about that.”
“I told him it wasn’t you,” I say, reaching over to touch his arm. “I know you’re not the person he thinks you are. If I agreed with him, I wouldn’t be here right now.”
He lets out a little snort of breath and doesn’t answer.
“So,” I say, turning back to his phone. “What should I put on the playlist?”
*
We drive the rest of the day, listening to music and talking. At around midnight, I’m the one who caves and asks if we can stop for the night. I’m not used to sitting still for so long, and I’m going stir-crazy from being in the car all day. When people talk about road trips, they always sound fun, but I didn’t factor in the amount of time spent getting there.
Preston finds an all-night boxing gym, and we go there to work off our energy and annoyance with each other after spending twelve hours straight in a car together.
“You’re not too bad,” I say after we’ve been at it for an hour and the owner comes to ask if we want to pay more or get out.
“You sound surprised,” Preston says, undoing his gloves. I can tell he was pulling his punches, and even though he’s got a serious disadvantage since he has no peripheral vision at all on his blind side, he held his own against me.
“I am,” I say. “You ever fight at Slaughterpen?”
He snorts and holds apart the ropes for me to climb through. He hops down after me, and I find myself admiring him the way I sometimes do. He’s so sophisticated, so thin compared to Royal’s thuggish bulk, that sometimes I forget he’s an athlete, too.
“What?” he asks, straightening.
“Nothing,” I say, jerking my gaze away.
“The Dolces own that place,” he says, and it takes me a second to get my head on straight. I don’t know what the fuck is wrong with me. I don’t like Preston in that way, but his body is so familiar and inviting, and when it’s all glistening with sweat, his shirt clinging to him, he looks good enough to lick.
Back at the hotel, he showers first, and I log into myOnlyWordsaccount to text Royal after making sure the location is turned off. I don’t want to deceive Royal, and I know he’ll see this as a betrayal even though I would never cheat on him. I wish I could tell him, but after agonizing about this idea for the past few weeks, I came to the conclusion that I can’t. There’s no way I could give him the kind of hope I have. Because if it all comes to nothing, it would break him in a way nothing else has.
I know what a cruel tormentor hope can be. I can’t put him through that, especially when my goal is to do the opposite—to heal him, to give him the one thing he needs most, the way he gave me Syracuse. But if Preston is wrong, if they’re not alive or we can’t find them, and I made Royal hope again, it will kill him. So, I have to find out for myself before I risk losing him to the darkness altogether.
When I step out of the bathroom after my own shower a few minutes later, a weird wave ofdéjà vusweeps over me. How many nights did we shower separately, and I’d step out of the bathroom in a towel, and Preston would tell me to get on the bed on all fours, call me his good girl as he slid his cock into me from behind?
Maybe he’s thinking the same thing, because he sits up from his bed and smiles when he sees me. “Look at us,” he says. “Just the two of us, like it always was.”
“Yeah,” I say, glancing back and forth between the two queen beds. At least he didn’t shamelessly get a room with one bed and pretend it’s all the hotel had available. Maybe my lecture about consent that night on the bridge hit home.
“What do you say?” he asks, pulling back the blankets. “One more for old time’s sake?”
I roll my eyes, forcing a laugh. “First of all, you’re shameless. Second, what happened to being all worried Royal would kill me?”
“I thought you said Royal didn’t get to tell you what to do anymore.”
“Doesn’t mean he won’t try.”
“He doesn’t have to know.”
“Preston…” I sink down on the edge of his bed. “I love Royal. Maybe I love you, too, but it’s in a completely different way. And I don’t think you love me that way, either.
“Who said anything about love?” he asks, giving the corner of my towel a little tug.
“I did,” I say, taking his hand. “I’m not what you want, anyway.”
He turns his hand over, so his palm is facing up, and links his fingers through mine. “You could be what I want.”
“Want me to tell you what a very wise man once told me?”
He gives me a suspicious look. “Probably not.”