Hunter steps toward us, finally braving the clear tension in the room. He pinches his heavy brow and squeezes his eyes shut.
“We just talked about this, and I thought for sure you’d have told me if you were hooking up with my sister. You haven’t been stringing Molly along for years, have you?” he asks Gray. “You haven’t been in touch since high school, have you…?”
I shake my head. “It’s only been the last few days. But we all know I wanted him before that. He knew it just as well as you or I or anyone who could see how I followed Gray like a puppy dog when he lived in Little Haven. He knew how I felt and he let me explore that, despite knowing he’d never commit to me. He’d never build something with me.”
“Molly, that’s not fair.”
Gray takes his first step in my direction since we started this, and I recoil.
“Maybe it’s not.” I’m shaking. My shoulders, my fingers, even my core. “Gray, we might have only been together a few days, but you knew I’d spent a lifetime caring about you. You should never have started anything with me.”
“It’s Christmas,” he whispers, a strange expression playing out across his face. Like that’s somehow supposed to make this injury okay. “You knew from the beginning that I was only here for a little while, and that I was on suspension, but not fired.”
“That doesn’t make it okay.”
“Molly—” He half-steps toward me, and I skitter back, running into my brother.
I turn around and look up at Hunter, embarrassing tears stinging the corners of my eyes. I bite my bottom lip until I taste blood; I willnotcry over this. I will not give Gray the satisfaction of knowing how badly I wanted this. My brother’s face hardens, and he puts a hand on my shoulder.
“You should go, Gray,” he says. “Can you stay at your sister’s place?”
Lindsey and Jake don’t live that far. He’ll have to put up with the baby waking up in the night, though, and we’ll have to move his things and—
But Gray is already nodding. He’s already backing up toward the stairs. This is the out he was looking for, the official permission to bail. My stomach knots into its tightest ball yet.
“Let Bates know I went to grab my stuff,” he says. “I’ll see him at practice later.”
I set my jaw and watch him go, determining not to let the tears fall. Where the hell is the fierce, biting girl known for her smart mouth right now?
Gray starts up the stairs, not even looking back once. When he takes the last step and his legs disappear around the bend, the gasp I let out is strangled and pitiful.
Hunter’s other hand is on my shoulder, too, now. I lean back against him, feeling all of four years old with us positioned the way we used to be in front of scary carnival rides or intimidating relatives.
“He’s trash. He was never good enough for you. He was never—”
“He’s your best friend.” I choke the words out, still fighting back the sting in my eyelids. “You’re supposed to act offended. You’re supposed to defend me. But we both know he means something to you. We both know you don’t really think those things. And… and he certainly doesn’t think them. He doesn’t know what he wants, so he’s running back to what he knows.”
Hunter says nothing in response. His big, calloused hands just squeeze my shoulders before he wraps his arms around my chest and hugs me close. He is a man-bear, and I cuddle in, loving my brother more than ever for that.
“At least you’ve got the party to distract you,” Hunter says. “You’ve got a project to throw yourself into. It’ll be like when Grandma died, and because she left you this trash hole, you had all the distraction you needed to get through your grief.”
I stiffen at that. “I must seem pretty bad off if you’re comparing a barely qualified break-up to the death of my favorite relative.”
“I’m your favorite relative,” Hunter says with a dry laugh, kissing the top of my hair.
I bat at his arm as the first traitorous tear glides down my cheek. “You’re definitely in line after Grandma. Probably after those third cousins we met at that one family reunion, too. And after my old pet hamster, Hamilton, for sure.”
“So, she still bites when she’s hurt. I would never want to hunt for an animal like you, little sis.”
I press my lips together as tight as I can. My gaze is still fixed on the top of the stairs. And my heart is somewhere past that, following along after the guy who didn’t choose me when I’d put everything on the line for him.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN: GRAY
My day starts at four a.m. to the sounds of crying and a blender running.
For several blurry minutes, I’m not sure where I am. I sit up in an unfamiliar bed in a small, square room, and quickly realize the crying is coming from a handmade white crib positioned at the far wall. I look down and run my hands over the tiny mountain of covers. Even in my haze, I recognize my little sister’s craftsmanship; she’s been making variations of the same Amish Star since she was old enough to learn to quilt. I hold my breath and tense before throwing back the blankets and swinging my legs over the side of the bed.
“’S alright,” I mumble, scrubbing at my eyes with the palms of my hands as I cross over to the crib. The hardwood floor is too cold under my stiff toes, and I have to resist the urge to hop-skip across it. “Uncle Gray to the rescue. Do you think running a blender this early counts as child abuse?”