Taking Turns (Turning #1)(41)

“Something… big,” she says. “Something very stressful and life-altering. Maybe someone died?” she offers. “Big like that.”

“Who would’ve died?” I mumble, talking to myself.

“I don’t know. But she was sad. I will say that. She was very sad. On the inside. She never said anything and she always had a smile. But I recognized it.” Chella stops for a moment, looking out the window for a few seconds. “I know sadness. So I recognized it.”

I don’t know what to say to that. Any of it. Both Rochelle’s sadness and Chella’s. So I change the subject. “Do you still have the book?” I ask. “I wrote something in there for her. I’d like it back, if you have it. I’ll pay you for it.”

Chella gets up and goes into her new bedroom. Comes back with a box and places it on the table in front of me. She opens the box and unwraps the book from vintage linens that remind me so strongly of Rochelle, my throat begins to ache.

“It’s yours,” she says. “It’s a gift. I don’t need the money.”

I want to touch that book so bad. I want to pick it up and hold it to my heart and hug it the way I wish I could hug Rochelle right now. But I close the box back up and push it away with one finger. Like it’s poison. Because it is poison. If I take this book—if I allow myself to keep it—then I will write the end of this new story before we even get past the beginning. I will doom the new game of Taking Turns to failure. And maybe I don’t care all that much for Chella, but Bric likes her. Smith likes her. And they both gave me what I wanted by continuing the game with Rochelle. They gave me three years of happiness with her.

I owe them a fair chance, at least. I owe them this much.

“No,” I say, trying to hide the deep sadness coursing through my body. “I don’t want it.”

I expect Chella to ask more questions. I expect some persuasion from her. Urging me to keep it. Hide it away if I don’t want to look at it. I hope for this conversation because I hope she will talk me into staying in the past. Give me the excuse I’m looking for.

But she doesn’t. Chella nods, picks up the box, and takes it back to her new room.

I close my eyes and breathe through the pain, and the loss, and the regrets.

I f*cked up. All of this is my fault because I f*cked up.





Chapter Fourteen - Chella




When I come back out of the bedroom Quin is sitting on the new leather couch looking… sad. He’s slouched down, legs open in kind of a sexy way. But his face. One look at his face and I know the last thing on his mind is having sex with me.

I sit down next to him. “Is there anything I can do?”

It takes a few seconds for him to look at me. And then it’s just a quick glance before he looks straight ahead again. “I don’t think so, Chella. I think I loved her.”

I want to keep saying sorry, over and over and over again. But it’s stupid. It’s probably annoying and it won’t help. So I stay quiet. I wrap my hands around his upper arm, lean my head on his shoulder, and stay quiet. Right now, we are just two friends being sad together.

“Say something,” Quin finally says.

“I don’t know how to help you. I don’t know you well enough to make you feel better. And there’s really nothing I can say except… I hope you find her again.”

“I was really counting on you having answers.”

Shit.

“I really thought it was some f*cked-up joke or you’d tell me it was just temporary. Or she’d call me. But that’s not what’s happening, is it?”

“No,” I say softly. “I don’t think so.”

He shrinks in that moment. Folding into himself. Trying to escape reality.

“We can be friends though, Quin. I’m not trying to take her place.”

He reaches over for me. His large hand comes down on my ass cheek and he pulls me on top of him until I’m straddling his legs, my hands on his shoulders.

“If I don’t f*ck you… who will?”

I laugh a little, thinking… Bric? But I don’t say it. It seems impolite to say it.

“You know what I just figured out?” Quin asks.

“What?” I say, looking down at him.

He stares straight past my shoulder. Looking at some apparition of the girl he loves and lost. “We’re gonna be spending the most time together. Your days off work belong to me.”

“Hmm.”

“I’m sure Smith planned it that way to make me stop thinking about Rochelle.”

I try to fit this new information into my current world-view of what’s happening in this… relationship. But there’s missing information, or I’m not quite understanding, or whatever. Because I have to ask, “What do you mean?”

“You know. Smith can’t touch you unless…” But he stops. “You didn’t get that far yet, so I can’t say. But I can f*ck you. Any way I want, any time I want, because I’m Number Two this time. I get all of you, you get all of me. We have to talk, and build a real relationship by getting to know each other. He did it on purpose. Because I was Number One last time and things…”

He stops. But I’m dying to know more. “Things… what, Quin?”