Written with You (The Regret Duet #2)(33)

He didn’t trust me. I got it. I deserved that. And as long as he kept bringing her back, I was willing to accept it.

But it was getting worse. His hate for me was growing instead of fading. It had only been three weeks; I didn’t expect him to be my best friend or anything. But he never missed the opportunity to throw out a snide remark even if it was mumbled under his breath. He’d bitten my head off when they’d arrived an hour earlier because I’d prepped slime for our nightly craft. Apparently, they were going to dinner afterward and he didn’t want her to get messy. I’d offered to give her one of my T-shirts to cover her clothes, but he leaned in close, his nose nearly brushing mine—and not in a good way even though my nipples reacted all the same—and seethed, “This is a privilege I’m letting you have. Pick another project or we’re leaving.”

I enjoyed taking his shit about as much as I would have enjoyed a root canal, but I had no leg to stand on. So I’d packed the slime away and instead broke out the photo albums. Not surprisingly, Caven sat on the other side of Rosalee on the couch, busy with his phone and ignoring my existence as I showed her more pictures of Hadley.

Looking at pictures was her favorite thing to do when she came over. And not just pictures of Hadley. She wanted to see pictures of me and my parents too. I thought Caven was going to have a nervous breakdown the day I told her that they were in heaven with her mommy. Of course, he’d been able to mask his emotions from Rosalee, but I’d seen the straining of the muscles at his neck and the sweat beading on his forehead. He’d said nothing though. He’d actually looked me in the eye for a second, making me feel like we were rebuilding a semblance of trust when I’d managed to redirect her interrogation about how my parents had died by showing her an old home video. I regretted it immediately, because the moment my mother appeared on the screen, Caven stood up and stormed outside. It was the one and only time he’d left me alone with her.

I’d started to go after him but that wasn’t a demon I could beat back. At least not for him. I would have only made it worse. The memories. The guilt. The pain. While Caven’s presence made me feel safe and calmed my ever-brewing anxieties, Willow did not do the same for him.

To Caven, I represented the past.

I was Willow, the little girl from the mall.

He was always on edge when he was around me. His jaw hard, his lips tight, and he fidgeted like it was either that or tear out of his own skin. He didn’t want my reassurances and not just because he was pissed that I’d lied. He saw me in a different light now, which was almost worse than being Hadley the Terrible in his eyes.

He hated her.

But the sight of me wrecked him.

Which, in turn, wrecked me too.

But just like he’d said the night he’d brought her over, these visits were about Rosalee. And while Caven and I were dancing the world’s most awkward tango, young as she might have been, Rosalee was thirsty for knowledge about the Banks family.

She had her favorite pictures of Hadley that she insisted I show her every time she came over. One was a photo that my mother had taken when Hadley had been jumping rope as a kid. Her mouth was so wide that the laughter was almost visible. Rosalee’s other favorite was one of me and Hadley together. We were fifteen, and it was April Fool’s Day at school, so we’d broken our rule of individuality and dressed exactly the same to confuse people. The irony was not lost on me or Caven. He’d cussed under his breath the day Rosalee had shoved that picture in his face, exclaiming, “Look! They are exactly the same!”

It was that same picture that was about to get me in trouble. Again.

“Can I get a word with you?” Caven flicked his gaze at Rosalee, sitting on a stool in front of my bathroom mirror, then back to me. “In private.”

I flashed a pair of wide eyes at her in the bathroom mirror, unplugged the flat iron, and tucked it under the sink before leaving the room. “Uh, yeah. Sure.”

We met in the hallway, where he quietly closed my bedroom door.

“What the hell are you doing?”

I pursed my lips to the side. “Her hair and makeup?”

“You said lip gloss and hair?”

I rubbed my chin, pretending to be deep in thought. “Okay, you got me. It was tinted Chapstick.”

“I’m talking about her hair, Willow.”

He didn’t say my name often, but each time, no matter how coarse or how short tempered, it caused a chill down my spine.

“What about her hair?” I asked, genuinely confused.

“It’s straight. Why is it straight? Her hair is curly.”

“Right. But she asked if I could do her hair like Hadley’s and you said yes. So I’m doing her hair like Hadley’s. I’m not completely sure where the problem lies?”

“Hadley’s hair wasn’t straight.”

I arched an incredulous eyebrow. “No. But she always wore it that way. Rosalee showed you the picture of us when she asked if I could do her hair.”

His jaw ticked as he cut his gaze down the hall. “I didn’t inspect the damn picture. Her hair was full of thick waves the night I met her. I just figured—”

Confusion hit me like a Mack truck. “What? That’s impossible. She hated when it looked like mine.”

He leaned in close. “You want to know something I’ve learned recently? Nothing is impossible when it comes to you and your sister. Stalking me down. Stealing my shit. Fucking me as a distraction. Leaving babies on doorsteps. Screwing with people’s heads. Pretending to be someone you are not. The list goes on and on. Don’t talk to me about impossibility, Willow. My entire life is currently an impossibility.”