Make Me Hate You(21)

I shrugged. “It’s okay.”

Tyler nodded, and his legs kicked gently below him as he leaned back on his palms again. “I don’t come out here nearly enough anymore,” he mused, reaching for his glass. He took a long sip before he continued. “I swear, somewhere between twenty-two and twenty-six, I entered into a serious love affair with my job, and I’ve neglected everything else, it seems.”

I stiffened a bit at his words, because it was the first time Tyler, The Man, was allowing me to see a little about who he was now that he was no longer Tyler, The Boy.

I knew that Tyler. I knew the cocky, care-free boy who never combed his hair and always smelled like sunscreen from being outside all the time. But the Tyler who went into a stiff, boring office every day? The one who wore suits and talked money with businesses and individuals alike? The one who had a superstar Instagram model girlfriend who his entire family already loved?

I didn’t know that Tyler at all.

“It’s easy to do,” I offered. “Gotta find the balance between work and play. What do you do for fun?”

Tyler laughed. “Fun. What’s that?”

He arched a brow my way, but I just smiled, waiting.

“I don’t know,” he offered. “I love to travel. Azra and I plan trips when we can get time off, or sometimes I’ll fly to join her wherever she has a shoot.”

My stomach did a flip at the sound of her name rolling off his lips, but I ignored it.

“What about when it’s just you?”

A small smile found his lips, his gaze on the water. “I like to light candles, put on a Hamasyan or Wang record, and read.”

Surprise flittered through me. “I didn’t realize you enjoyed listening to piano so much.”

“It’s sort of a new discovery, the past couple of years.” Tyler shrugged. “It’s peaceful. Sometimes I just sit there and listen, close my eyes, let my mind wander.” Something passed over him then. “It takes me back, in a way. Makes me think of simpler days.”

I nodded, taking another long sip from my whiskey glass, which was almost empty now.

“I’m sorry,” Tyler said, shaking his head. “I don’t know why I’m telling you all this.”

“I asked,” I replied simply.

Another quiet moment passed, and then Tyler took a sip of his whiskey, holding the glass between his legs when he was done with a distant smile. “You were fun tonight.”

I cocked a brow. “What do you mean?”

“At the bar. Dancing and singing the way you were… you were fun. You were different.”

“Gee, thanks.”

He chuckled. “I just mean that I feel like you’ve been kind of hostile since you got here. And tonight, you were… lively. Light. Carefree.” His eyes found mine in the shadows. “That’s how I remember you.”

The whiskey was swimming loudly in my brain, mixing with the vodka and tequila and beer and God knows what else was still hanging around in there. I warmed from the inside out, my thoughts fuzzy.

But my stomach dropped at his words, and a cold sweat prickled on my skin.

I threw back the last of my whiskey — which wasn’t much, but still too much for a single sip, and felt more like a shot. Then, I stood.

“I should head back up there.”

Tyler scrambled to his feet, opening his mouth just like he had in the bar, like he had something to say.

But he was silent.

I swallowed, turning, but two steps down the dock and he finally spoke.

“You’re in your head tonight.”

I paused, waiting, but kept my back to him as my pulse kicked up a notch. How could he tell?

“I saw it when you were on the bar, and again when you were sitting at the fire. You’re hurting.”

My head dropped, heart sinking with it as I tried to find my argument.

Then, a gentle touch brushed my elbow, and I zeroed in on the way his fingers wrapped around my arm.

“It’s because of what day it is, isn’t it?”

His words were just a whisper, but they might as well have been a blood-curdling scream for how my heart raced in my chest at the sound of them. I followed the line of his arm up to his shoulders, his neck, his jaw, noting the way it was tense before my eyes found his in the darkness.

“I don’t know what you mean,” I lied, swallowing the sour taste of the words down.

Tyler’s brows tugged together, his lips parting slightly, but then he released his grip on my arm, taking a full step back.

We watched each other for a long moment, and part of me longed to take it back, to tell him he was right, that it was the haunting of June eighth that had me fucked up. I wanted to tell him that it did this to me every year, that every year on this day I thought back to the last time I saw my mother, to the day she abandoned me for good.

And that I thought back to him, too — to that day in his room, to the way his skin was hot and sticky with sunscreen, to the way his lips were warm on mine, to the way it felt to be touched by him.

But what was the point?

He hadn’t been able to heal the wound my mother left. No one could do that but me. And when it came to what happened between me and him, it was even more pointless to bring up.

Because he’d taken it all back.

He’d said it was a mistake, that he was sorry, that he never meant for it to happen.