The Girl in the Love Song (Lost Boys #1)(74)

“She is. I heard your parents talking.”

“Thank God, though I’m probably going to be cut from the team.”

“You shouldn’t be playing anyway,” Miller said darkly. “Not until you’re better. They said it’s a concussion. You’ll have to be careful for weeks.”

“I will.”

A short silence fell. He was still holding my hand.

“Miller…”

“I’m sorry, Vi. For a lot of things. I’m sorry I went silent on you. Disappeared. I’m sorry I ran to another girl when I should have told you the truth, that we always felt like more than friends. From the very first day. But I said nothing.”

“Not nothing. You put it in your songs,” I said with a smile. My hand in his tightened. “I’m sorry about so many things, too. Evelyn calls me Snow White, and I hate it. But I think it’s kind of accurate. I’ve been poisoning myself by thinking we would turn into my parents. But then you kissed me that first time and I woke up.”

“Yeah?” The vulnerability in his eyes was raw and naked.

“Yeah. Your kisses have magical properties, Stratton. The first rearranged my universe. The second at the Shack turned me into a puddle of lust. I’m a little bit scared what will happen with number three.”

His small smile faded. “I still haven’t told you the rest. About Amber.”

“I know. Shiloh told me.”

“I would’ve told you the minute it was over, but she asked me to give her time and so I did. She deserved better than me. Maybe you do too.”

I shook my head, then winced. “Don’t say things like that and make me shake my head,” I said with a small laugh.

Miller wasn’t smiling. “It’s true.” He studied our clasped hands as he spoke, rubbing his thumb back and forth over my skin. “I walk around every day pretending like it doesn’t fucking matter what my dad did. I tell people he’s dead because if he’s dead and gone, so what if he left? But he’s not dead. He could come back any time, and he doesn’t. And what he did matters.”

“Of course, it does,” I said softly, surprised. Miller had rarely spoken about his father in the four years I’d known him.

“It matters,” he said, “not just because Mom and I had to live in a fucking car. It messed me up too. I lost a lot, real fast. My dad, my house, my school and our neighborhood in Los Banos. My friends. Hell, I nearly lost my life. It’s not his fault I have diabetes, but he doesn’t know I have it, and he fucking should. I’m his son.”

I nodded, listening, wishing I could pull the hurt out of him so he didn’t have to carry it anymore.

He raised his eyes to mine. “He took everything so that’s what I have left. The fear that anything can be taken away, at any time. When I heard you were hurt, it fucking killed me. Because maybe I’d pushed you away so hard, it turned my fear into a reality.”

He leaned close, pressed my hands to his heart. “This is yours. Always. I’ll be whatever you want me to be. I’ll be your friend if that’s what you want. No more bullshit. Or I’ll be…more. I’ll be nothing. All I want is for you to be happy.”

My throat felt thick and my heart full at what he was offering me. “You can never be nothing to me, Miller. Not ever.”

The expression that came over his face was heartbreakingly beautiful. Miller bent his head to me, and while I wanted nothing more than his kiss, we weren’t done clearing the path for us ahead. I put my hands on his chest.

“Wait. We have to be honest with each other all the time and talk about everything, okay? That’s the only way we’re going to survive. That’s the real lesson my parents have been teaching me.”

“Okay,” he said slowly.

“There’s something I have to tell you.”

He sat back in his chair. “What is it?”

Inhale, exhale. “I kissed River.”

Miller stared, his hands around mine going still. “When?”

“Yesterday.”

“Yesterday,” he repeated flatly.

“Yes, and it was a huge mistake. I knew it before I did it, and I knew it while it was happening. We were like two pieces of plywood smacking together. Painful and awkward and just all wrong.”

I could see Miller working this over in his mind. And he wasn’t happy.

“As far as I knew, you were still with Amber, and I was trying to do what you did. Get you out of my system. But it’s not possible.”

“No, not for me either,” he said. “I guess I can’t be pissed, but I just…I don’t like it.”

“I know. And I didn’t like seeing you with Amber. It wasn’t revenge, it was just…trying to take control of my feelings. It didn’t work.”

Miller inhaled deeply through his nose and let it out. “Okay. Well, I’m glad you told me.”

“There’s more.”

“More?”

“He asked me to the Prom, and I said yes.”

Now Miller let go of my hands and scrubbed his over his face. “I don’t know if I feel like I’m about to cry or laugh like a crazy person.”

“We’d only be going as friends. And I do care about him as a friend. We had an amazing talk. I think he’s under a lot of pressure from his parents.”