Breakaway (Beyond the Play, #2)(95)

She sniffles. “How can you know?”

My breath catches in my throat. I’ve never said these words before, but they’re truer than anything else in the world, and there’s no use holding back when Penny needs to know once and for all that for as long as she lets me, I’ll be hers. I can’t recall the moment I realized; it could have been a thousand different ones, brief moments coming together to create a constellation that’s imprinted on the fabric of my soul. Every time she smiles at me, I fall in love all over again.

“Because I love you.”





57





COOPER





The moment the words leave my mouth, my chest feels lighter. It’s like I’ve been carrying around an enormous secret—although honestly, I’m sure anyone can see my feelings flash across my face in neon whenever I look at her—and now I can finally relax.

For a long moment, she just looks at me. I resist the urge to pull her back into my arms. I need her to choose this, to choose me and us. To walk through the door of memory together. No matter how ugly the story is, no matter what she’d endured, I’ll be there at the end, holding her tight.

She has to know that by now. If she doesn’t, then I’ve fucking failed as a boyfriend.

“I trust you,” she says. There’s something fierce in her expression, a touch more of the Penny I’m used to seeing. “I never thought I’d be able to trust anyone like this again.”

I reach out then, pulling her into my arms. She tucks herself against me, making herself small. I tighten my grip around her waist as I brush my lips against her hair briefly. “You can trust me. Take your time.”

She nods against me, sniffling. “I think I fell,” she says. “When I came upstairs. I was panicking, I couldn’t… I hit my head, I think, on your bookcase.”

“I’ll chop it to pieces tomorrow.”

I think I get a smile. I can feel the outline against my chest. “All I could smell was Tropic Blue.”

“What’s Tropic Blue?”

“A cologne.” She sniffles again. “A really shitty cologne. My ex used to wear it all the time.”

“Preston.”

She stiffens in my grip. “Yeah. Preston. But Brandon was wearing it. He was trying to apologize for what happened in Vermont, and he reached out and I smelled it, and it’s like… it’s like I was back there. At a different house party. A different February 18th.” She laughs for real this time, bitter, shaking her head. “I just knew I needed to make it stop.”

The sweater. She must’ve been looking for something to stop the memory, to shake herself out of her panic attack. I pick it up and hand it to her. “Here, baby.”

She looks up at me. Tears still fill her eyes, but her voice is steadier. I brush a stray tear away from her cheek. She buries her nose in the sweater again. I don’t even try to tamp down the rush of possessiveness that I feel.

“Thanks,” she says thickly. “Take it as a compliment, I guess. You smell good.”

“I’m glad.” I run my hand through her hair, untangling it gently.

“Preston filmed me when we had sex.”

I thought I’d braced myself for whatever she was going to say. I was wrong. Her words hit me like a fucking freight train. It’s like she just punched me square in the throat; I can’t breathe for a moment.

Suddenly, it all makes sense. No sexting, no pictures. No video calls when we hook up long distance. The tripod at the sex shop… my face burns. I was an asshole to her without realizing it, mocking her pain. Fucking hell.

Her lower lip wobbles, and fresh tears leak out of her eyes. I force myself to keep looking at her, even though I want to melt into the floor. I don’t know what to say. What the fuck do you say when someone you love tells you something so painful, you can feel the memory and it’s not even yours?

“Sweetheart. I’m so sorry.” I swallow down every curse I wish I could throw at him, an asshole I’d punch out in two seconds if I ever got the chance. “Did he… I mean, was it…”

“No, it wasn’t like that.” She laughs hollowly. “I wanted it so badly. I thought I loved him. I wanted to be that close to him, to share that experience with him.”

“That’s sweet,” I manage to say.

“It was our first time.” She plucks at my shirt with her fingernails. She went to the salon with Mia the other day to get them done; each midnight blue nail has a snowflake on it. “We’d been dating for a while, and it was perfect, you know? I was a figure skater. He was a hockey player. Older, which made me feel special. His team would be on the other end of the ice while I practiced with my crew, and we’d all hang out. By the time we’d been dating for six months, I felt ready to take the next step. He’d had sex before, but I hadn’t, and I wanted to feel that close to him.”

I’m starting to feel faintly nauseous. It makes sense to me that Penny would treat her first time as a big deal. Virginity’s a social construct, sure, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t carry a lot of weight for most people. No wonder she planned out a list she wanted to follow; she needed control over her own experiences since her first time was tainted. “You planned it?”