Pieces of Summer (A stand-alone novel)(52)

It’s not a light conversation topic, though. Explaining my limited pantry and fridge choices goes into the complicated enigma that is me these days. It’s an adopted lifestyle of necessity, not of choice.

Too deep.

Too soon.

Too much.

“I like to keep my options limited since I’m on a diet,” I lie. It’s a stupid lie since I’m about to eat pizza with him, and he’s definitely seen me not eat like someone on a diet.

He cocks an eyebrow, letting his gaze rake over me. I’m still in just my panties and my T-shirt. “You don’t need to be on a diet,” he says idly, then opens the freezer without looking inside it. “And I don’t think strawberry ice cream fits into a diet. Why are you lying to me?”

I shouldn’t have lied. It was a terrible lie.

“I’m a takeout whore,” I say around a sigh, to which he laughs. It’s not a lie, but it’s not the truth either. I wish I could keep my house stocked with groceries. But that… gets messy.

All those expiration dates are a daunting problem, and feeling like I’m in a race to finish it all before that date… Well, life sucks with a full fridge.

Turning around, I go to find my shorts, but just as I start to pull them on, he’s jerking them out of my hand and tossing them over his shoulder.

“It’s easier to torture you this way,” he murmurs while stepping closer, sliding his hands over the skin of my hips and slipping his fingers just below my panty line.

I stare up, watching his eyes as he watches me, waiting for me to spill secrets I never will.

“Do you like what you see when you look at me?” I whisper softly.

His brow furrows in confusion.

“You know I do.”

My hands stay at my sides as he starts to run his hands over my ass.

“Then don’t ask me to give that up. A lot has happened in twelve years, Chase. Don’t ask me to give up the way you look at me when it’s the first good thing that’s happened in a really long time.”

I clear my throat when emotion wads up in it, and his hands pause. His eyes study mine intensely, as though he’s trying to decipher what that means. The doorbell rings, startling me, and he bends to press a kiss to my lips before heading toward the front door.

I go hide in the kitchen as his voice carries through the house.

“Um… Chase James? You live here?”

“My girl does. How much?”

“Whit lives here?”

Freaking small towns.

“No,” Chase says, annoyed. “You going to give me the f*cking pizza and price or interrogate me all night?”

“Sheesh. Sorry. Just thought you were with Whit. Is she single now or what?”

“Fucking eh, dude. Yes, she’s single. Good luck getting her to date a guy who isn’t legal yet. Pizza. Now. Keep the change.”

The door slams, and I stifle a smile as Chase walks back in holding the hard-to-procure pizzas in his hands.

“Hayden hasn’t changed one bit,” I muse as he puts the pizzas down on the bar and grabs a paper towel.

“Everyone wanting to know everyone’s business? That’s never going away,” he grumbles.





Chapter 31


CHASE



As she finishes eating her second slice of pizza, she turns and throws away her crust. I watch her, just as I have been doing all night. Everything is mounting up and causing me to have more questions.

Everything Whit was drunkenly asking is grating on my nerves now. Mika used to be very much a control freak. Overly so. Judging by her over-zealous writing room upstairs, she’s still a meticulous note-keeper and control freak.

So why would she specifically request to not be involved with any of the numbers and schedules at the bowling alley? And why no food in the house? She loves cooking. Always has. She was the first person to ever cook anything for me. Hell, she’s the one who taught me how to cook for myself.

And what the f*cking hell happened to her stomach? Those were cuts. Someone definitely f*cking cut her to pieces and did enough damage to scar her for life. Was that all at once or over a period of time?

I can tell she doesn’t want to talk about it, and I know what it’s like for someone to try and pry dark secrets out of you. What sucks is that I always told Mika the stone cold truth. She saw it. I took her into that hell and she saw what I went through.

It didn’t change the way she looked at me. It didn’t change the way she loved me. It didn’t change a f*cking thing, and it made me love her that much more. It’s also the reason I knew I was the one who had to walk away when reality came crashing down.

She’d hate me by now if I had made her live through that hell until the day my mother finally died. I couldn’t just leave her though. She might have not deserved me looking after her, but I couldn’t have dealt with the guilt if I hadn’t done all I could.

My father? Well, when he dies, he can rot in hell with no guilt on my end. At least my mom kept me alive when I couldn’t fend for myself, and she also made sure I had clothes, even if they were ratty and used.

“So what’s up with your parents?” I ask quietly.

“Dead,” she says without looking at me, and I grimace.

“Sorry.”

“Dad’s better off. He had a stroke just before I turned eighteen and he usually didn’t even know when someone was around. He just died within the past year, but it was a blessing. He didn’t want to be like that. No one does.”