What He Never Knew (What He Doesn't Know, #3)(87)

I nodded in response, cracking my neck before I launched into one of my favorites from Bach. Even though the music was joyful, I played the piece as if from a distant world. Everything was hollow. Everything was void.

And Sarah was avoiding me, working in the kitchen instead of out on the floor.

I knew she was there. I could feel her presence, a familiar buzz that warned my body she was near. It used to warn me to stay away, to keep my distance, to remember what I could and could not have.

I should have listened to it, then.

Now, it only served to punish me, to remind me what I’d lost, what was so close yet so out of reach.

It was the worst brand of torture.

The night passed in a sort of gray fog, my fingers flying over the keys, a forced smile on my lips, a voice that seemed to be someone else’s greeting the patrons and talking between pieces. To everyone else in that room, I imagined I seemed the same. But inside, I was burning.

It wasn’t until my first break that I felt a tiny flash of relief, and I told the patrons I was taking a half hour, even though that was twice what I usually took. I needed a moment. I needed space.

I needed Sarah.

And I was on my way to the kitchen to find her when I ran into Charlie, instead.

“Reese,” she said, hand wrapping around my bicep and pulling me to a stop just before I hit the swinging door to the kitchen.

I let her turn me, heart squeezing at her proximity, at the voice that I knew so well, at the warm chocolate eyes that I could close my eyes and see perfectly. But it was different this time. I didn’t want to reach for her, to hold her, to inhale her scent and imagine the days when she was mine.

I just wanted her to leave me alone so I could go find Sarah.

I hadn’t seen her since she showed up at my house unannounced on the anniversary of my family’s death. I’d dodged her calls, her mother’s calls inviting me to dinner, her father’s calls inviting me to have a drink and play a round of golf, her brother’s calls saying he wanted to catch up. I loved them, and I knew in my heart they would always be a sort of family to me.

But I’d needed space. I’d wanted to heal. And Sarah was helping me do just that.

Until I ruined everything.

“Charlie,” I greeted, scratching the back of my neck. “I was just about to head outside to smoke. Could we talk after my set?”

“No. We can’t. This is important.”

Her reaction surprised me, and it wasn’t until then that I saw the bend in her brows, the concern etched on her little face. She pulled her hand from where it held my arm, crossing her own over her chest.

“Graham has been trying to reach out to you. So have I.” She swallowed. “We all have, and you haven’t answered any of our calls.”

“I’ve been busy,” I explained.

Charlie paused, like she was waiting for more — busy doing what, she seemed to ask me with her doe eyes. But I didn’t feel the need to explain further, not when the only thought on my mind was getting inside that kitchen and talking to Sarah.

“Jennifer Stinson called my mother earlier today.”

I didn’t understand the correlation, but the heavier Charlie’s gaze became, the more I was on alert. Why would Jennifer call her mom, and why would Charlie need to talk to me about it?

“Okay…”

“She wanted to talk to my mom because she’s on the board at Winchester, and apparently, Jennifer wanted to voice some concerns about a particular teacher. She didn’t want to go straight to Mr. Henderson, especially because, in her own words, this teacher is a close family friend.”

I gritted my teeth. “So, me?”

She nodded.

“What the hell did she say?”

Charlie looked around us, like the conversation wasn’t safe to have in public. Then, she tugged me off to the side, to a back corner behind a booth that was vacant, looking around once more before she spoke in a hushed tone.

“She said you had taken high interest in a particular student, and she worried that it might not be a professional one.” Charlie paused, eyeing me like she was looking for some sort of tell, some sort of reaction from me. “She said she ran into you and Sarah Henderson in the park one day… that you were both acting strange… and that she spoke with someone here, at the restaurant, and they confirmed her suspicions.”

I scoffed, shaking my head. “That’s bullshit. No one here knows a fucking thing.”

Charlie’s shoulders fell, brows folding inward as she covered her mouth with one hand. “Oh, Reese…”

And I realized then that I’d confirmed the story without even realizing it.

“It’s true, isn’t it?” Charlie’s eyes widened as she shook her head. “I thought… I was so sure there had to be a mistake. I was so sure you could never do something like this.”

“What do you mean like this?”

Charlie looked around again, lowering her voice even more. “She’s a girl, Reese. She’s twenty-one. You’re her teacher, for Christ’s sake. And she’s the niece of the man who signs your paycheck. Do you not understand how grotesquely wrong this all is?”

Indignation rolled through me like a tidal wave, swallowing all rational thought as I stared at the woman I once loved. And I knew it then, in that moment, that it truly was past tense.