When I'm with You (Hope Town #3)(18)

And as if that wasn’t enough, I know now that her very overprotective father knows I f*cked his baby girl without realizing whom I had in my arms.

“Oh f*ck,” I grumble.

“Yeah, oh f*ck is right. You fix this and me and you … we aren’t done with this shit,” he tells me with another intimidating look before turning and walking back into my parents’ house.





PLACING THE LAST BRUSH BACK in its designated drawer, I look over at the sunrise landscape that I had been working on for the last two days. I study it with a critical eye and a deep exhale.

It’s beautiful, stunning even, but looking at it just causes me to feel nothing but sadness when it should inflict the exact opposite.

I started with the tall maple trees lining each side of the canvas and the center focusing on the rising sun. The sun is and should be the spotlight, but for me, the grassy field that takes up the whole bottom half is. The sun’s rays hitting the empty field cast an entrancing effect, as each blade appears to be glowing.

I’ve always had a talent at making my work look as if it was a picture rather than a painting, and this one is no different. My fingers itch to reach out and see if I could feel the light sheen of dew covering the valley between the trees.

The bright green blades look just like Nate Reid’s eyes.

I know exactly why I escaped to my art after the family dinner two nights ago. Painting has always been the only thing, other than being near him, that made me feel like I was complete. An outlet that I can channel to express the feelings I never know how to separate in my jumbled thoughts. I’ve never been the type of girl who wants to go out every night and party.

To me, art is something I can understand when people never have been. I don’t need to pretend to be someone else to get some sort of approval when I get lost in an introvert’s heaven. But because of that, a loneliness I just can’t shake always lingers.

I hate the knowledge that the only other time I’ve felt safe enough to be me outside of my painting was when things were normal between Nate and me. I never had the feeling of judgment from him. He never looked at me as if he had no clue how to deal with the shy, quiet, awkward girl.

Some people might think I’m insecure, but I’m not, even though it has taken me a while to realize that. Getting past the fear of being accepted as the weird artsy girl will probably always be with me, but I’m ready. I’m just lonesome. A little lost maybe, but I know something needs to change. I need to learn not to care what people think and live my life for me, no one else.

It doesn’t take me long to tidy up my workspace now that my brushes are clean and stored in the large wooden storage chest that my dad had made for me. I’m meticulous in the order of that chest. Each paint pot, tube, and brush is stored in its labeled spot before I leave the room. When I push the last drawer closed, I run my hand across the bright teal of my name inscribed on the top of the white painted box. It’s the only purposely-placed color in this whole room, aside from my canvases that is.

Of course, that chest is the only thing that’s neat and tidy in this room. I deliberately decorated this room in all whites from the ceiling to the floor including every piece of furniture in here; that way, if paint spilled or transferred from me as I moved around, the room would take on a life of its own. My own little piece of living art. Little smudges on the couch, chair, and table. Splatters dance across the floor in random successions. Even a huge smear of bright red graces the center of my ceiling courtesy of a very overeager new tube of paint exploding when I tried to open a jammed top.

I can’t wait until the day that this whole room is a collage of my career.

With a smile on my face, I move over to the sink and wash my hands before picking up my phone and turning it on. A few notifications start popping on the screen as the signal wakes up. I give them a quick glance, reminding myself to open the Uno with Friends app I’ve been obsessed with lately so I don’t lose my daily accumulative rewards.

A few messages from Levi come, letting me know what time he’s picking up Nikki and Seth before coming for me, but before I can open his message to reply, another one pops up.



Nate: Call me, Ember. I’ve been trying to get in touch with you, but I need you to work with me. Call me, text me, just do something other than continue to ignore me. Please.



Yeah, no.

After the family dinner and a pity party I’m not proud of, I decided no more stupid thoughts of something that will never be. I should have moved on and I had done a good job of that after my graduation night … until his sister’s wedding and one too many drinks.

Inhibitions and fears went out the window as old feelings and dreams started trying to mend my broken heart that night. I had been coming around the side of the house, laughing to myself about getting lost on the way back from the bathroom, when I found myself colliding with a hard body. I’m still not really sure how things progressed from there; all I knew was that my panties were on the ground and I was burning from the inside out.

Then, of course, there was the figurative bath of cold water when I realized Nate had no idea who he was pushing his hard dick inside. The next thing I knew, I was no longer in his arms as I rushed from the darkened corner blindly.

Not even wanting to think about everything that followed, I ignore his message and go to Levi’s text.