The Replaced(61)

“I like your new hair,” Tyler finally said, glancing down at me once we’d cleared the fields and were in almost the exact same place Simon and I had just been when Nyla had snuck me away from the showers so we could meet in private. He grinned, and that dimple of his, the one I’d spent so much time thinking about, obsessing over just a few short weeks ago, made a welcome appearance.

I smiled up at him, and he scratched behind his ear. “Weird, right?” he asked. “This. Running into you here, of all places.” And then his dimple vanished. “And both of us being, you know, Returned . . .” It was almost comical the way he said “Returned,” like he hadn’t quite gotten used to the idea yet, and I wondered when I had, because it hadn’t been all that long ago that I’d said it the same way he did.

There was a large flat boulder, low to the ground in front of me, and I kicked it once. I wasn’t sure how to respond, because everything I wanted to say was unsayable. I couldn’t tell him I loved him or that I’d missed him, because as far as he was concerned, five years had passed, and the last time I’d seen him he’d been a kid. I propped one foot against the rock, struggling for the right words.

“Is this Simon guy your leader? Have you been with him all this time?” Tyler asked, searching my face through the darkness.

“No . . . I, uh . . .” How could I even start? “I only just came back a few weeks ago. Right before you were taken.” I wondered if now was the best time to tell him the rest.

His eyes widened like he hadn’t even considered that. “So this is all new to you too?”

“Pretty much,” I admitted. And then, because I was dying to know more about him, I asked, “So what happened? Where did you wake up?”


He moved closer, and I had to stifle a shiver that had nothing to do with the night air. He sat on the boulder and tilted his head back so he could look at me. “Somewhere not far from here, I guess. I honestly don’t know exactly where I was or what I’d have done if Griff hadn’t’ve come along when she did.” Somehow I managed to keep the cringe off my face when he mentioned Griffin, saying her name the way Simon did, but I felt it deep in my gut. I didn’t want him to be grateful to her. I didn’t want him to be anything to her, which made me feel petty on top of everything else, considering she’d saved him and all.

But I wanted to be the only important girl in his life.

There, I’d said it. So shoot me.

Tyler kept talking. “Would it make you think less of me if I admitted I was scared shitless when I woke up?” He grinned and regarded me sheepishly, the same look I remembered from before. “I had no idea where I was or how I’d gotten there,” he explained.

I laughed. “It totally wouldn’t,” I confessed. “I know exactly how that feels. One minute I was arguing with my dad over college, and the next I was waking up behind the Gas ’n’ Sip. At least that’s what I thought.”

“Dude. You woke up behind the Gas ’n’ Sip?”

I smirked. “Talk about weird, right?”

His grin grew. “Talk about gross.”

The butterflies were back . . . every time he smiled at me. I couldn’t help it. I remembered exactly the way those lips felt on mine. “So how much do you remember?” I asked, changing the subject before my entire body burst into flames.

Shrugging, he told me, “Just that. Me waking up surrounded by sand, and then Griffin and some of the other Blackwater Ranchers showing up with this crazy story.” He patted the spot next to him on the rock, and I didn’t hesitate to take it. Somehow the rock was still warm, but his arm, where our skin made contact, was even warmer. “I’m sure I don’t have to tell you I thought she was smoking crack when she first tried to tell me what happened. I mean, it’s pretty nuts, the whole alien thing.” I had to laugh, because we’d had this conversation before, only it had been me trying to figure out a way to explain it to him without sounding like I was on crack. It was funny to hear him being so whatever about it. “I guess it’s hard to argue with the healing thing, though,” he said as he nudged me again. “You know, I do it faster than anyone else.”

“Wait. What?” I bumped against him when I sat up straighter. “The healing? What do you mean faster?”

He gave me a you-should-be-impressed kind of look. “You heard me. Like, if you cut me, I heal faster than anyone ever has before. That’s what Griffin says, anyway.”

My knee-jerk reaction was to argue, because there was no way he could heal as fast as I could, right? But I couldn’t be sure whether my reaction stemmed from my competitive streak, or whether I was just in shock. Was it really possible there were two of us who could heal faster than the rest? And could it really be a coincidence that that person had turned out to be Tyler?

It took me forever to even come up with, “So, who all knows?”

“I haven’t told anyone, if that’s what you mean. Griffin told me not to. But I figured it’s okay to tell you . . . since we’re friends and all.”

Friends. The word felt like a knife through my heart. I didn’t want to be Tyler’s friend. I mean, I did . . . of course I did. It’s just that’s not all I wanted to be.

I hoped we could be so, so, so much more than just friends.