Midnight Heat (Firework Girls #2) (12 page)

Turns out heaven is plenty large enough to hold a little piece of hell.

Our journey down the coast is truly magnificent, or would be if I weren’t feeling increasingly hemmed in by the fact that I’m here with Sam and Grayson. In spite of the size of this thing, I can’t seem to escape them. And I’ve tried. But no matter where I go, someone draws me back to the group.

Jack was the latest culprit. He found me lounging on one of the upper deck chairs and decided that wouldn’t do at all. After luring me to the deck of the main pool to join the others, he unceremoniously picked me up and threw me into the deep end.

It was a welcome diversion, as it turns out. There we all were—the Firework Girls, Jack, Shane, and Grayson—dunking, splashing, and generally messing around, and I forgot for a while to be upset. In fact, I rather enjoyed being so close to Grayson in a suit.

Hottest guy present, hands down.

But when the rowdiness hit a lull and Sam, in her cute little string bikini, wrapped her arms around Grayson’s neck with that flirty look she gets, I couldn’t stay. Under pretense of getting a drink from the poolside bar, I extricated myself from the scene and ended up face-down on a lounge, sunbathing.

That’s where I’m at right now. I figure if I’m within sight of the group maybe they’ll stop reeling me back in. I really, really don’t want to do this anymore.

Every time they all erupt in laughter, it’s Grayson’s laugh that makes my heart ache.

How did I get myself into this mess?

Another twenty minutes or so go by. I flip to my back and watch as the group slowly makes their way to the shallow end, apparently on their way out of the pool.

Sam and Grayson exit first, heading for the towel rack next to me. Of course. Of all the lounges I could’ve parked myself on, why did I choose this one?

I inwardly sigh, but outwardly plaster on a smile. They’re both grinning and start drying off. We hear Ashley squeal and look in time to see Jack has sneak attacked her and dunked her under the water.

“I’m convinced Jack is in love with one of you,” Grayson says as Jack bounds up the steps, laughing, “but hell if I know which one.”

“I’m his favorite,” I say automatically, retreating to an old joke.

“You wish,” Sam says.

“Girls, girls,” Jack says, drawing near with an impish grin on his face. “There’s plenty of me to go around.” He raises both arms and flexes his muscles dramatically. “Oh yeah. Look at those biceps. Try not to swoon, fair ladies.”

Sam throws a towel at him but he catches it deftly. “Get over thyself,” she says.

He winks at her and throws the towel over his head, rubbing vigorously. Ashley, Isabella, and Shane come up and grab their own towels.

“Oooh Chloe,” Sam says, eyeing a guy across the pool and sinking down next to me. “That’s the one right there.”

“The one for what?”

“Your date for the reception. He’s perfect for you.”

I glance at Grayson, who meets my eye then looks away. “No thanks,” I say.

“Come on,” Sam says, “he’s
so
cute.”

I take a better look at the target. He’s in red swim trunks and lying on a lounge across the pool from us. “I guess.”

“Are you blind? He’s completely f—”

“Do
not
finish that sentence.”

I glance at Grayson. He looks irritated. Maybe he doesn’t like Sam drooling over the cute guy over there.

“Come on, Chloe,” Sam continues. “I say we go over there and get you in his line of sight. I’ll be your wing man.”

“Ugh. Pick on Ashley for once, would you?”

“Good luck with that,” Isabella says smiling.

“Ashley and I have an understanding,” Sam says dismissively, waving her hand.

“You have an understanding with Sam?” I say to Ashley. “How do I get me one of those?”

Ashley’s face is impassive and she’s not quite meeting my eyes. It occurs to me just how little I’ve seen Ashley dating over the years. She’s gone on dates, yes, but not many, and she’s never been serious about anyone. She claims she doesn’t have time for relationships, what with all her practicing, but she’s never had difficulties making time to hang with
us
.

Ashley shrugs and says lightly, “A little bribing and threatening gets you a long way with Sam.”

“That’s true,” Grayson pipes in.

I look at him sharply, but he’s drying off, not looking at me.

“Oh come on,” Sam says. “I’m just trying to help. You’re my friend. I can see you need some spanky hot sex.”

Out of the corner of my eye, I see Grayson glance at me, but I’m looking Sam directly in the eyes. “Cut. It. Out.”

She tilts her head at me and I can see she’s finally gotten the message. “Oh fine,” she says easily. “I’ll just let you admire him from afar.” She winks at me and pats my arm, then stands and goes to Grayson.

“As for
you
mister,” she says snaking her arm around Grayson’s waist, “I have something I want to show you.”

My heart drops and I look away to the pool. My skin is crawling. Throughout the day, I’ve seen a few couples sneaking into the state rooms. I wonder if that’s where Sam and Grayson are heading.

I don’t want to know. I don’t want to know. I don’t want to know.

“We’re going to go play pool,” Isabella says to me, as Sam and Grayson disappear inside. “Want to join us?”

“
They’re
going to play pool,” Ashley says. “I’m getting my tail back to that piano.”

“Actually, I think I’m going to get cleaned up,” I say standing. I’m not looking at anyone.

“Dinner’s not for a while,” Shane says. “You have time.”

“And maybe take a nap,” I add.

“Okay,” Isabella says with a wave. “We’ll catch you later.”

I force myself to smile as they leave. I head to the lower level and the cabin with several of our bags in it, feeling sick to my stomach the whole way.

Once I’m showered, changed, and done with my makeup, I’m a little more in control. But just a little.

I follow the sound of Ashley’s music to the main lounge. She’s still in her shorts and tank, not yet changed for dinner. I pick an empty spot on the couch nearest her and sink onto it, letting the comforting lilt of the music wash over me. I could listen to Ashley play all day.

She wraps up one song and flows easily into the next. This one is sort of haunting and pulls out all my longing for Grayson. Or maybe any song would do that right now. I was longing for him before I even sat down. Heart aching, I sink lower on the couch and let my head rest on the back, watching her. She catches my eye and gives me a questioning glance. I can’t bring myself to smile or pretend.

As she finishes the number, an older couple comes over and requests a song. She rarely refuses requests, but she graciously backs out of this one, eyeing me the whole time.

They finally leave and she comes over and sits next to me. “So,” she says gently, “how are you handling the thing with Grayson?”

I sigh. I don’t even know where to begin.

“That good, huh?”

I shrug. “It doesn’t really matter. It’s too late to tell Sam now.” It’d be even worse.

“Do you wish you’d said something?”

“I don’t know. No. It still wouldn’t have been fair. To either one of them.”

Ashley gives me an appraising look. “Why do I get the feeling,” she says slowly, “that you’re not telling me something?”

“Probably because I’m not telling you something.”

She sinks low and lays her head on the back of the couch too, waiting. My heart starts pounding in anticipation of my impending confession.

“I...” I begin. How do I say this? I lower my voice and try again. “I kind of still have feelings for Grayson.”

Her eyebrows raise.

“Actually, that’s not quite right, either,” I continue.

Ashley furrows her brows at me. I sit up slightly and look around to make sure Sam and Grayson are nowhere in sight. I settle back and turn back to Ashley.

“I sort of fell in love with Grayson that night,” I say lowly.

“What?!”

“Shhh!” I look around again. The scene hasn’t changed.

“How could you fall in love with him?” she whispers urgently.

“I don’t know,” I say miserably.

“I thought you said it was just a one-night stand.”

“It was one night, but it wasn’t a one-night stand.” That’s never felt like the right phrase for what happened between us. It wasn’t a one-night stand at all. It was the Night of Grayson, and those are two completely different things.

I proceed to tell Ashley what happened—as best as I can explain what I thought I felt between us—along with what happened the next morning. A few times I feel tears start to rise up, but I push them back down. I can’t cry over Grayson. Especially now.

When I’m finished, Ashley says, “Oh, sweetie.”

I shrug miserably. What’s to be done?

“Okay,” she says gently, “you have to tell Sam.”

“What? No!”

“She has to know.”

“Why? What difference does it make? I ran out on him. It’s not like there’s any chance of us getting back together.”

“But... this has to be killing you. Sam wouldn’t want to put you through that.”

“It’s—” I sigh. “Look, I’ve thought about all this a hundred times. But how crappy would it be for me to pull the rug out from underneath them?”

Ashley frowns, not quite convinced.

“I can’t do that to him again and... yeah it sucks that he’s here with Sam but it’s not like that’s going to last forever. Plus it’s Isabella’s wedding and...” I hesitate before putting voice to a relatively new fear, “what if Sam gets mad?”

“Why would she get mad?”

“You remember what happened with Loni.”

Ashley pauses. I can see by the hesitation on her face that she does remember Loni.

Loni was Isabella’s roommate freshman year, but we all hung out together and got pretty close. Sam cut her off after Loni slept with Sam’s ex. Loni thought Sam wouldn’t care because he was practically a one-night stand, but Sam was livid. She just couldn’t get over the fact that Loni would sleep with the same guy she slept with. The rest of us tried to patch things over, but it was just over between them after that.

“This is different, though,” Ashley says.

“But is
Sam
going to think it’s different? Especially when I could’ve said something right away but didn’t?”

“I don’t know. I think she would. Probably.”

Yeah, that’s about how certain I feel about it. “Look, it doesn’t matter anyway. Telling Sam doesn’t change anything and I don’t want to risk upsetting the cart in the middle of Isabella’s wedding week. There’s just no point. I can’t be with Grayson anyway and he’ll be out of her life too, soon enough. I just need to get through this and then it’ll be over.”

Ashley sighs. “I guess, but god, honey. This sucks.”

I nod. “Yeah. It helps to talk about it, though. Thanks for listening.”

Ashley gives me a sympathetic smile.

I do feel a little better. I just need to get through the rest of the week. In three days I’ll be on a plane back to Boise and life can go back to normal.

I try to ignore the ache that thought creates, while Ashley returns to the piano to play me my favorite song.

About an hour later, Ashley leaves to get ready for dinner and I go to the upper deck just in time to see the sun sink into the water. The yacht is on its way back to the resort, so I circle around to the other side to watch the twinkling lights of the little town on the coast. I’m not even sure what town it is. We’re still a couple hours from docking, I think, but we’ve been traveling at such a leisurely pace I don’t really know how far we’d gone before we turned around to head back.

I hope dinner isn’t assigned seating, or if it is, I hope I’m far away from Sam and Grayson. It’s easier to handle everything when they’re not right in my face. Though, in spite of all my avoidance maneuvering, this evening still hasn’t been easy at all.

Then I hear his voice. “Hey.”

I spin to see him coming along the promenade deck. He’s wearing slacks and a nice button-down shirt and is back to looking impossibly handsome. He’s alone—and giving me a rather serious expression—but I still glance around for her. “Where’s Sam?”

“Getting ready.”

He comes up next to me and leans on the rail, turning his attention to the shoreline.

I go back to the view as well. I should leave. But I don’t.

We stand there in silence for a few moments, the town sliding by in front of us. Without moving my head, I glance down at his hands. They’re clasped loosely together. I want to run my fingers over them.

“How’s your channel going?” I finally ask, unable to bear being so close to him without either kissing him or speaking. Since the first isn’t really an option...

“Pretty good,” he answers.

I nod. “That’s good,” I say awkwardly. I really, really should go, but I like being here with him.

“When did you move to Boise?” he asks.

“About...”
Six days after I met you,
“...nine months ago.”

I can’t help but look at him when I say it. He’s watching the shoreline, but gets a strange expression on his face. I don’t say that I spent all six of those days fighting the urge to go to his house and beg him to forgive me. I swear, the job offer in Boise was the only thing that saved me.

Of course, at this exact moment I’m not so sure leaving Grayson was salvation, exactly. But when I think back to where I was at that time, and when I think about how much I’ve grown as a person over the last nine months, I still know in my heart the timing for Grayson wasn’t just wrong it was
terrible.

I look away to the coast in frustration. Sometimes life just sucks.

“Did you know you were moving when we...” he lets it trail away.

I shake my head. “No.”

There’s a pause, then he says quietly, “I haven’t said anything to Sam about... you know.”

The Night of Grayson. Yes, I know. “I figured that. She’d definitely say something to me about it if she knew.”

My tone must reveal my dread at the idea of her knowing, because he says, “Well, she couldn’t be mad at you for it.”

I look at him. Maybe. Maybe not. He doesn’t know Sam like I do. She’s fiercely loyal to her friends, but if she thinks you’ve betrayed her...

“You haven’t done anything wrong,” he continues. “Especially because you were...” He stops abruptly.

He isn’t finishing his sentence, so I do it for him. “First. I know.” I’m irritated and having a hard time hiding it. The thought of Grayson and Sam together...

“Well, look, I just wanted to tell you that I accept,” he says. I look at him again. “Your apology, I mean. I don’t think I said that yesterday.”

I blink at him, but he’s still just studying the shoreline. “I understand how that night might have been a little... overwhelming.” He glances at me tentatively. “It was pretty intense, I know.”

I nod. Intense. Yeah. That’s one word for it.

“It’s for the best, though. It only proved the Rule is a good thing.”

My skin is starting to crawl again. I’m not sure why. “The ‘not till you’re thirty’ rule?”

“Because otherwise you’re too young and do stupid things, right? I mean...” his eyes are still fixed on the shoreline. “I was being stupid. Love at first sight isn’t real. People who are too young mistake infatuation for love all the time.”

I look at him sharply. Love at first sight? Had he felt that too? Or is he saying he only thought it was love, but it... wasn’t?

“But it’s for the best,” he says firmly, nodding. “It woke me up and reminded me I need to stick to the Rule. No matter what. I can’t end up like my parents. I don’t want that. When I marry, I want it to last, but not out of sheer stubbornness. I want to be like those old couples you see, still holding hands and making each other laugh. I’m willing to wait for that. I just...”

He glances at me, then away again.

“I don’t want to make a mistake,” he says. “You made me even more determined not to break the Rule. So, it was a good thing. That way.”

My heart is pounding with dread. The dinner bell starts ringing and I startle.

“It was for the best,” he says again, shrugging. “Don’t feel guilty.” Still without looking at me, he pats me on the shoulder and walks away.

The bell is still ringing and I follow him in a sort of haze. As we join the crowds slowly flowing toward the dining room, my pace slows and we get separated.

It’s over with Grayson.
I’ve been saying it for months. I’ve been saying it all week. And
I’m
the one who ended it. But I didn’t realize until just this moment that I only believed it in my mind.

Now my heart’s catching up to things.

I killed it forever. I really, really did.

Somewhere inside of me I must have thought I still had a chance, because the weight of the realization that
I have no chance
is flattening me. I can feel the tears building in me. I think I’m going to cry right here and now.

I hold it in. I can’t cry here. I can’t cry now.

Numbly, I float into the dining room. I check the tags, find mine, and sit down. He’s directly across from me and Sam comes in and sits to his left. Ashley sits to my right. All these people sit down and Isabella’s father stands and welcomes us and the porters start serving and all I can think is this:

It really is over.

I look at Grayson, not quite realizing he’s looking at me too and I should look away. You know, to be proper or whatever the hell. But all I can do is look at him and realize he’s not mine and never will be mine and I don’t know if I can handle that.

Sam leans into him, wearing that carefree smile of hers, and says, “Oh Grayson, I have to tell you the funniest story.”

I look at her, furrowing my brows. I’m trying to remember why Sam gets to be the one to tell him funny stories. How the hell did this happen?

Isn’t Grayson supposed to be mine? But he’s not. And he’s glad about it.

He thinks it’s for the best.

“You okay, Chloe?” Sam asks me. “You’re not looking well.”

“I’m fine,” I answer automatically. “I have a headache.”

I’m still looking at Grayson and he’s looking right back at me. How could he have said that? That night meant everything to me, and he’s just glad it’s over.

“Why don’t you go lie down,” Sam says. “That big State room is on this deck. Why don’t you go to that one?”

I must not look good because everyone’s watching at me with concern. I manage to smile—who knew I was so good at fake smiling when I only want to be real crying—and say, “I’m alright. Thank you, though.”

I don’t want to make a scene and besides, if I leave this table, I really will be crying and now is not the time.

I try to steel myself. I need to get it together. I focus on my plate, noticing what’s in front of me for the first time. Some sort of creamy soup. It’s orange. What the fuck is this?

Tears are still dangerously close to the surface. Everyone’s starting to eat, so I mechanically dip my spoon in my bowl.

Sam says something about how good the soup is. “Isn’t it amazing?” she asks.

She must have asked Grayson—I wouldn’t know because I’m not looking—because he says, “It is.”

That’s all he says, but his voice pierces me to the very core.

I stand abruptly, my chair scraping against the floor. “I’m really not feeling well,” I say to no one in particular. “I think I will go lie down. I’m sorry.”