“You’re my family now, Evie. This is it—you and me forever.”
I rest my nose against his, staring into his ocean eyes. “Forever,” I echo.
The intro starts to play, and I see Evie freeze in the passenger seat beside me.
It’s like the radio is playing a sick joke on me. I never listen to this song. Ever. I have successfully avoided hearing it in nearly ten years, and now that Evie’s sitting here beside me as we drive to the place where we met and fell in love, our wedding song starts to play on the fucking radio.
Well, fuck Bon Jovi and their fucking “Livin’ on a Prayer.”
I reach over and change the music station just as Jon Bon Jovi launches into a full warble. And what do I get? Bruno Mars wailing “When I Was Your Man.”
For fuck’s sake.
This is not good, but it’s definitely better than listening to the song we got married to. And it’s definitely better than sitting in complete silence for the rest of the journey.
We’ve hardly said a word to each other since I picked Evie up from outside her apartment building in Culver City forty-five minutes ago. She told me she’d wait outside for me. I guess she didn’t want her dad or Casey to know she was going away with me.
And yeah, I know how long we’ve been in the car. I’ve been watching the clock. There’s not much else to do when sitting in the car with your soon-to-be ex-wife, whom you’re still fucking, than look at the road ahead, listen to the radio, and continuously check the time.
I’m just thanking God that we’re only a few more minutes away from the beach house. Otherwise, I might have to shoot myself.
I guess I didn’t think how it would be, actually spending time with Evie since we started sleeping together. Not that we actually sleep. We just fuck. Then, after we’re done, I go and hide in the shower until she leaves because I don’t know how to deal. Afterward, I spend the rest of the night and the next day telling myself that it won’t happen again, that I’m done. Finito, she is out of my system.
Until I find myself standing outside the coffee shop, waiting for her to finish working. Yes, I know her work schedule.
I’m so screwed.
I’m addicted to her again. My obsession is in full flow. I can’t believe how stupid I’m being. But I can’t seem to stop. I don’t know how to stop.
I’m eighteen years old again and at her mercy.
I know it has to stop because I can’t keep doing this to myself.
I can feel myself softening toward her, getting close again, and I can’t let that happen. I can’t risk letting her shred me to pieces again.
I barely survived the last time.
So, after this weekend, I am definitely done. I’m going to tell her that it has to stop. No more.
After this weekend, no more sex with Evie.
Yeah, sure you are, Gunner. You keep telling yourself that. You’re in so deep again that you can’t even see a way out.
I swing my car into my driveway and turn off the engine.
“You still have the beach house?” Evie asks in surprised voice, staring at it through the windshield.
My scalp starts to prickle. “I bought it when I got back from Harvard.”
I watch her processing this information, and then she turns her face to me. “It always was a beautiful house.”
You’re beautiful.
I suddenly feel like I can’t breathe.
Fuck.
I open my door and get out of the car.
You need to sort your shit out, Gunner, ASAP.
I get Evie’s overnight bag from the trunk and head to the house, with her behind me. I unlock the front door, letting her in first.
I watch her step inside the hall. Her movements are timid, like she’s afraid.
Maybe she is.
I am. I’m fucking terrified.
I hadn’t considered before now, how difficult it would be to have her in the beach house again.
It’s hard. Really hard.
There’s an ache in my chest that won’t seem to go away, and I have a feeling it’s going to be here all weekend.
“You’re in the spare room,” I say as I walk past her, heading for the stairs.