“Where?”
He lets go of my elbow and shifts back, making room for me on his bed. “Right here. Before you keel over.”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re a liar, a worse one than your brother.”
“Jack doesn’t lie.”
“Nah, he just grunts. Now take a fucking seat.”
I get a kick out of the faint aggression lacing the words. Of the fleeting glimpse of who he really is. And I’m too selfish to walk away from the best and worst idea anyone’s ever had.
Far too fucking selfish.
I take that seat on his bed and try not to roll my eyes as Skylar plugs two fingers into my pulse point. “Worried I’ll pass out and you’ll be stuck with me till morning?”
“I’m already stuck with you.”
“Not for long.”
“Going somewhere?”
“Not yet, but it’s not like I’m putting down roots here.”
Skylar’s gaze is absent—he’s listening, counting. Whatever he needs to do to check I’m not dying. Then he glares at me for real. “You have roots here. Jack and Sol just got you back.”
“And they know I’m not going to be here forever. I fucking hate this place.”
“Why?”
My boots are clean, I rinsed them outside. But so’s the carpet. I bend to unlace them one-handed, giving Skylar my back whileI contemplate his question. “We came here so my dad could pretend our mam never existed. It still feels like that, even though he’s long gone.”
“Your dad’s not dead.”
“Is to me.”
I get my boots off and rise, taking them to the door, banishing them to the hallway that’s as dark as Skylar’s bedroom.
It’s autopilot to go back to his bed, and it shouldn’t be. He doesn’t want me there for company, and I don’t need to be there for my fucking health.
But here I am anyway, and he doesn’t comment. Or ask me about my loser of a dad. He tucks his little white earphones into a case and tosses them on the bedside table—beside the stone I flicked at his window a few weeks back.
He kept it.
To chuck at my head another day, perhaps, but I’m all right with that.
Skylar stretches out again, further away from me this time. He stares at me a long moment before he inclines his head to the space beside him. “You can lie down if you want.”
I do want. But not so we can glare at the ceiling together and talk about my dad. My brother. Or my non-existent plans for the future. I want to warm him up. I want to press my lips to his neck and taste his fucking skin.
Not happening.
And as I ease down beside him, I almost believe it.
“Can I ask you something?”
I turn my head. Skylar’s on his side, his face close enough to torture me. “You want permission? Or are you gonna ask anyway?”