Fangs, Fate & Other Bad Decisions novel Chapter 61

Chapter 61

The SUV is parked across the street from the bookstore. It’s just past six, and dusk filters in around us, all orange haze and long shadows. The lights are still on inside, casting that familiar honey–warm glow through the windows and out onto the pavement. I step out first, leaning against the side of the car like I might melt into the metal if I stay still long enough.

Mike doesn’t speak. He just steps out of the driver’s side and leans beside me with his arms folded.

The storefront is quiet. But I can see her silhouette move behind the counter through the big windows. She’s laughing at something while talking to someone inside. Her smile is bright and real, and she’s utterly unaware of the storm that’s standing twenty feet away.

“You’re not going in?” Mike finally asks, his voice low.

I shake

my head once, but my chest aches as I say, “She doesn’t want to see me.”

“You sure about that, boss?” he asks, his gaze also remaining on her.

I close my eyes for a second–just one–before I answer dejectedly. “No.”

I stand frozen against the car’s cold exterior with my fingers twitching at my sides. My every instinct screams at me to go to her, to demand an explanation from her that I’m not owed. To tell her I miss her with every part of me that is ruined.

But I don’t. Because I don’t trust myself not to scare her away

Another ten minutes pass as we stand side–by–side in silence. She eventually disappears from view without looking up and noticing me there.

Mike shifts beside me a few times, still silent, but still supportive. And after a few more minutes of her not coming back into view, I decide to put us both out of our misery and push away from the car, saying, “Let’s go.”

Mike doesn’t argue. He just gets into his seat and drives away as I stare out the window, like the passing street might give me the answers I need.

At our third red light, Mike speaks, his voice soft as he observes, “She didn’t see you.”

The penthouse is dark when I enter, but I don’t bother to turn on the lights. There’s something almost reverent about the stillness, like the place Itself knows I’m unraveling. The walls feel too tall, and the ceilings are too silent.

pour myself a drink–something aged, expensive, and pointless–and stare out through the glass at the skyline I used to love, but it’s her I see on the inside of my eyelids. Or more specifically, that moment. The moment he hugged her and she laughed at him. for him. I replay it like my own personal punishment, letting every frame scrape my emotions raw.

“She’s not mine,” I say out loud, and tellingly, the glass panes don’t argue.

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