Second Chance Summer (Chance Series, #1) (8 page)

A little touch of your lips,

And I’m mesmerized.

Just one kiss,

See those darkened eyes,

A little touch of your lips,

And I’m mesmerized.

Forever waits and I’m its slave,

My heart is yours, but I’m not brave,

Hold me tight, look in my eyes,

It’s all you, you, you, it’s you.

My words fade out with the chords of the guitar, and a tear drops to the wood. I swipe at my cheeks, relaxing my hold on the guitar with my other hand. I remember writing that song last summer after Reese dared me to write a song that reminded him of us.

“I bet you can’t write a song about us,” he’d challenged me.

“Is that a dare?” I raised my eyebrows in response, smiling a little.

“You bet it is.” He grinned, leaning forward. He propped his chin on his hands and watched me intently.

“I’ll write a song,” I replied, tapping my guitar with my fingers. “I’ll have it done by the weekend.”

“Really?”

I nodded. “Really.”

I went away that night, and for the next three days I worked hard on a tune and the lyrics. When I had it I called him, and we agreed to meet in the tree house in my yard at midnight.

I was sitting and waiting for him when his head popped into the tree house.

“Let’s hear it,” he ordered, pulling himself up. “See if you really have done it.”

I grinned then, a big grin. He settled himself back against the tree trunk that the house was built around, and fixed his eyes on me.

I began to play, letting the music fill the wooden shack softly, and started to sing in time. My eyes closed, and I lost myself in the music.

When I stopped singing, Reese’s strong hands pried the guitar from my fingers. I opened my eyes to find him setting the guitar down gently. He turned back to me, crawling across the tree house floor.

“You did it,” he murmured, sitting in front of me and pulling me into his lap. I wrapped my legs around his waist, hooked my hands behind his neck, and nodded.

“I told you I would.”

His hands ran slowly up my back, his fingertips drawing soft patterns. “Is that really what you think about us?” His eyes searched mine, looking for whatever I’d been hiding for the last five weeks.

I let my lips curl up to the side a little. “Song lyrics are the words your soul is too afraid to say.”

His lips curved upwards into the biggest smile I’d ever seen him, and he pulled me even closer to him. His lips closed over mine, taking them in a searing kiss, and I knew that kiss was all the words
his
soul was too afraid to say.

As his tongue met mine, he lifted me up, and laid me backward, resting my head on the cushions I’d been sitting on. He lowered his body on top of mine, one of his hands traveling the length of my body. I tangled my fingers in his hair, holding him to me, and kissed him with everything I had.

I shake my head, banishing the memory from my mind, and rest my guitar upright against the tree. I look up at the tree house.

Dad built it when I was six, saying I needed some of my own space. Mom had argued that I had my own bedroom and that I was a little girl, therefore I had no need for a dirty tree house. I’d pulled on a pair of pants and sneakers and asked Dad when we were building it. He’d ruffled my hair, laughed, and I’d spent the next two days in the yard with him building it.

In thirteen years, the tree house has changed from a place to have tea parties with dolls, to a place for my teenage dreams to form, to the solace I find in it now. It’s all that’s left that’s really mine. My dad isn’t mine, and my mom belongs to the alcohol she so loves. The tree house and the music are all I have, and I hold onto them tight.

A part of my mind perks up, reminding me I could have Reese, and I bury it away. No – I can’t have Reese. The music is the one constant I have, the one thing I can hold onto with the confidence it’ll never leave me. It’s inanimate, but gives me purpose. It gives me an escape.

But Reese… Each look makes my heart race and every touch sends me crazy, but eventually one of us would have to let go. Because eventually, everyone we love will leave us. My parents taught me that. One day, I would have to let him go.

I’m not sure if I’m strong enough to do that again. I’m not sure if I could walk away from him another time.

“I know that look.”

I look away from the treehouse in his direction. He’s leaning against the porch casually, his arms folded across his chest and his legs crossed at the ankles.

“Do you ever actually work? ‘Cause you just keep on poppin’ up here, and I’m starting to wonder if you’re actually stalking me.”

He laughs. “No stalking. I promise. And yeah, I work most of the time. It’s quiet today, so I got the afternoon off.”

“You spend more time out of that place than in.”

“Maybe, but this isn’t a bad alternative to spend my afternoon.” He grins, and my stomach flutters a little.

“How do you know I’m not busy?” I challenge, raising my chin defiantly. He shakes his head, his shoulders shaking with silent laughter, and strolls across my yard.

“The only busy you are right now is playing that guitar, and you already know I could listen to you sing all day.” He grabs the guitar. “So I’m just gonna get a tan here in your yard while you sing to me.”

My lips curve upwards. “What if I don’t want to sing to you?”

His fingers move across my guitar softly, and he sits down, positioning it in his lap. “Then I’ll sing to you.”

I laugh out loud, swinging a little. “You can’t sing
or
play guitar, Reese.”

“Wanna bet?” He raises his eyebrows.

“Uh, yeah. You used to look at my guitar like it was an alien or something.”

“That was a year ago. I’ve learnt a few things since then.”

“Go on, then. Surprise me and sing to me.”

“Serenade you,” he corrects, pulling his shirt off. “I do serenading.”

“How did you work that out?”

“I’m a guy singing to a girl.”

“Aren’t guys supposed to serenade outside bedroom windows late at night?”

“Are they?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay, then this is a half-assed serenade.” He shrugs and I laugh again.

“Okay… But do you really need to be shirtless to do that?”

Reese looks at me from under his lashes as he gets comfy. “How else am I gonna get my tan?” he challenges.

I smile. I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything sexier than Reese Pembleton holding my guitar, shirtless.

Jesus, I contradict myself at every turn.

He gets his hand ready, and his eyes burn into mine. “Don’t hate me,” he whispers, playing the first chords of the song.

Stay
by Black Stone Cherry.

Mom played it endlessly after Dad left, and I taught myself the acoustics to ease the pain. Like singing it would bring him back, like begging would make him come back and stay.

The worst thing is that this song totally encompasses everything Reese and I are, and he sings it so beautifully. I never knew he could sing, but his voice has a husky, deep quality to it that combined with his southern twang makes
me
want to stay.

I squeeze my eyes shut, letting the swing come to a natural still as he sings. Tears sting at my eyes and one escapes, trailing silently down my cheek. I’m not even sure who I’m crying for.

I could be crying for the girl who wanted her daddy to come home. I could be crying for the girl who ran away last year. Or I could be crying right now for the girl so jaded by her parents that she’s afraid to let go and fall into something that could be so, so beautiful.

And I realize I’m crying for all of those things, but mostly because I’m afraid. I’m afraid of never having that beauty. I’m afraid of one day, never looking into someone’s eyes and seeing the love my father had for my mother.

But, ultimately, I’m scared of looking into Reese’s eyes and not seeing that beautiful love.

Reese leans the guitar against the tree and his hands frame my face, his thumbs wiping at my cheeks. He touches his mouth to the spots just below my eyes, his lips hot against my skin. His body rests between my legs, my knees half-gripping his waist.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers against me.

I shake my head, my hands twitching in my lap before making their way to his sides where I run my fingers along his skin. “Don’t be sorry.”

I breathe heavily, and his nose trails down the side of my face, his breath against my lips. He pauses, his lips suspended above mine, and when I don’t protest he takes them in a gentle kiss. It quickly turns to more when I grip at him tighter, and he cups the back of my head. Our tongues swipe against each other’s, and my legs squeeze his sides slightly.

“I just wondered if it was true,” he whispers, releasing me.

“If what was true?” I look in his eyes.

“Would it? Make you stay?”

I swing back and get up, turning away from him. “I…”

“Because it’s true. The lyrics, that is.”

“If you love me, Reese, then it’s the me you knew a year ago.” I walk toward the house. “I’ve changed in that year; I’ve grown up.”

“You think that makes you so different?”

“I know it does!” I stop and run my fingers through my hair, turning to him. “I know I’m different. I know I’m not the girl I was last year, the girl you say you love.”

“Huh.” He stands and tilts his head to the side. “That’s funny, because the girl I know and you have a lot in common.”

“Like what?”

“The way you smile when you’re genuinely happy. The shadow of sadness in the back of your eyes you think no one can see. The way you bite your lip when you’re concentrating, the way you run your fingers through your hair when you’re frustrated. But you know what else is the same? The way you walk away
every
single time.”

I have no words. How do you reply to that? How do you deny things that are so true to the person that knows every part of you?

“Why are you still here, Reese?” I ask in a quieter voice. “Why haven’t you left yet?”

“I’m here because I can’t fuckin’ leave. You think I haven’t tried, Kia? You think I haven’t damn well tried to leave the way you did?”

“You haven’t tried hard enough!” I yell, my emotions getting the better of me as they always have done with him. “If I walked away, you can too!”

“No, I can’t!” He clenches his fists at his sides and starts walking toward me. “Even now, with you so blatantly pushing me away, I
still
can’t fucking do it, Kia!”

“Why?” Tears leave my eyes. “Why can’t you do it?”

“I don’t know. Maybe I care more than you did.”

I suck in a breath, his words cutting me right to the core, and shake my head. “Don’t! Don’t ever say that to me!”

“Why? You did it so easily, but it’s so hard for me! You did it after three months of us, yet I can’t do it after a year of nothing so it must be true!” He throws his hands in the air, and I storm across the yard to him, my palms slamming into his solid chest.

“The day I left I broke my fucking heart!” I cry. “You don’t know how hard that was for me! You don’t know how many times I cried my goddamn heart out in New York because I just wanted to run back here to you, so don’t you stand there and tell me I don’t care! I’ve always cared, and I still do!” I hit him in the chest again. “You don’t know how much it broke my heart to leave you,” I say quieter. “You don’t know how much it would break my heart again.”

He grabs my shaking body into him, crushing me against his chest, and my knees buckle. His hand splays on my back, holding me up, and the other cups my head. He buries his head in my shoulder.

“Don’t ever tell me I don’t care as much as you do.” Tears stream down my cheeks. “I care too much.”

“I should have come after you.”

“And done what?” I laugh through my tears.

“Hell, I don’t know. I should have said everything then instead of waiting for you to come back. I took the easy way out, and now look. It’s just makin’ everything harder. Maybe…” He takes a deep breath and places his lips by my ear. “Maybe if I’d just said it all then, maybe it would have been enough to make you stay.”

“I’ll never stay in the Grove,” I whisper. “I can’t.”

“I don’t give a fuck about this place.” He tilts my head back and runs his thumb across my cheek. “Maybe it would have made you stay with
me.
”

“Harlan Grove is your home, Reese. I can’t be in New York and stay with you. Not that’s how it works.”

“Isn’t it?” His gold-flecked eyes are intense on mine. “How do you know I wouldn’t have gone with you? How do you know I wouldn’t have left?”

“We were eighteen. Kids. Hell, we’re only nineteen now.”

“Why does our age have to make a difference? You think I give a damn how old we are? You think the fact we’re still teenagers makes me love you any less than if we were thirty? ‘Cause it don’t, baby. It don’t make a bit of difference to me.” He presses his forehead against mine. “Now or in ten years’ time, I’ll still feel the same need to follow you wherever you go. I just wish I’d had the balls to do it a year ago.”

“I wish you did, too.” My voice is barely audible. “Maybe then it would be different.”

“It can be different, Kia. You just have to stop being so damn stubborn and let me in!”

“I’m leaving again at the end of the summer. I’ll just break our hearts all over again.”

“Have you just listened to a damn word I’ve said? If it means I get to have you, I will follow you to New York and wherever the fuck you decide to go after that. I will follow you into the fiery pits of Hell if that’s what it takes to get you to stay!”

Something, and I have no idea what, makes me finally grab him. Maybe it’s the rawness in his voice. Maybe it’s the determination in his eyes, or maybe it’s the sliding of his hand into my hair.

My fingers wind around his neck, and I pull his face to mine, crashing our lips together. My whole body goes taut against his as he tightens his grip on me, his fingers digging into my back. I can feel my dress riding up as his teeth drag across my bottom lip, and I take a step backward, tugging him with me.