Page 76 of You Met Me There

She sneers at me. “If that were true, then you would have come back sooner. Not just now that you’ve been having troubles with Luke. Not because you were running away from him, but because you wanted to be here and see us. But we weren’t important enough to you for you to do that.”

I step back, her words a slap.

A heavy sigh leaves her as she turns her back to me. “I don’t think you should spend much more time with the boys.”

My eyes shoot up. “What?”

“They’re getting attached to you. It’s not good for them. The more time they spend with you, the harder it will be for them when you leave. And I’ll have to deal with the repercussions.”

“But I want to be a part of their lives,” I say to her back. “I’ll come back to visit. Jules, I’m not going anywhere again. Not like before.”

When she turns back to face me, her eyes are no longer teary, but cold and hard. “I forgave you, you know. Once, years ago when I didn’t want to feel this hurt anymore.” She grips at her chest, like she could simply pull her heart out of her skin to hold it in her hand. “I forgave you, even if I was never going to have the chance to tell you that.”

“And now?” I ask quietly. “Are you taking it back?”

“No.” She shakes her head. “But I’m protecting myself and my kids.”

She pushes past me, stepping out the back door and leaving me in her kitchen alone.

I run out the front door, my vision a blur. Everything passes in a haze, my cheeks hot, a heavy weight in my chest. I cry so hard I don’t remember the drive back to the cabin.

Chapter 38

Natalie

“We have to leave,” I say, storming into the bedroom. The door hits the wall with a bang.

Luke looks up from his laptop. He’s sitting on the bed, where he has his feet crossed at the ankles. “Leave? Why? What’s wrong?”

“I can’t do this anymore. I just have to go. I want to go back home.” I pull my suitcase from the closet and unzip it, spreading it open on the floor.

Luke moves to stand at the bedroom door, watching me. “What happened?” he asks calmly.

“Juliet blames me for everything. She told me so. She doesn’t trust me; she thinks I’m bad for the kids. She doesn’t want me here.” I open drawers, scooping clothes out in armfuls.

“Did she say that? That she doesn’t want you here?”

I blink at him, a pile of shorts and jeans squished between my arms. “She didn’t have to say those exact words. She said enough other hurtful things. And she’s treated me poorly ever since I got here.” My arms release the clothes, dropping them into the open suitcase on the floor. “I just want to go home.”

“You can’t run again.”

“I’m not running. I just don’t live here. We were here for the summer, and the summer’s over. It’s time to go back to reality.”

“Natalie,” he sighs. “The summer isn’t over yet. You can’t leave them like this. Not again.”

I stare at the floor, mindlessly twisting my hair between my fingers. “I knew it was too good to be true the moment she hugged me that first day. I knew she couldn’t actually forgive me. She said she did, but she didn’t. She can’t.”

Socks fall to the floor as I pull them from another drawer, and I trip over my hiking boots in my haste. I carry my toiletry bag into the bathroom, slide all my things into it from the counter, and rush back to the bedroom, dropping it with the rest of my things.

Luke remains against the doorframe.

I look at him. “Pack, or I’m going back alone,” I say. “I’m not staying here any longer.”

“Yes, you are,” he says firmly.

“What?” I stare at him. “Luke, I can’t. This isn’t working. I shouldn’t have come back here at all. Jules had a good thing here, a new family. She finally forgot about me, and I just came right back with my tornado of … darkness.” I spit the word. “She doesn’t want me here.” My hands fumble through the motions of packing, but I’m not really seeing anything, grabbing blindly at things around the room.

“She doesn’t want you to go,” he says, taking a slow step toward me.