Page 48 of On One Condition

How do I move us forward?

“I promise I’ll be better at it next time.”

The flash of recognition in her eyes tells me she remembers. That line. That night. Standing by my truck under the moonlight.

Her lips curl up in a bittersweet smile. There is a depth to the emotion in her eyes and, sure as hell, as I stare at her, I can see her guard go back up and lock into place.

It’s in the quick avoidance of her eyes and the lowering of her legs so she can hop off the counter and put some physical distance between us. I study her as she moves about the small space, confused.

She kissed me first.

She initiated the events that led to this.

“You take all the girls to bathrooms on the first date?” She tries to the sell the joke with a forced laugh as she shoves her panties in her purse and smooths down her skirt with her hands.

“I apologize. This”—I point to the space around us—“isn’t exactly how I imagined this happening.”

“Don’t apologize. We got it out of the way, right? Now we can move on.” Asher pulls her purse strap over her shoulder and heads toward the door.

The high I’m on crashes.

“What? Asher. Wait.” I have my hand on her arm and spin her so she’s forced to look at me. “What are you doing?”

“Leaving without saying goodbye.” She lifts a brow and tries to shrug out of my grasp. “Isn’t that what we do best when it comes to each other?”

I do a double take, her words cutting deep.

“We need to talk about what happened. That night.”

“I told you I don’t want to.”

“And I don’t give a flying fuck,” I shout at her, done with the cat and mouse game between us. “We need to talk.”

“Why?” she asks, her voice low and even, her emotions so much more controlled than mine. “Do you really want to hear about it? Do you really want to know I cried for weeks and weeks after you left without saying a word? Do you want to know what it was like giving a person what I gave you and then to be treated like I never existed?”

“Asher.” Her name is a plea. An apology. An . . . I don’t know, but every ounce of hurt woven in the thread of her voice is because of me. It’s my fault.

I’d fight for her too.

But I didn’t. Isn’t that the crux of this whole thing? I was scared and worried about myself. I was fearful of my father and the consequences of Pop’s threats. Sure, I worried about her and the pain I felt over losing her—our friendship, our plans—but my hands were tied.

But she had to have known that.

Had to have understood why I didn’t respond to her direct messages on social media.

“What? Is that too hard to hear for you? To know how much leaving me devastated seventeen-year-old me?” Her shoulders shudder as she draws in a breath. “How about how your father crushed my self-esteem, shredded it to pieces along with everything I wanted to be in order to keep me away from you? Or what about how I was deemed the town’s slutty gold digger who was trying to get pregnant by you simply for a payday?” I stand before her staggered. Dumbfounded. And she must read my expression as something else because she gives a quick shake of her head as if she’s done with me. “You know what? Never mind. It’s not fucking worth it.” She tries to jerk her arm from my grip, but I only squeeze it tighter.

The night you let me be humiliated.

“My father?” I ask. I fear the answer will rock my world for the second time in a matter of seconds but in a completely different way than Asher just did.

“He came to the farm that night out of the blue. Confronted Pop. They argued. I heard, and when I went out there to see what was going on, he told me . . .”

“He told you what?” I demand, wanting to pull the words out of her. But I don’t because I fear what she’s going to say.

“He said you got what you wanted from me and were already out with the next girl.” Her voice is barely a whisper as fury simmers inside of me in a way I’ve never felt before.

“What else? What else did he say?” I yell, hating her flinch when my voice raises.