Logan. Cole. Elle.
No equation worked when all of us were a part of it. I had to let one go. I knew who I wanted to let go, but I wasn’t sure if that was impulse and abandon talking or if it was, without a doubt, my heart ordering me to choose the boy curled around me I’d known for a handful of days.
So I had a lot to think about and just as many decisions to make.
First things first though, I had to get home. It had to be getting close to, if it wasn’t already, after midnight. Dad would be unleashing the bloodhounds soon, along with calling every resident in the phone book, if I didn’t get home.
Only because I knew Cole wouldn’t have noticed if I stuck my tongue in his ear, I pressed a light kiss into his forehead after I’d worked my way out of his arms. I retrieved my bra and tank from the ground and slid into them while I continued the search for my sandals. I finally found them close to the water, resting beside his sneakers.
I studied Cole’s peaceful face for a few seconds before I made myself start heading for the Jeep. He was happy, even in sleep, and it made me smile to realize I’d been part of putting that happiness on his face.
The farther I got from Cole, the more my chest throbbed. I knew something was likely playing tricks on me, but by the time I’d made it inside the Jeep, I couldn’t decide if my heart was closer to breaking or stopping. Either would have almost been preferred to the pain.
Before I ran back to him and nestled against his side, I started the Jeep and headed for home.
I could see the lights streaming out of every window before I was half a block away. Dad was awake. Waiting for me. Guaranteed to be angry beyond repair at me for coming in so late, shutting off my phone, and having no good explanation.
There was no way, if I wanted to live to see the dawn, I would admit to my dad who I’d been with and what I’d been doing with him. Even a chill dad wouldn’t have been okay with that, and my dad couldn’t have been any less “chill.”
I paused outside the front door to put my hair back up into my standard ponytail and made sure my tank and skirt didn’t look like they’d just been torn off, rumpled, or dirty. Other than a smear of dirt at the neckline of my tank, I was as put together as I could be.
My key hadn’t clicked over in the lock before I heard Dad’s booming footsteps coming towards the door. “No, she’s home.” Dad’s voice was just as booming. I didn’t hear any other voices, so he must have been on the phone. “Thanks, Logan.”
Wonderful. He’d been on the phone with my boyfriend, no doubt wondering if Logan knew where I was. So much for having a little time to decide who I’d tell what. Logan might not come charging over tonight, but he’d be around first thing in the morning.
“Where have you been, Elle Marie Montgomery?” Dad was still clutching his phone when he swung the door open. His brow was set and his whole body was tense with anger, but his eyes were tired. Mom had died fourteen years ago, but dad had aged fifty years in that timeframe. He’d aged another ten tonight. “I expected you home almost two hours ago.”
I hung my head a little as I stepped inside. Through all his overbearing faults, I loved my dad and I hadn’t meant to send him over the worry cliff tonight.
“Sorry, Dad,” I said. “I kind of lost track of time.” Because I was busy touching a man and having him touch me in a way that made me lose all sense of everything, time most of all.
“Where is your phone?” he demanded.
“In my purse,” I whispered.
“So why didn’t you answer it when me, Logan, your Grandma M, and everyone else I called to see if they knew where you were called?” He wasn’t shouting, but the telltale quiver in his voice gave away that he wanted to.
“I turned it off,” I answered, still not able to look him in the eyes.
“Why in the world would you turn off your cell phone late at night when your family and friends thought you’d gone missing?”
Because I didn’t want to be reminded of friends or family tonight. Because I wanted to live in a dream for two hours of my life. Because the reality I was living wasn’t the one I wanted. Because . . . I was an eighteen year old woman who could do what she wanted without being treated and scolded like a child.
That last “because” was the one that got my blood close to boiling and the one that snapped back. “I turned off my cell phone because I wanted to. I wanted to have a couple hours to myself where I wouldn’t get a darn phone call every two seconds if I wasn’t doing what everyone expected me to do.” I wasn’t shouting either, but I had the same quiver in my voice. Like father, like daughter. “And where I was, I wasn’t missing.” I marched up the stairs, as ashamed as I was proud for standing up to my dad. Pausing at the top of the stairs, I looked back down at him. He was looking at me like he wasn’t sure where his daughter was. “I wasn’t missing out on anything.”
After locking myself away inside my bedroom, I kept waiting for my dad to come bursting through the door to announce I was grounded until the day I turned gray. He never did, though.
In fact, I’d crawled into bed and fallen asleep before I heard him climb the stairs to head to bed himself. I fell asleep that night picking up right where Cole and I had left off in my dreams.
I WOKE UP late that next morning, thanks to the fact my phone was still off so my alarm wasn’t there to help me rise and shine for my breakfast shift at the diner. I rarely worked breakfasts, especially Sunday breakfasts because I was expected to sit in the front row with Logan and his mom while his dad gave the sermon, but I filled in when needed.