In My Dreams I Hold a Knife by Ashley Winstead

Chapter 7

Now

If there was a hell on earth, it was this moment.

“Kill your father, then you’re free? Quoting Freud at a college party is too clichéd for you, darling.” In slow motion, Caro walked past me to where Coop stood, leaning in to kiss him. It was a surreal image, like rewatching a beloved movie, only to find the actors suddenly switched and everything now wrong. I looked away, focusing on the way my stiletto heels stabbed twin holes into the grass.

“I, for one, would be sad if Coop’s brand ever changed.” Mint raised his glass. “Long may my favorite roommate darken our otherwise idyllic lives.”

Courtney’s candy-red lips widened into a smile, flashing teeth as white and straight as her husband’s. “Actually, since Minty and I couldn’t make the engagement party, let’s cheers to Caro and Coop.”

The engagement party. Memories surfaced, too fast for me to push back, edges blurred by alcohol but still clear enough to be damning. I refocused, realizing everyone else had lifted their glasses. I hastily added my own, though it was empty.

“To Caroline Rodriguez,” Coop toasted, “a living saint, who rescued me from depression and poverty after law school. May I eventually be worthy of her.”

Caro blushed prettily.

“To Caro and Coop,” everyone sang. I echoed, a beat too late.

“Speaking of depression and poverty, guess who I saw?” Courtney raised her brows. “Eric Shelby. Remember him, always creeping around wherever we went? Figures he’d worm his way into our Homecoming party.”

Caro’s cheeks flushed. “He works here. And you should be nicer to him.”

“I need a drink,” I announced, to no one in particular, then dug my heels out of the dirt and hurried in the direction of the bar.

My plan was unraveling. No one was reacting the way I’d thought. I hadn’t anticipated Caro ambushing me so quickly, hadn’t expected to be shoved into Courtney and Mint, to feel the claustrophobic pressure of Eric somewhere out there, circling us. I hadn’t in a million years expected my own reaction to seeing Coop again.

It changed everything. What chance did I have of showing everyone the newer, truer me—brilliant, beautiful, successful Jessica—if I had to spend all weekend avoiding him? How would I secure my triumph if, at every moment, I had to focus on pushing memories away, acting like I didn’t care?

I thought I’d already beaten this, the stirring in my blood, the prickling awareness of real, flesh-and-blood Coop, only yards behind me. My body was so alert, and he’d barely glanced at me.

I had to leave. Put as much distance between us as possible. The bartender filled my glass to the brim with wine, somehow sensing my need. I shoved money into his tip jar and fled out of the tent, heading toward the velvety blackness of the trees. Tonight was ruined, but I’d recover tomorrow. All was not lost. The important thing was staying away from—

“Running away?”

I froze midstep.

“I guess your brand hasn’t changed much, either.”

I turned slowly, hoping against hope, but there he stood, tall and lit by the glow from the tent, his face half-shadowed.

I straightened. He watched the movement closely, following the way the straps of my dress pulled over my skin. I cleared my throat. “Coming in swinging. That strategy always worked so well for you.”

Coop grinned. A rare thing.

“Why are you here?” I asked.

“Why wouldn’t I be? I graduated from Duquette, didn’t I? No matter how hard those bastards tried to stop me.”

I tipped my glass back, letting wine slide down my throat. Talking to him alone is a bad idea. Walk away, Jessica.

“Cheers,” he said, lifting his glass.

I tried not to look at his eyes, but I couldn’t help it; his gaze dragged mine up from the ground. Eyes vivid green, dark-lashed, looking at me like he always did—too intense. Goose bumps crawled across my arms. “If I recall, the old Coop thought Homecoming was stupid.”

“Maybe the new Coop is full of school spirit.” The new Coop—of course. It had been ten years since college. A full year since we’d even talked. Like me, he was different now. It wasn’t just that he was a lawyer, which had always seemed so improbable in college. Or that he lived in a new city, wasn’t joined at the hip with Jack and Frankie and Mint. He was engaged now. He belonged to someone else. To my best friend.

I repeated it to myself, over and over.

“Well,” I said, starting to step around him. “I’m glad you came. If you’ll excuse me.”

He caught my arm. “What… We’re not going to talk about it?”

A chill ran the length of my body. His hand was warm, the fall air cold. He was so close. I opened my mouth to speak, but he shook his head.

“Don’t you dare say talk about what.”

I didn’t move. “I don’t think there’s anything to say. It’s been a year.”

He clenched his jaw. “Can we have an honest conversation for once in our goddamn lives?”

I laughed—I couldn’t help it. “Having an honest conversation is what ruined things in the first place.”

A light sparked in his eyes. His fingers flexed on my arm. “I thought you said you were drunk at the engagement party.”

A memory: my heart, shattered into pieces. My body, unsure how to function without it. Unable to put one foot in front of the other, swimming in pain. The beautiful brass bar, the bottles of red wine, Caro, resplendent in white. The desperate thought: I have to tell him.

We were crossing into dangerous territory. I could feel the ghosts starting to stir. “I was,” I said carefully. “Very drunk.”

“Well, which was it? Were you being honest, or were you drunk?” The look in his eyes was too serious. Jesus Christ, Coop. He always wanted so much.

It all rushed back. Caro and Coop’s engagement party. Everyone there—families, all our college friends, except Mint and Courtney, of course, off on some glamorous vacation. At first, the news that Coop was dating Caro had been a slash to my heart. As Caro’s friend, I had to hear every excruciating detail about how they’d reconnected. How Caro—who checked in on her old friends, no matter how much time had passed, because she was that kind of person—gave Coop a call one day out of the blue.

And apparently it was perfect timing. Coop, struggling with law school and full-time work, but also haunted by something—Caro had whispered it, like a secret between us, haunted. He’d needed a friend, and there she was. I’d acted puzzled, kept my voice light over the phone, even as my heart hammered, even as I wanted to scream that I knew what haunted him, and it had its hold on me, too.

I’d borne their relationship silently, because I had to. Waited for the wound to heal, or for them to break up, which I told myself was inevitable.

But then the opposite happened. Caro said she was moving to Greenville to live with him. Then, too quick, the call came, the one where Caro was shrieking, and my knees were buckling. They were engaged. And something inside me crumbled, something important that had been there for years, holding me up, although I’d never realized it. I’d tried all my usual tricks to dull the pain, but the only thing that worked reliably was wine.

“Jess, I need you to be honest.” Coop tugged my arm, pulling me closer. “It’s been years since I could read you.”

Was I being honest, that night at the engagement party? Clutching him in the darkest corner of the bar, begging, Don’t marry her. You’re supposed to love me. Love me, love me, love me. Like an incantation, powerful if said enough times. Grabbing his hand. Leave with me right now, let’s go. Let’s run away and never come back.

His hands on my shoulders. You’re drunk, Jess. You don’t mean what you’re saying. His face stony. I know you don’t mean it. Because if you did, it would be the cruelest thing you’ve ever done. Stepping away, putting distance between us. And Caro is your friend.

Honest, or drunk?

I looked at Coop’s hand on my arm, his strong, graceful fingers. I followed the hard curves of his biceps, visible through his sweater, skimming the elegant swoop of his neck to his full lips, long lashes, shock of dark hair. Every inch of him familiar, beautiful, infuriating.

I felt alive in a way I hadn’t for a full year, maybe longer, and the feeling made the decision for me. I couldn’t let him disappear from my life again. From this moment on, I would play by the rules, take no risks, stick to friends only. Even if all I ever got was a sliver of Coop—a few friendly words, a hand on my arm—I would make do. No matter how much it hurt.

“I was drunk,” I whispered, the words like a door closing. “Of course.”

He closed his eyes for a moment, then opened them, dark and burning. “Coward.”