Chapter 42
Gage
I couldn’t have been asleep long, not with the way my brain still felt foggy and unclear, but something was wrong. Something was different. It made my body spring into action before my mind could catch up.
I rolled to my side, stretching my arm out across the blanket, reaching for her automatically. She must have moved in her sleep, curled up somewhere just out of reach. That was fine. That was okay. But I just needed her close again. I needed her pressed against me, where she belonged.
My hand swept across the blanket, the cool fabric telling me what my brain couldn’t yet comprehend-she wasn’t there.
My brows furrowed as I pushed myself up onto my elbow, rubbing the sleep from my eyes with the heel of my hand. A groan slipped from my lips as my back protested the hard ground beneath me. Nothing but a thin blanket had softened the earth last night, but I hadn’t cared. Bree had been in my arms, curled against my chest, her body soft and warm and mine.
I blinked, my gaze sweeping over the clearing. She wasn’t lying nearby, wasn’t perched on the edge of the water with her glasses slipping down her nose, wasn’t gathering her things. The panic didn’t hit me yet, because logic stepped in-maybe she’d gone to pee. Maybe she’d just wandered to the treeline for a second. She’d be back.
She had to be back.
Because we were supposed to wake up together. We were supposed to exchange numbers, put her into my phone under My Girl with a line of ridiculous heart emojis. We were supposed to kiss again, and again, and again, until it was time to go. Bree wouldn’t just leave. She wouldn’t.
“Gorgeous?” I called out, my voice hoarse and low as it carried across the quiet morning. My eyes searched the treeline for movement, for the tilt of her head, the sway of her blonde hair. “Bree?” I
tried again, sharper this time, my tone betraying the shift in
my chest.
Nothing. Not even the snap of a branch. Not even the smallest sound.
My heart picked up speed, a heavy drum pounding inside my ribs, as nerves clawed up my throat.
Bree?!” I shouted, my voice cracking.
And then I saw it.
The small piece of paper lying next to the basket.
It hadn’t been there before. I knew that instantly, the way I knew the shape of her laugh and the rhythm of her breath when she slept. My hand shook as I reached for it, every muscle in my body screaming at me to just… not. To leave it where it was. Because picking it up, opening it, would
1/5
make something final.
But I did it anyway.
The second I unfolded the page, my chest caved in. The curves of her letters cut right through me,
the familiar scrawl that had always looked a little too beautiful for the notebooks she scribbled in. And there, on the page, were small dark stains. Watermarks. Teardrops.
She’d written this sitting right next to me, crying as she put pen to paper… and I’d been dead
asleep.
My eyes burned as I forced myself to read.
“Gage, I don’t know how to start this. That’s ridiculous, isn’t it? Just a few days ago I was giving a
lecture on how to write a love letter, but it seems like I don’t even know how to do it myself.”
A stone dropped into my stomach, heavy and cold.
“But that is what this is. A love letter. From me to you. Because I do love you, Gage. I really do. I love
you more than I ever thought I could love someone else, especially with everything I’ve been through. And while I knew this last night, while there was nothing I wanted more than to tell you I loved you too,
I think it was for the best that I didn’t tell you, that you stopped me from saying it.”
How the f**k could my heart expand and break in the same breath? How could I feel like I was
soaring and plummeting at the same time?
“Because while I know how much I love you, it scares me all the same. I was in love before, Gage, and I thought I had everything I could ever want, everything I could ever need. And while that should have
scared me, it didn’t. But this does. Because you could hurt me so much more than he could, you destroy me completely, leave me empty and utterly broken.”
could
My chest ached so hard it felt like it was splitting open. The bridge of my nose stung, my vision
blurred, and before I knew it, a tear slipped down my cheek. It fell onto the page, soaking into the
paper until it looked just like hers.
“And if I’m being honest, I’m not ready for something like that. I’m not ready for something as intense as you. I need to figure myself out, I need to be comfortable being myself. And while I hate that I can’t figure that out with you, I know I need it.
That’s why I have to leave, Gage. Why I have to go be myself, why I have to figure out my life. Because
you deserve someone who knows all of this, someone who can love you as unconditionally as you
love me.
The future you described yesterday was amazing, honestly it was everything I could have ever wanted to hear. But I can’t string you along, I can’t let you hope for a future, when I barely know what to do with myself. I have so many things I need to do, so many fears I need to overcome.”
215
<Chapter 42
More Rewards
Another tear fell. Then another. My vision blurred so badly I had to blink hard to keep reading, to force myself to the end even though every word gutted me.
“I so hope you find someone who is ready for that kind of life with you, who will treasure you the way you need to be treasured. I’m not hopeful enough to ask you to wait for me, even though I want to, even though I don’t want to leave you. But I have to let you go… isn’t that the saying? That if you love something, you have to let it go?”
“No,” I whispered, the word breaking off my lips like it hurt to say. My brain fought with my denial, clawing at every shred of logic, every desperate prayer that this wasn’t real. “You’re not doing this,
Bree. You can’t do this.”
But the words on the page didn’t change.
“Maybe I’ll meet you in the future, maybe you’ll get married, maybe you’ll have the kids, the house, the dogs and the cats. And I’ll find it in myself to be happy for you, Gage, I promise you I will.
But know this for sure, if you do come to my school, if you play against our team, I’ll be there, cheering you on. I’ll be sure to watch your games once you go pro, once you start making money doing what you love. So give it your all, Adonis, because I’ll be watching you.
Forever yours, Bree.”
“No, no, no, no,” I choked out, my voice cracking with every repeat, my throat tightening like it was being squeezed by an invisible hand. I turned the paper over in my hands, flipping it back and forth, needing there to be more. There had to be something-an address, a phone number, a hidden line
she’d scribbled at the bottom. Something.
“Don’t do this to me, Bree,” I pleaded, my voice hoarse, broken. Tears blurred my vision as I clutched the page like it was her hand, like if I held it tightly enough, she couldn’t slip away.
But the paper stayed silent.
I forced my shaking legs underneath me, fumbling into my clothes with frantic hands. I shoved one leg into my shorts while still hopping on the other, tugging my shirt over my head with no care if it was inside out. My sneakers fought me, the laces knotted, but I didn’t care. I jammed my feet in anyway. I had to move. I had to run.
Because maybe she hadn’t gone yet. Maybe she was still here.
Maybe she was sitting at Rachel’s hut, zipping up her suitcase, folding the blanket we’d just tangled ourselves in, waiting for me to find her. Maybe I could reach her before she climbed into a
car, before she drove away from me forever.
My chest burned as I ran, legs pumping harder than they ever had, harder than when Coach put us through hell, harder than during any game. If I was fast enough, maybe I could turn back time. Maybe I could erase the letter and replace it with her smile.
3/5
* Chapter 42
More Rewards
The camp came into view, the huts scattered in the soft morning light. A few people were already awake, their voices carrying in low murmurs, but not everyone was up yet. That gave me hope. It meant it was still early. It meant I wasn’t too late.
My feet pounded up Rachel’s steps, the boards rattling beneath me as I slammed my fists against the door. Each pound was frantic, desperate, my knuckles stinging as I called her name inside my head. Please open it. Please let it be you. Please tell me this is some kind of mistake.
The door creaked open.
But it wasn’t Bree.
Rachel stood there instead, her hair mussed from sleep, her eyes red like she’d cried recently. The sight gutted me, because I already knew. I didn’t need her to say a word.
“How long?” I rasped, my voice raw as her gaze landed on me.
Her lip trembled, her eyes shining with pity, and that pity cut deeper than any blade. “Just over an hour ago,” she whispered. Her voice shook like she was mourning right alongside me. “Gage… I’m so sorry. I couldn’t stop her. I couldn’t make her stay.”
My chest caved in completely. The dam broke, and the tears I’d been somewhat holding back streamed freely down my face. Rachel’s own eyes welled again, and before I could stop her, she wrapped her arms around me.
I stood stiff for a moment, too broken to even know how to react, but then I collapsed into it, clutching her back, burying my face in her shoulder. She started crying too, soft sobs muffled against my chest.
“She wouldn’t listen to me,” she whispered, her voice catching. “I tried, Gage. I told her she needed to stay, to say goodbye, but she just… she just wouldn’t.”
I held onto her, even as every part of me fractured, even as I felt my entire world crumble around me. The warmth in my limbs seeped out like water draining from a broken glass. The ease Bree had given me, the laughter, the joy-it all evaporated, leaving me hollow.
If she had told me she needed space, I would have given it to her. If she had said she needed time to heal, to find herself, I would’ve waited. I would’ve tied my own hands and buried my own needs just to make sure she had what she needed.
I would have given her anything.
But this? This letter? Her leaving me with nothing but her tear-stained words, cutting me off so clean, asking me to move on, asking me to find happiness in someone else?
That wasn’t going to fly.
I pressed my face into Dachol’s shoulder :-L
1
<Chapter 42
More Rewards >
thought she could let me go, thought she could choose fear over us, but she didn’t understand. She didn’t understand what she’d become to me, what she meant, what I’d already decided the
second I kissed her.
I wasn’t him. I wasn’t the bastard who broke her before. I had promised her I wouldn’t hurt her, and I’d meant every goddamn word.
If she thought she could walk away forever, she was wrong.
I’d give her a few days, maybe a week. I’d let her breathe. I’d let her convince herself she was doing the right thing. I’d let her sit with the silence, let her realize what it felt like without me filling it. And
then? Then I’d find her.
I’d drag her back to me if I had to. I’d tear down every wall she tried to build, break every chain she
thought she had to wear. Because Bree Morgan was mine, and I wasn’t about to lose the best damn thing that had ever happened to me.
Not now. Not ever.
Because love wasn’t about letting go. Not for me.
I loved Bree Morgan. And I would burn the whole goddamn world before I let her go for good.
