18 Cade

Lance: Can I swing by and practice with you one day this week?

Cade: Sure.

Lance: Wednesday?

Cade: Sure.

Lance: Will the nanny be there?

Cade: Fuck off, Lance.

Lance: Lmao. So angry all the time. See you on Wednesday!

* * *

“Tell me about young Cade.”

I’m sitting as far away from Willa as I possibly can. If I could build a wall of pillows down the middle of this bed, I would. Not that it would stop me from dragging her underneath me.

Terrible, horrible, no good, unbelievably bad idea.

Even her questions I don’t want to answer aren’t helping distract me from the nearness of her. The smell of her.

The fucking temptation of her.

“Um.” I clear my throat. “I dunno. Not much to tell.” Propping my hands across my stomach, I chance a peek over at her.

She’s a little pale, the dark circles under her eyes highlighted only by the dim glow of the bedside light.

She’s fucking beautiful.

All sloping lines. Her neck. Her nose. The bottom line of her jaw. There’s an elegance about her. Willa Grant is classy. She’s got fancy written all over her, yet she walks around in old concert tees and is just crazy enough to knock a kid into a pool for revenge.

She’s so much more than meets the eye, and sitting in a dark room with only a small stretch of soft mattress between us, I have to admit to myself that the way I want her is about so much more than how she looks.

She captured my attention the first time I laid eyes on her, and I haven’t been able to look away since.

It’s goddamn distracting.

“Come on. Were you this serious as a kid? Or were you like Luke?” She says it lightly, but I can see the way her eyes have started to sag.

“I was nothing like Luke. And I don’t want Luke to be anything like me either. My mom dying changed too much.”

She nods solemnly but doesn’t start dithering over me, which I appreciate. For someone who grew up privileged, there’s an inherent practicality about Willa. Something in the way her mind works. I see it when she talks to Luke. She’s not prissy or high maintenance. She’s down to earth, and I love that about her. Even if she is delusional about accepting compliments.

“I watched her die that day. I watched my dad hold her. I watched him sob.” My teeth grind, and I drop my eyes for a moment. “I think my childhood kind of died that day too.”