Delirious from heat and panic, I peeled my hoodie from my body and threw it to the front seat of the truck, relishing the air on my damp skin in my white, short-sleeved V-neck. I shoved West out of the way from the window with my butt, taking over.

“I owe you one,” I dropped my voice to a whisper.

“Two.”

“What?”

“Twice I’ve saved your ass, and it hasn’t even been a month. Your favors are piling up real quick, Texas, and I’m going to cash in on them. Soon.” He flipped fish on the grill, rolling a green apple candy stick in his mouth. It always made him smell delicious. Like Granny Smith and winter.

“Any chance you can stop bein’ a prick today?” I growled, hiking the plastic gloves up my fingers.

“Not even the slightest,” he said nonchalantly, but I thought I detected something else underneath his relaxed stance. An underlying exhaustion. The same boy I saw in the parking lot, staring at nothing, waiting for the day to end.

“Good talk.”

“Communication is key, baby.”

“I’m not your baby.”

“That’s a relief. You’d make me a no-show dad, despite my good principles.”

Principles? Ha.

Luckily, we didn’t have time to bicker for the next four hours. We worked nonstop before we sold out of everything. West St. Claire may have been a bad boy, but he was dang good for business.

When the endless line of customers was finally served, I took a deep breath, turning around and grabbing the edge of the counter behind me.

As soon as I looked at him—really looked at him—the air left my lungs.

“Holy crap. What happened to your face?”

His entire face was slashed up, like someone had put scissors to it and tried to cut him into ribbons. The scratches under his eyes implied that same someone had also attempted to gouge them out. He had nasty red, purple, and yellow bruises all over his neck, like he’d been choked, and his lower lip was double its usual size.

My guess was he bled buckets last night. He belonged in the ER no less than Grams did.

“Fell down the stairs,” he said grimly. Sarcastically. Why did I think I was going to get a straight answer out of this guy?

“What’s your excuse?” His hooded eyes drifted to my injured arm. I tilted my head sideways, not sure what he meant, before realizing I was standing there with a short-sleeved shirt and that he could see my entire purple arm.

I let out a frantic yelp, bolting to the passenger seat to grab my hoodie. I knocked a few pans and spatulas on my way and tripped over an empty case of soda. I fumbled with the hoodie, trying to get it on me as soon as humanly possible, but the more I tried to figure out if it was upside down or not, the more flustered I got.

Finally, West plucked the hoodie from between my hands, turned it inside out, and pulled it over my head, his movement flippant, almost lazy.

“There.” He yanked my hoodie down, giving it a final tug, like he was dressing up a kid. “Nothing like a nice parka in the middle of a fucking Texan summer.”

“It’s not a parka.” I wrapped my hands around my waist, shaking all over.

I couldn’t breathe.

He saw my scars.

He saw my scars.

He saw my ugly, stupid scars.

Jarring, red, and bumpy, they were hard to miss, and I wondered if any of our customers had lost their appetite as I’d served them.

I was surprised I didn’t throw up in West’s lap as soon as he brought it to my attention. Maybe because he seemed so unfazed about it, and already knew so much about me, it wasn’t totally shocking.

“Texas.” His tone was low. Unruffled.

“I … I … I have to go,” I mumbled, turning around, getting ready to bolt out of the truck. He snatched me by the arm, pulling me back in effortlessly. I jerked and cried, desperate to leave, to never face him again, but his clutch on my arm tightened, almost to a bruising point.

He backed me into the trailer, until I had no choice but to accept that I wasn’t getting out of there before we talked it out.

Again, I found myself trying to kick and punch him.

Again, I failed.

He was now crowding me so close, his breath fanned my face as he spoke. I started screaming from the top of my lungs. Like he’d raped me. Like he was hurting me back.

“Calm the fuck down.” He bracketed me with his arms, my back against the fridge. He didn’t sound any less composed. “Or you’ll leave me no choice but to slap the hysteria out of you.”

I shut up immediately. I didn’t think he would lay a hand on me—I already gathered he wasn’t that type of guy—but I didn’t put it past him to punish me in some other way.

I pretended to breathe in and out. The sooner we got this out of the way, the sooner I could leave.

“You done freaking out?” He raised an eyebrow.

“Sure. Totally Zen,” I bit out, gulping greedy breaths. “May I have some of my personal space back now?”

West took a step back, allowing a sliver of space between us. He leaned against the counter, folding his arms. “So.”

“So?” I huffed.

“You’ve got yourself a nice, angry scar.”

He said it. He actually went out and uttered it aloud. Nobody had pointed out the existence of my scars before. Not to me, anyway. People usually ignored it. Pretending they hadn’t noticed. Which was somehow even more uncomfortable for me.

“What’s the deal with covering it up? We all have scars. Yours is just visible.”

“It’s gross.” I swung my gaze to the ceiling, avoiding his stare. I refused to cry for the second time in a week, and I was definitely not going to let him see it.

“Says who?” he pressed.

“Says everybody. Especially when people around me used to know me as someone else.”

As someone pretty.

“Sounds like a pity party to me. Should I bring anything? Snacks? Beer? Inflatable sex dolls?”

“Who said you were invited?” I was still focusing on the trailer’s ceiling.

He snorted out a laugh, slapping a rag over his knee in my periphery.

I noticed West laughed a lot when we were around each other, but never at school.

I also noticed he was apparently insane, because he didn’t seem bothered at all by his own dire state.

“You’re making a big deal out of nothing. It’s just scar tissue.”

“It ain’t attractive.”

“It ain’t unattractive enough to prevent me from wanting to tap your ass.”

My mouth dropped, and I blinked rapidly, trying to figure out how, exactly, I was going to answer him.

He’d been throwing around the idea that he found me appealing every now and then.

I still thought he either said that sarcastically or because he wanted poor Toastie to feel better about herself. At least I’d stopped thinking it was De La Salle who sent him to breathe unfounded hope in me. West didn’t seem like the type to answer to anyone, much less take direction and orders from others.

“Was that your idea of a compliment?” I hissed.

“No,” he drawled, dead serious. “It’s my idea of the goddamn truth. What is wrong with you?”

Something euphoric and warm clawed at my chest. It was the first time I’d toyed with the idea that he was telling the truth. We stared at each other wordlessly. I waited for him to explain why he looked like he’d been attacked by a pack of wolves. When he didn’t, I arched an eyebrow.