Boy, I seemed to have no problem lying tonight—lying to Nathan about my whereabouts, and lying to myself, because deep down, I knew there wasn’t going to be any such thing as a clean break after a month’s time. Someone was going to get badly hurt. Possibly two people I cared about. All because of my selfishness.

This felt like a runaway train. I just hoped it didn’t crash and burn, taking all three of us down with it.

• • •

I thought maybe I’d get lucky and be able to sneak into my parents’ house with both of them sleeping. All I needed was to somehow get to my dad’s underwear drawer. But after I used my key to enter, I unfortunately found my mother sitting on the living room couch watching television.

She lowered the volume. “What are you doing here?”

Without saying anything, I rushed past her to their bedroom. Dad shifted in bed as I opened his drawer as quietly as possible to grab a pair of his boxer shorts. It was too dark to find pants, so I’d just settle for these. I couldn’t let my mother know why I needed to change my pants. If she asked, I’d pull something out of my ass.

On my way back out to the living room, I dumped my dirty jeans in a corner of the guest room where I’d be sleeping.

My mother’s eyes widened when she noticed me wearing only a T-shirt and Dad’s gigantic boxer shorts. “What on Earth?”

I plopped down on the couch. “I’m spending the night.”

“And you found the need to take off your pants the second you got here?”

“They have engine grease on them. I was fixing my truck. I wanted to be comfortable.”

Her eyes narrowed. “What kind of trouble did you get yourself into?”

“I told you what happened.”

“I’m not talking about your pants. I mean why are you spending the night?”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“This is about Farrah, isn’t it?”

Fuck.

I put my feet up on the coffee table and ran my hand through my hair. “What do you want me to say? You knew from the last time you started to grill me that something was going on there…”

“Does Nathan know?”

I crossed my arms. “No. And he never will.”

“What happened exactly?”

“What part of ‘I don’t want to talk about it’ don’t you understand, Mother?”

She smiled. “You know, when I was younger, I had an affair with your uncle Rod’s best friend, Stephen.”

That surprised me. “Really?”

“Oh yeah. I was only eighteen, and Stephen was a couple years older. Your uncle found us together, hiding in the shed behind Grandma’s house.”

“Well, damn. What did he do?”

“He beat the snot out of Stephen.”

I chuckled. “That sounds like Uncle Rod.”

“That was the end of their friendship.”

“No surprise there. What about you and Stephen?”

“We continued to sneak around for a while. He was really sweet to me, but eventually my feelings waned, and it was too stressful to continue upsetting Rod when it didn’t seem worth it anymore.”

I rested my head on the back of the sofa and stared up at the ceiling. “This story is basically confirming what I already know. If Nathan were to find out about anything happening between Farrah and me, our friendship would be over.”

“Well, that’s the thing. It could be over temporarily. But years later, Rod actually admitted that he regretted his reaction. So, it was a friendship wasted. I understood that the way he found out was shocking. But if he’d allowed himself to get over that, and looked at it objectively, he would’ve seen two people who were crazy about each other, and who never meant to hurt anyone.”

“There’s one big difference between your situation and mine. You said Stephen was a nice guy—probably would’ve treated you like gold if you’d allowed him to. I’ve never been good at relationships. Farrah would end up getting hurt if I led her to believe there was a future for us.”

That wasn’t the only reason I didn’t deserve her. But it was the only one I was willing to admit to my mother tonight.

“So if you’re so sure about the way things should be, why don’t you trust yourself? Why are you sleeping here tonight? You’re feeling guilty about something that already happened, am I right?”

“I think we’re done talking about this tonight.” Kissing her on the forehead, I said, “I’ll see you in the morning.”

In the guest bedroom, I settled into bed and brought my fingers to my nose. I could still smell Farrah. Holy shit. My dick rose to attention as I replayed everything that had happened in my truck—the way she’d told me she wanted to suck me off, the taste of her lips and tits, the way she grinded her pussy on me until we both came. I was completely wired.