Where We Left Off (Phoenix Falls Series Book 1)

Mitch stands in front of me in the kitchen, hands on hips, head bowed. It’s Christmas Eve and he just got back from Pine Hills with my mom, so she’s upstairs unpacking the suitcase he lugged to their room whilst I prepare for the Mitch Inquisition part iii. It’s not such a chore when I can see the curl of his biceps through the stretched cotton of his white long-sleeve t-shirt, and he’s wearing the same baby blue jeans that he had on in the photo my mom sent me. Does he only own the one pair?

He’s rooted to the spot in silence for at least a whole minute, steam slowly seeping out of him like a volcano. When he looks up at me his expression is rigid but not aggressive. At least he isn’t Cadillac red anymore.

He holds his hand up, palm facing out. I don’t know if it’s to prematurely subdue or silence me, but I remain both subdued and silenced as I wait for him to rip the bandage.

“It is none of my business, River, and I don’t want to talk about this any more than you do.”

If he’s referring to me getting it on with his son – which I’m pretty sure he is – he may be surprised to know that I actually wouldn’t mind talking to him about it. I mean, I have literally two friends, and his son is now sort of one of them, so I’m overdue a juicy indulgence about the mind-blowing sex I’ve been mercifully granted before my lifetime of sad academic servitude. Plus, Mitch is really attractive, so it wouldn’t gross me out if he thought about me naked. I know I shouldn’t be thinking it, but I am only human. If anything, it’s going to be way more uncomfortable for him to discuss this than it is for me to discuss it.

Nevertheless, I don’t say any of this, instead opting to silently observe him whilst he struggles. He’s all hot and bothered. I wish I had some popcorn.

He shifts his weight from one foot to the other. “For the sake of your mom being my partner, and you being her daughter, and Tate being my son, there are a lot of people that I care about involved here, so I have to make sure that precautions are being put in place so that no-one gets hurt in the long run.” His eyes burn into mine as he tries to determine whether or not I’m taking him seriously. I nod, relenting. I almost roll my eyes but I do value my life. “So,” he says hesitantly. The muscles in his chest tense and he rolls his shoulders. I feel like he’s a quarter-back, and I’m one wrong move away from him mowing me down. “Were you careful?”

I knew that this is what he was going to talk to me about, but for some reason, now that he is talking to me about it, I feel unprepared. My little gasp escapes me before I can stuff it back down my throat, so I try to detract from it by narrowing my eyes at him. There is no way for certain that he knows what happened whilst he was away, so I’m not about to hand him such prized information over on a silver platter.

I opt for innocent until proven guilty. “I cannot imagine what made you assume such a thing, Mitch,” I say, my tone the perfect blend of distrustful teenager and scandalised step-daughter.

He narrows his eyes on me in return. “How about I rang my son’s landline every day for the past week and he picked up a grand total of – how many times was it again? Oh, right. No times.”

I almost do a little pony snort but Mitch doesn’t look like he’s in a friendly mood. I give him my best perplexed look instead and say, “Very suspicious.”

“River-”

“Yes.” I blurt it out and he pauses like a VHS freeze-frame – stopped mid-motion but glitching a little. He’s on the precipice of detonation so I choose to put him out of his misery. “I was careful. He was careful. It was all very nice and careful.”

We stare at each other, gauging our reactions like we’re not sure if we’re on the same team or not. After a few seconds he realigns himself, standing to his full height and his chest engorging as he takes a deep breath. He nods once. Then he winces.

“I didn’t need to know about the ‘nice’ bit,” he mumbles, one rough tan hand scratching his scalp in irritation. I can’t help the small laugh that bubbles out of me and it catches his attention. His expression is softer now, although I can see his discomfort in the lines twitching beside his eyes and mouth. He looks apologetic as he says the next part. “Obviously Tate is going to come round tomorrow, but I can’t have you two being alone together at any point, okay? It’ll be too obvious, and I want for you to know what’s happening in your future before you let your mom in on this – if ‘this’ is still going on by the time that you’ve figured out what you’re going to be doing. I know I sound callous and I’m sorry, but we need to be pragmatic about this.”

Everything that he just said is totally logical and correct, but now all that I’m thinking about is Tate on Christmas Day. Maybe I should have given him his cross back so that he could be feeling optimum holiness tomorrow, but I don’t want to draw anyone’s attention to it now, so I dismiss the thought.

He continues, “You might be able to find a moment at the house warming next week but, I’m telling you, strictly nothing inappropriate, River. If someone sees you and tells your mom you will be in deep shit.”

Mitch swivels the ball of his foot back and forth, watching it like it’s his soul’s compass. He looks over to the entryway and then back to me, scratching the back of his neck contemplatively. “You know when you first met me and you said something like I just want what’s best for my mom?” he asks. I tilt my head, puzzled, but I say yes anyway, not sure where he’s going with this. “Yeah? Well, that’s how I feel about Tate,” he says, his voice tenacious yet kind. His hands are stuffed in his pants pockets, resolute. I nod in understanding, presuming that he’s made his point, but then he adds, “And you.”

My eyes flash up to his immediately, unsure if I just heard him correctly, and he holds my gaze.

“You’re… family now. Whether through my son or through your mom, it doesn’t matter. So that’s how I feel about you, too.”

I’m too shocked to speak so I just continue staring at him, the blood in my brain feeling as if it’s coagulating, my muscles tense and immobile.

Mitch cares about me? It’s impossible. Mitch hates me. I heard what he was saying to Tate in the attic that night. He thought that I was going to use his son and then leave without a trace, which – okay – is essentially true, but not in the sense that I have no feelings about it, because, annoyingly, I do. But Mitch doesn’t know that. Right?

Finally he nods again and exits the room, leaving me alone and dumbstruck, with only the kitchen counter for support.

*

The housewarming party is tucked in perfectly between Boxing Day and New Year’s Eve – that time of the holiday season when no-one wants the celebrations to end – so the Coleson’s home is lit up like a middle-aged frat house tonight. Mitch’s work buddies, who are all as thickset and sun-kissed as you could ever possibly imagine, are lounging in the living area near the back with their partners, reclining into the soft brown sofas with beer bottles swinging from lose fists. Tate’s mom has even been invited here, but I’m pretty sure that she’s going to politely decline coming round. Above the fireplace the mantle is lined with an evergreen garland, shiny red baubles intermittently dispersed through the leaves, and bowls of butter cookies and bottles of opened wine are set across the dining room table. The atmosphere is hazy with laughter, old Christmas songs, and cinnamon-bun scented candles.

Obviously I’m invited – I mean, technically I live here now – but I’m staying as out of the way as possible, although, for my mom’s sake, I’ve made an effort to dress ‘normally’ just in case. I’m wearing my dark denim jeans as it’s freezing outside, although the initial blanket of snow has disappeared for now, and for a touch of personality I’m wearing my cream long-sleeve top with a little Kewpie in the centre.

I’ve been in my room for the past hour, lying on my bed in the flickering candlelight and listening to a CD that I shouldn’t be, but now I’m so hungry that I’m going to have to brave going to the kitchen. I pull on a pair of fuzzy socks and pad quietly out of my room until I reach the downstairs entryway. I turn right to the dining room and pluck two butter cookies from the bowl, biting into one as I head into the kitchen to put the kettle on. God, this is a really good cookie. It feels really bad to be enjoying it so much, but the fact that Tate made them makes them even better. I can’t wait for him to get here tonight. I don’t know why but I need to see him. The cookie melts down my throat, creamy and sweet, and then I shove the second cookie into my mouth. I flip the kettle on after checking how much water is inside, whilst simultaneously retrieving a mug from the cupboard and a teaspoon from the drawer.

Then I hear it. The quiet shuffling sound behind me. It results in a prickling sensation at the back of my neck, seeping down my spine and into my muscles – a type of primitive paralysis keeping my body stilled.

What the hell?

I slowly lift my hand to the cupboard above my face and I open it to pick up a teabag. I’m moving like Frankenstein’s monster, slow and unsteady, as I pour the water into the cup, staring straight ahead at the now-closed cupboard door, determined to stay as still as possible.

There are eyes boring into me, through my hair and to my skin, but there has been no shift in the air around me, implying that I am the only person in the room.

My spine flexes and a light shiver ripples over my shoulders as the realisation dawns on me. The kitchen window. It’s right behind me and I’m almost one hundred percent certain that someone is staring at me through it.

I have a really bad feeling. On an animal level my body can sense the ill intent and it’s making me lightheaded. The noise and cheer from the living room has descended to the underworld, throbbing in my ears as if I’m below a surface of water.

A slight movement catches my eye and suddenly I’m looking at the round silver doorknob on the cupboard in front of me. It’s blurry and distorted but there is a blot of colour in the black smudge that depicts the window, like light catching on something pressed up against the pane-

I flip around and a flash of gold evaporates from view. There’s someone out there who isn’t meant to be. My heart is in my throat and I’m gripping the countertop behind me. Even if I didn’t trust my eyes, I wouldn’t be able to deny the whip-fast rustle of shoes on Mitch’s gravel border. Now the only thing that I can see in the pane is my own terrified reflection, washed out in a watery silver tint against the blackness beyond the porch. Ten seconds, twenty seconds, thirty. I’m too panicked to be able to move. I want to run upstairs and hide under my bed. I want to get my inhaler and release the pain in my lungs.

I want to walk to the back of the house and tell Mitch that there’s an intruder on his property.

I’m about to pry my frozen fingers off the counter behind me when the front door opens. The front door is open? We didn’t even lock it? My eyes stretch wide and the blood runs from my face until Tate steps inside the entryway, fingers on the handle to close the door behind him. When he sees me his expression changes from warmth to shock to incensed concern. He looks angry as he rushes to me, leaving the door open, and he encases his fists around my elbows.

“River,” he says. His brow is clenched, and his eyes are running all over my face. I feel weak. I’m glad he’s gripping me so tightly because, if he wasn’t, I think that I would be on the floor. “Tell me what happened.”

My hands are shaking as I lift them to hold onto his forearms. I look down at them and my nails have turned purple. I’m icy cold as I think of what is happening. I know this reaction. My body knows this reaction more than my brain can comprehend right now, and all I can think about is the fact that I need to get as far away from here as possible.

“I need to go,” I whisper. He doesn’t hesitate. We don’t check behind us to make sure that no one is watching as he pulls me from the kitchen, I slip into my shoes, and then he hauls us from the front door to his truck. I start shivering hard, and I’m not sure if it’s because the temperature has dropped to frost level or because I know that someone is lurking out here in the dark. I don’t look around me to see. I don’t want to ever see it again.

What if I’m literally going crazy? There is no logical reason why I would have seen what I know I just saw. It doesn’t make sense. It just doesn’t make sense.

He unlocks the car and swiftly opens the passenger door, helping me lift up onto the step and practically pushing me inside. He strides to the driver’s side and hunches in, locking it as soon as the doors are all shut.

He turns to me and grabs my face in both of his hands. They are so comforting and warm that it almost makes me cry. His fingers wind into the hair at the base of my skull and he rubs his thumbs firmly up my cheeks. It confuses me at first because his touch is so much rougher than it usually is, but then I realise that he isn’t comforting me: he’s trying to re-circulate my blood flow.

“Your lips are white,” he murmurs disturbed. His face is twisted in pain as he starts pushing his thumbs into the padded halves of my bottom lip, pressing until I feel his warmth begin to seep inside of me.

“Tell me,” he says again, and this time I want to obey.

“That day,” I say, and I’m startled by my own voice. It comes out louder than I thought that it would and it reverberates around the car, making the silence even more penetrating. “You have to tell me what you thought was going to happen.”

Tate blinks at me, as if confused, and I can see his mind trying to reach the place that mine is currently at. He isn’t sure which day I’m talking about. There have been a lot of days, but only one day would merit this reaction.

As soon as he realises what I’m talking about his body tenses and stills. He isn’t sure where I’m going with this and, to be honest, neither am I. But something doesn’t feel right. Something has been amiss in our stories for too long, and I need to rectify it now or I’m going to go insane.

“The last day that we were in school together before Christmas?” he asks. His voice is low and quiet, unsure. I nod and he runs his hand down his face, then through his hair. “Um,” he says heavily, “I thought… I thought we were going to meet up after the final bell. I was outside whilst you were in your classes, and I kept looking up at the windows to see you.” He swallows and undulates his shoulders, his eyes diverted out of the window. He looks like he doesn’t want to continue so I scoot closer to him and drop my hand to his thigh, which is widely spread and hardened under his jeans. I spot a slice in the denim above his knee and slip my hand into it. I’m instantly met with the searing heat of his skin, so extremely juxtaposed to the wintry tips of my fingers, and he makes a quiet groan. He rolls his head to face me and then he wraps one of his hands around the side of my throat.

“Do I have to continue?” he pleads, and I squeeze my hand around his naked thigh to encourage him. He groans again and this time pulls me by my neck so that he can reach my lips. He kisses me and a pained sound releases from his chest. He slants my mouth open so that he can kiss me more intimately, and he runs his other hand down my back, until he’s gripping me forcefully from behind. I trail my unoccupied fingers up to his belt and he pulls my face back so that he can look down, a grunt of desire escaping him.

“Continue,” I order and his distressed eyes flick back to mine. He removes both of his hands from my body and lifts his arms back so that he can grip the headrest behind him. The hot scent of his warm skin and cologne rushes over me.

“You weren’t waiting for me where I asked you to, and then when I found you, you were so angry at me. You… hated me and you didn’t want to see me again.” His tone is slightly bitter, but I catch the glints of confusion and betrayal in his eyes, so I run the hand that I have inside his jeans as high up his thigh as the denim will allow. “Fuck,” he grits out.

He closes his eyes and his hands drop to his belt, slapping the tongue of leather through the metal buckle. His fingers hurriedly push his top button through the loop and the zip down his fly, and then he presses his hand in between the denim and his underwear. He palms himself with anguished strokes over the stretched cotton.

“Why are you asking me this?” he asks, his eyes still squeezed shut. As I watch his hand I momentarily forget everything else that has happened in the past five minutes, but then I feel the silent chill again and my body stiffens anxiously.

“The note,” I say. “You forgot about the note you wrote me.” And without the note, none of this terrible stuff would ever have happened. I have to know the truth. What were his intentions if they weren’t for things to end up exactly as they did?

He opens his eyes and there is a new expression etched on his face. Defiance.

He lifts his arms up again so that he can grip the headrest the same way he did earlier. If he didn’t, I’m not sure what his hands would be capable of right now.

“I never wrote you a note, River,” he says, eyes staring intently into mine.

I feel the twist of a knife pressing in my gut. “Yes you did,” I refute. “You did give me a note-”

“Yes,” he replies, his voice straining with tension and a cacophony of emotion boiling beneath the surface. “I did give you a note, but I never wrote you a note. I typed you a note.” He cocks his head, more confused than ever. Join the club Tate.

I press my temples roughly and then jolt my head straight. “You wrote me a note and you typed me a note,” I say, agitated now. “The day that I’m talking about… that’s the day that you wrote me a note.” The minute details between these discrepancies is making my blood congeal.

He shakes his head, seeming less perplexed now but much more concerned. “River, there was no handwritten note. We had a plan that day. Why would I write you when we already knew what we were doing?”

A horribly logical thought. I brush it off, adamant in my refusal to be manipulated. “I literally showed it to you outside when I saw you, before I…” Before I screamed horrible things at you. Before I clawed you, pushed you, shoved you. Before I absolutely lost it.

He turns a full ninety degrees in his seat and his eyes are molten. “I thought that you wrote that.”

I throw my head back against the headrest and it smacks hard. Tate immediately cups the back of my skull and laces his fingers into my hair so that I can’t do that again. His jaw is entirely rigid.

“Why would I write a note and then sign it ‘Tate’?” I ask. “You looked at it, you would’ve seen what it said,” I argue. I’m losing my will to endure this fight – it seems so fruitless and I feel as though I can’t trust my mind. What is happening to me?

His tone changes so that it’s low and soothing as he rubs his thumbs up my jaw. “Baby, I didn’t read it. I told you – I said something like ‘if you want to say something to me, say it’ because I didn’t want to read a note. I glanced at it and I couldn’t-”

He immediately stops and then glances around the car as if he’s searching for the rest of his sentence. Why wouldn’t he have read it? He changes paths completely.

“I thought that you were mad at me for leaving or you wanted someone else, and that’s why you were so angry. I thought that you didn’t want to, like, long-distance with me because we were crazy-young. And I got that – I didn’t agree with it, but I understood it. I was going to stay with my mom and my step-dad until I could move into this house with my dad, and then I was going to transfer back to school. When you didn’t want us to be a thing anymore I still moved here because I didn’t want to be at home with my step-dad and…” He shakes his head. “My dad let me do online schooling until I graduated. It was easier. It helped with… certain things.” He sighs and dips his forehead to mine. My eyes have grown wide but he’s so lost in his past that he hasn’t noticed.

He lifts his head and his eyes are on my mouth. He presses his lips against mine and another soft anguished sound comes out of him. He shifts in his seat and grips his hands on me tighter, one lacing its way up into my hair and the other rubbing its way down around my throat. I’m too startled to react. My eyes are open as he parts my lips and gently slides his tongue against mine. I feel it deep in my stomach and I stir at the heat that’s sliding down my belly.

Tate pulls back and looks into my eyes, understanding that something that night went seriously amiss, and now he wants answers too.

I’m desperate for clarity – I need to be one hundred percent sure – and Tate can tell. A pained look crosses his face, as if he didn’t want it to come to this, and he presses his forehead against my shoulder. I hear him inhale deeply and his broad shoulders swell. I run my hands across his muscles and squeeze them in my palms.

It takes him a few moments to gather himself and then he lifts his determined face to mine. “Baby, the reason why I typed you a message that time instead of writing it… the reason why I didn’t want to read the note that day…” He looks away from me briefly, wincing slightly, and then draws his eyes back to mine. “I’m dyslexic,” he says. “I have dyslexia. It’s not a big deal but when I was in school it was… hard. Some people handle it better and with good tutorage they can improve, but I was kind of stubborn back then so I just threw myself into sports, and biking, and the stuff with my dad instead. Don’t get me wrong, I can read, but at that time – especially with handwritten text – it was… it would take me just a lot longer than the typical kid to read something really fucking basic. That’s why I was so angry and, to be honest, embarrassed when you showed me that note. I didn’t want you to see me like that, especially since I thought you were breaking up with me.” His brow is contorted as he studies me for a reaction. “I’m really sorry River.”

My heart hitches in my chest as the pieces of the puzzle slowly fall into place.

Tate never wrote me a note.

Tate never wrote me a note.

Tate’s dyslexia… it’s in everything. Everything he’s said or done that I didn’t quite understand at the time. It’s been right in front of my face and I didn’t even see it.

Tate never wrote that note, and Tate has no idea.

He’s waiting for me to respond so I do the only thing that I can think of to convey all of the emotions that I’m feeling right now. I wrap my arms around his neck and kiss him so freaking hard. He groans as I crush myself against him and I feel the relief from his lungs pour inside of me. His chest is heaving. I run my hands all over him – around his throat, up his jaw, into his hair – and I part my lips so that he can slide inside.

Why on earth did he apologise to me just now? I hate that he felt like he should say that. I have never been so relieved in my life.

I pull away from him so that I can slip off my glasses and I place them down on the dash before I move over to settle in his lap. His pants are still unzipped, exposing the cotton of his boxer briefs, and the pressure from my groin makes his head fall back in pleasure. He spreads his thighs wider, stretching my knees out until I gasp, and then he slides down in his seat so that his face is closer to mine. He uses the hand around the back of my neck to bring me to him so that he can kiss me again, and his other hand slides between us. He deftly rips my jeans open from simply pulling the denim alone and he slips his fingers down the front of my underwear, grunting in pleasure as he feels how soft I am. When I try to do the same to him he eases me back.

“Wait, baby, we need to-” He restrains my wrists in his hands and I struggle pettily against his hold. “You need to finish this. You need to tell me what happened.”

I roll my eyes and sigh exasperatedly. Seriously? “I don’t want to. It’s over now.”

He shakes his head. “Uh-uh. You need to tell me what caused you to feel like this for so long.”

I stare at him with narrowed aggravated eyes and he strokes my wrists consolingly, coaxing me with princess treatment. I huff and throw my head back. He grabs it in his palm before I can do any more damage, like smashing it into the windshield.

“You’re not gonna like it,” I warn. God knows I definitely fucking didn’t.

He nods. “I know. If this is anywhere near half as bad as what I’m thinking, I’m about to get arrested.”

A little flame of delight licks up my sternum. In the dark of the car with only the neighbours’ Christmas decorations to light up his face, Tate glitters down at me like an angel. I press a chaste kiss to the pad of his bottom lip and his chest enlarges protectively.

“Tell me,” he says finally.

So I do.