Crushed (In This Moment Book 2) Read online

  My thoughts are foggy with the memories flooding my mind, and the alcohol is making it even harder to grasp onto reality.

  Shrugging, I shake my head and grab a glass from the tray. Waiting for answers, Lizzy glares at me as I down another shot. When I still don’t respond, she goes on.

  “So, it’s your first night back in town and you already have two guys fighting over you?”

  My life feels like a bad joke. The ridiculousness of my situation is so over the top, all you can do is laugh—which is exactly what I do. It’s the hysterical kind where you’re not sure if you’re laughing or crying.

  I haven’t seen Eric in years. Not once did I run into him when I was home visiting, even when I still so desperately wanted to see him. Why did he have to be here tonight of all nights? As if I’m not already struggling to keep my shit together.

  “No.” I try to catch my breath as I wipe the moisture from my eyes. “They were just some old friends.”

  Lizzy wouldn’t recognize Eric. We lived in neighboring towns and went to different schools growing up. I think she only met him once in passing. She would remember the way he broke my heart, though. So, I’d rather not tell her that was him.

  “Well, why don’t you ask them to sit with us?” she questions, looking across the bar at Eric and Levi.

  “No, thanks.” My eyes slide over to the bar. “But I’m happy to invite Brenden over.” I lift my hand as if I’m going to wave him over.

  “Oh my God!” she squeaks, grabbing it and bringing it back to the table. “Stop! That isn’t funny.”

  “He’s staring at you right now, and it’s kind of intense,” I goad. Her face turns a deep red before she plants her head in her hands.

  “This is all your fault!”

  “My fault? What did I do?” I ask, feigning innocence as I turn my attention back to her.

  She lifts her head and narrows her eyes at me, her mouth twisted.

  “Oh, please. He told me how you posted on Facebook that we’d be here,” she sulks.

  “He did?” Chuckling, I briefly eye Brenden again, who’s still staring unapologetically. “So, he admitted to stalking you here?”

  Her lips curve into a smile—a real, genuine Lizzy smile—and my heart warms.

  “He actually admitted this isn’t the first time and called himself my ‘official stalker’.”

  We both begin to laugh—my own genuine and joyful this time—and the tension leaves my body.

  “That’s the greatest thing I’ve heard in a very long time,” I hiccup.

  My eyes subconsciously roam over to Eric’s side of the bar, and my stomach somersaults when I find him studying me, a soft smile playing on his lips. For a second, hope blooms in my chest, but as soon as he realizes he’s been caught, he scowls. His smile now replaced with a look of disdain, he diverts his eyes from me.

  A pain rips through me as I blink away the tears threating to fall. I wish it didn’t hurt. I wish I didn’t care. But Eric treating me as if I’m nothing—as if we were nothing—hurts a hundred times more than finding Christopher in bed with another woman.

  Clearing my throat, I pull my attention back to Lizzy and force a bright smile on my face. I’ve gotten good at pushing away and ignoring my own sorrow.

  “So, what else did Brenden say?”

  “He apologized to me…” she murmurs, keeping her eyes on her beer bottle as she picks at the label.

  “Wait, he apologized to you? For what?”

  From what Lizzy told me, she’d walked out on his birthday celebration without so much as a goodbye and has been ignoring him since. I’ve been on the receiving end of that kind of treatment, and it’s no fun.

  “I don’t really know.” She shrugs, squirming in her chair. “Dancing with that woman, I guess. He thinks I’ve been mad at him all this time.”

  “Interesting… And did you clear that up for him?”

  “Kind of,” she sighs, meeting my eyes briefly. “I mean…I told him I wasn’t mad at him, but I didn’t tell him the truth. I kind of blamed my ignoring him on you.”

  “Liz—”

  Levi steps up to our table again, interrupting me. “Dance with me.” My breath catches as I look for Eric, unsure whether I feel relieved or disappointed when I realize he’s not with him.

  Levi extends his hand out to me, and my face heats as I shake my head in protest. “Levi…I don’t—”

  “It’s Lee,” he corrects. “Just dance with me.”

  My brow furrows as I study his warm smile and soft eyes, wondering what he’s doing. I’m sure his brother warned him away from me, yet here he is again.

  When I don’t respond, he takes my hand and pulls me to my feet. My eyes go wide as I look to Lizzy for help, but the traitor merely shrugs, amusement lighting her face. Some friend she is.

  “What are you doing?” I hiss as he leads me onto the dance floor.

  My eyes frantically scan the bar, feeling flustered by all the people looking at us.

  “Dancing with the most beautiful woman in the room.” We come to a stop on the dance floor, and his hands settle on my waist.

  “Why?” Hating the way his compliment made my blood heat, I wrap my arms around his neck as I look up at him.

  “Well,” he smirks, pulling me closer as we begin to sway to the music, “besides the obvious…let’s just say I’m doing someone a favor.”

  “A favor?”

  “Tell me, Julianna, are you a married woman?” he asks, ignoring my question.

  Rolling my eyes, I bite down on the corner of my bottom lip. I don’t feel like having this conversation with anyone, and I know anything I say will be relayed right back to Eric. He wasn’t exactly happy with my decision to marry Christopher. Not that anyone was. They’d all been so sure it would end badly, and they were right. He doesn’t deserve the satisfaction of knowing that.

  Levi tilts his head, raising an eyebrow as he waits for my answer.

  “Yes,” I relent, sighing.

  The air seems to grow thicker as my thoughts darken. The road that lies ahead of me isn’t going to be an easy one. I’m about to be a twenty-eight-year-old divorcee with little real work experience and no college degree. When I married Chris, I dropped out of college. It was always my intention to finish getting my degree, but my time was spent helping him start his practice.

  “Oh…” His features appear to draw in with concern and disappointment.

  “I’m getting divorced.” I’m not sure why I felt the need to clarify that. It’s none of his business and I don’t want Eric to know my life is in ruins right now.

  “Oh!” He grins wide, his tone excited and upbeat this time.

  I’m not sure what he’s so happy about. There isn’t going to be anything happening between us—married or not. Not tonight or ever. He’s at least six years younger than me, and more importantly, he’s Eric’s little brother. There’s no way in hell I’d ever consider dating him. Just dancing with him is making me feel uncomfortable.

  “May I cut in?” We freeze as Eric’s hard voice cuts through the loud music and noise of the bar. When I look directly into his angry glare, my heart beats against my ribcage.

  Laughing, Levi releases me and steps back. “Absolutely, big brother. What the hell took you so long?”

  Eric takes Levi’s place, leaving me paralyzed, his hands heating my skin as they land on my waist. My entire body trembles as I lift my arms to hook them around his neck, his eyes holding mine captive. As we begin to dance, my thoughts are a jumbled mess, every part of me feeling almost numb from the sensory overload.

  “Why are you here, Jules?” His question comes out low, his voice meek compared to a moment ago. If I didn’t know better, I’d think there was even a hint of sorrow behind his words.

  “Yes, it’s nice to see you. I’ve missed you too,” I clip. His glare remains impassive, but I feel his hands twitch at my words. “I do have friends and family here, you know? It’s not as if I haven’t been back since I left.
You simply never knew I was here, and that was your choice, not mine.”

  As my heartache begins to seep into my tone and my eyes start to water, I clamp my mouth shut and drop my head, finally breaking his hold on me.

  “Yeah right,” he spits. “Like any of that was ever my fucking choice.”

  My head snaps back up, my eyes narrowing as I take in his snarled lip. A rage begins to bubble up inside me. It certainly wasn’t my choice for him to cut me out of his life like I never mattered.

  “No? I guess it was someone else ignoring my calls—all my pleas.” I could go on, and would, if not for my damn throat closing up on me.

  His mask of indifference slips for a moment, and I swear there’s regret in eyes, but it’s quickly pulled back in place before I can be certain.

  “Where’s your husband?” The disdain in his tone as he says “husband” is thick, as if he’s offering Christopher up as his explanation, but that reasoning makes no sense. I hadn’t been the only one who took nuptials.

  Letting out an exasperated groan, I shake my head and roll my eyes.

  “I don’t know, Eric. Where’s your wife?” I retort.

  Fury lights his eyes as his nostrils flare, his body going rigid as he stops moving to the music. If I didn’t know for certain Eric would never hurt me, I might be frightened.

  Without responding, he pulls back and turns on his heel before storming away. Shocked, I remain rooted on the dance floor where he left me, watching him as he passes his brother and makes his way out of the bar.

  When my gaze moves back to Levi, he’s staring at me, his eyebrows drawn and mouth twisted. My stomach knots as if I’d been the one to do something wrong, and I wonder what exactly Eric told him about me. When I move toward him, he shakes his head before heading out the door toward his brother.

  What the hell just happened?

  HUNGOVER

  “Hey, Jules. You okay? You’re quiet this morning,” Eric asks, concern heavy in his furrowed brow.

  A smile tugs on my lips at his nickname for me, loving how close we’ve become.

  “Yeah…I’m just tired.” That’s a lie. The truth is, I’m dreading the approaching summer. Talking to Eric is my favorite part of every day, I’m not ready to give that up. A lot can change over eight weeks, things might not be the same between us next year. What if I lose this—lose him—for good?

  “Come on,” he smirks, nudging my shoulder. “You should be in a good mood. It’s the last day of school! Aren’t you excited?”

  I shrug. “Actually, my summers are usually pretty boring. How about you?”

  My pulse races as I wait for his reply, wondering if he caught the subtlety behind my question. I don’t have the courage to outright ask him if he’d like to hang out over the summer.

  “My summer will be pretty busy.”

  Nodding, I turn to look out the window of the bus, worried the disappointment will be evident on my face.

  “Hey, before I forget,” Eric chirps, bringing my attention back to him as he digs through his backpack and pulls out his yearbook. “I wanted you to sign my yearbook, and I was hoping I could sign yours.”

  It’s not like asking to sign my yearbook is a declaration of his love for me, but my heart still stutters all the same.

  “Yes, of course,” I rasp, pulling out mine. “I’d really like that.”

  Panic sinks in the moment we’ve made our exchange, my mind going blank as I try to think of the perfect words to write. It’s only made worse when I glance over at Eric out the corner of my eye and he’s already writing in mine.

  I tap the pen to my lip, my nerves becoming more shot by the moment. I can’t hand this back to him without writing something. Taking a deep breath, I do my best to let the words flow.

  Closing my eyes, I fold his book. When I open them again, Eric is staring at me with a soft smile on his lips. My stomach does that flipping thing it always does when he looks at me this way—like I’m someone precious to him.

  My hands shake as I hand him his yearbook and take mine back, my eyes widening when he immediately flips it open to read what I’ve wrote.

  “Wait! You’re going to read it right now?”

  “Yep! Go ahead. You know you want to read mine too.”

  He’s right. I’m dying to see what he wrote. So, when he drops his head to read my words, I open mine to do the same.

  December 20th

  The ringing of my cellphone wakes me, and my head pounds to the beat of my heart. When I open my heavy eyes, the room spins, and I quickly close them again. It’s been a while since I’ve been this hungover. I almost forgot how awful it can feel.

  My mouth is dry, my body is weak, and I need to pee like a racehorse. Yep, I drank way too much last night.

  My mind is still hazy and it takes me a moment to remember where I am. When the cold, hard reality hits me, my heart sinks.

  With a sigh, I reach over to grab my cell phone off the nightstand, knowing without looking who’s on the other line.

  “Hi, Lori,” I rasp.

  “Why am I hearing from Cat that my baby sister is home?” she demands, hurt and anger both evident in her tone.

  Tennessee was once my home, but it became a place of heartbreak and nightmares for me long ago. I don’t know if I can handle being back here. If the thought of allowing Christopher to ever touch me again didn’t make my skin crawl, my fear and weakness would send me right back into his arms. This place holds too many memories for me, some I wish I could permanently get rid of.

  Rubbing my aching temples with my free hand, I adjust myself to a more upright position and glare at the sunlit window, as if that will make the sun retreat in fear and set again. It doesn’t. “I was planning to call you this morning, but Lizzy and I had a late night,” I offer, knowing my explanation won’t do anything to help.

  If last night is a preview of what life here will be like for me, I’ll never survive it.

  My chest tightens as I think of Eric and the harsh, coldness in his eyes as he looked at me. We were close once…or I thought we were. I loved him. I still love him. Seeing him last night proved that.

  He doesn’t deserve my love, nor my friendship at this point, and I shouldn’t have any desire to go down that path with him again, but I do. The agony of missing him has been unbearable. It’s been awful always wondering and never knowing how he was—if he was safe and happy.

  What I want or how I feel doesn’t matter anyway. He clearly doesn’t care about me. Perhaps he never did.

  For years, I held on to the hope that Eric still thought of me despite everything. I wanted to believe he was out there missing me as much as I missed him, but I finally gave up on that notion.

  “What the hell is going on, Julia?”

  My chest burns as bile rises in my throat. I wouldn’t be ready to have this conversation even if I weren’t hungover, but it isn’t doing anything to help the situation. I sigh. There’s no way around it. Christmas is only a few days away, and then I’ll get the pleasure of explaining to my entire family that my husband is a cheating bastard.

  “I left Christopher,” I announce, bracing myself for her reaction.

  When I’m done explaining what happened, I pretend to listen as she goes on a twenty-minute rant about Christopher, not even taking a break long enough to notice when I put the phone down to go the bathroom. It’s exactly why I didn’t tell her when everything went down—why I never talked to her about my marriage at all. What I need right now is support and understanding, not ‘I told you so’s’.

  By the time I get her off the phone, I’m even more exhausted than before, longing for the distance that used to be between my family and me. Though I told Lori I needed a couple days to adjust to everything, that I’d see her on Christmas, something tells me she’s going to ignore my request.

  As I snuggle back into Lizzy’s guest bed determined to get a few more hours of sleep, my mind wanders back to Eric. It took me years to get over the pain of losing him, to s
top thinking about him daily, but it only took seeing him once to undo it.

  Pulling up the Facebook app on my phone, I search for Eric—something I haven’t done in a long time. It’s pathetic. His life is none of my business, but there are questions I want answered. Is he happy? Does he have any kids? What has his life become? My quest for more information falls flat, and it really shouldn’t surprise me that there’s no profile for him. He always did prefer to stay off the grid. Turning into a total stalker, I decide to look up his brother. He does have a profile, but it’s set to private. The only thing I can see is the profile picture of him with some redhead on his arm. I scowl at the photo, praying he hadn’t been at the bar last night flirting with me while his girlfriend sat at home.

  Shaking my head, I close out the app and toss my phone down on the bed. This can’t happen. I can’t let myself get sucked back in by Eric. Seven years ago, he made it clear I was disposable to him and reiterated that fact last night. I have enough on my plate to worry about without adding him into the mix. He’s part of my past, and I need to focus on my future.

  LUNCH OR LECTURE

  My heart slams against my chest as the doors to the bus slide open in front of me, my nearly empty backpack suddenly feeling heavy. Looks like I was right. Day one of my sophomore year feels as scary as day one of my freshman year. It’s exactly like starting over again. I’d totally chickened out on calling Eric. Big shocker. Since I wasn’t smart enough to give him my number, I’ve gone all summer without seeing or talking to him. You’d think in a small town like this, I’d manage to run into him at least once, but no such luck.

  After dialing his number at least a thousand times, I know it by heart, yet I’d been too terrified to let it ring through. Hours were spent trying to think of the perfect thing to say, but I could never come up with a good enough reason to call him.

  Boarding the bus, I say a silent prayer he’ll be here too. When my eyes roam to the back and I spot him in his normal seat, I almost jump for joy. As I make my way to him, the goofy grin that spreads across my face is unmistakable. My crush must be painstakingly obvious to everyone, Eric included, but I missed him so much, I can’t contain my excitement.