Evan’s POV
The heavy brass latch clicked shut under my thumb, but the sound did nothing to quiet the deafening roar inside my head.
I sat on the edge of my mattress in the dim loft, clutching the dark brown leather notebook against my ribs so hard the leather creaked beneath my grip. My chest heaved against the tight binding of the shoulder sling, my lungs fighting for air as if I had just run ten miles uphill.
I felt completely naked. Stripped raw.
For seven years, this book had been my ultimate vault. A private, sacred secret kept locked away in the shadows where nobody could touch it, judge it, or use it against me. Every graphite stroke of her messy high school ponytail, every shaded contour of her jaw as she studied, every single page was a silent confession of a love I was never
