Chapter Thirteen
I should have told him.
The words had haunted me ever since that night on the street, clawing at the edges of my mind, whispering in the silence. You should have told him.
But I couldn’t.
Not when he had Dottie. Not when he had made his choice.
Not when telling him meant ripping myself open and letting him see the wreckage he left behind.
So I did what I always did.
I ran.
Not physically—no, I was still stuck in this godforsaken town, still pretending my world hadn’t cracked open beneath me. But emotionally? I shut down.
Demi knew. She saw it in the way I moved, the way I barely spoke, the way I existed in a limbo of pretending I wasn’t carrying Asher’s child.
But pretending could only last so long.
Because secrets like this?
They always found a way to explode.
