"Uh huh." Ember still remembered the first time Ethan Blackwood had come to their high school, looking ruggedly gorgeous in his plaid shirt, jeans, and riding boots. He had a white Stetson that time, too, and with his back against the side of his pick-up and muscular arms crossed over his chest, the man looked as if he was posing for the cowboy edition of People's Sexiest Man Alive. It certainly had captured everyone's attention, with the entire town practically coming to a standstill as they had waited with bated breath to see who it was he had been waiting for.
And when Anah had finally come out, and Ethan had laughingly swung her up in his arms despite her blushing protests...
The memory made Ember smile, and when she reminded Anah of this, she was delighted with the way her friend immediately turned red. "You are so adorably modest, little Anah."
Anah groaned. "Stop calling me that."
"How mean." Ember feigned a look of hurt. "Are you saying Mr. Blackwood is the only one allowed to call you that?"
Anah nearly groaned even as she felt her cheeks turning red with guilt. If only it were someone else - anyone but Ember - who had heard Ethan call her that!
Anah tried changing the subject by asking Ember about their history homework, but Ember being Ember, the other girl instead took evil pleasure in enumerating the reasons she was largely convinced Ethan was interested in her.
'He used to be really friendly and approachable, but "the break up" changed it.'
Although Ember didn't quite go as far as actually making quotation marks in the air, Anah could easily imagine it nonetheless. It was in the way everyone in town spoke of it and made the incident seem like this shamefully appalling local tragedy that everyone couldn't forget.
'Then you came along, and it's like getting the old Ethan back!'
Anah always had to work hard against being swayed by this particular line of argument. After all, it could simply be coincidence, and Anah only happened to meet Ethan just when he was ready to move on.
'And fine, I get it that he hasn't told you he likes you yet or asked you to be his girl, but you can't ignore the fact that you're the only girl he spends time with. You guys have dinner, watch movies, and go for sunset rides. That's pretty much the definition of dates in this side of the world, you know?'
But Anah refused to buy into this logic either. Those activities weren't exclusive to couples. Siblings could also do all those things together, and even worse, she had once heard Ethan describe her exactly in that manner. He had invited her to attend a party with him and the twins, and Ethan had introduced them to his host, Damian Fox, as his 'little sister from another mother'.
'What about the twins? Thornton's, like, the town's resident bogeyman, but we've noticed how he even makes an effort to smile when you're around. Aidan's giving you the special treatment, too. Are you saying all of those things are coincidental? That it hasn't anything to do with the twins thinking you're important to Ethan?'
Anah could see why Ember would think the twins' treatment of her was remarkably different compared to how they were with other girls. But that, too, could be easily explained. The twins were incredibly gorgeous (the first time Anah had seen them, she had noticed right away how the two could be dead ringers for Keanu Reeves), and when one also factored in their equally-incredible net worths, well...
Suffice to say, the twins only enjoyed her company because she was one of the few girls who didn't look at them with dollar signs in her eyes.
Ember and Anah's debate continued on for the rest of the afternoon, but by the time classes ended for the day, Ember hadn't even succeeded in getting her friend to budge an inch.
"Is it the age difference?" she finally couldn't help asking. "Did Mr. Blackwood once mention that he'll always think you're too young or something like that?"
Anah shook her head.
"There must be a reason why you're so dead set against even considering he could be interested in you," Ember said, exasperated.
Just one reason, Anah thought, but it was also the only reason that mattered.
She could still remember the day Ember had first blurted out about Guilia, and how numb she had felt, listening to what Ember knew of Guilia and Ethan's doomed romance. At that time, all she had been able to think about was—-
That's why.
The bleakness in his gaze, the hollow pain she had sensed in Ethan...
That's why.
It was all because of Guilia, and even though Anah was now in Ethan's life, nothing had changed. The bleakness, the emptiness...it was all still there.
That's why...
She would never be able to fool herself into thinking Ethan was interested in her.
Because he simply wasn't.
ANAH WAS ALREADY WAITING outside her school the moment Ethan pulled up, and she swung up into the passenger seat next to him before he could even get out to open her door.
"Still ashamed to be seen with me, I see," Ethan commented with a smirk.
Anah wrinkled her nose. "You know it's not that."
That was true, Ethan thought as he shifted gears and made a U-turn at the corner. Anah hated drawing attention to herself whereas Guilia...
Don't think about her, dammit.
His jaw clenched, and as he had been wont to do in recent months, he turned to Anah for distraction. She already had a book up, the paperback succeeding in hiding most of her face. He noticed the way her chest was
