Fool Me Twice by Mandy Hubbard

Author:Mandy Hubbard
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Published: 2014-09-03T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter Eighteen

At any moment it’ll be death by rattlesnake bite, because I keep turning over rocks and digging around in crevices. I’m filthy, from head to toe, and my fingers are split and bloody from digging into the weeds.

It takes me nearly an hour to find the buckle.

Cars have been pulling into the grounds for the last twenty minutes, and if I don’t hurry, I’m going to miss the opening ceremonies. Mr. Ramsey will kill me. But now I’m so relieved I can’t bring myself to care. I clench the buckle in my hand, racing back to the cabin, hope and fear and a thousand things whirling through me.

I have to fix this. I don’t know why. I should be gleeful that I hurt him so much. But that tiny triumphant voice in my head is so drowned out by regret that I can’t listen to it.

The Landon I saw, vulnerable and raw and hurt, has to go away. I’ll give anything to return him to his cocky, comedic, debate-master self. I’m afraid to acknowledge what that even means, how my feelings for him have shifted so abruptly.

I bound into our cabin, slamming the door open and rushing into the bathroom. I grab the first tub of toiletries I find and dump it upside down. Bailey’s cosmetics tumble out onto the floor.

And then I see it.

Nail polish remover.

I grab the bottle and rush to the kitchen, yanking a few paper towels off the dispenser and plunking down on the barstool. I put a bunch of nail polish remover on the paper towel, but just before I touch it to the buckle, I pause.

What if I make it worse? What if I ruin it forever and he can’t forgive me? The remorse pumping through my veins is terrifying.

I don’t want to hurt Landon. Not like this.

Oh God, for some stupid reason I care about him. This is bad. Really, really bad.

I wipe furiously at the buckle, willing the paint to disappear, to reclaim what the buckle used to be. Nothing happens, and I cry out, tears threatening to spill over.

But then the tiniest bit smudges away, revealing the gleaming silver again. And I sniff back the tears, wiping with renewed vigor, as more of the buckle reveals itself. Ten minutes later, when the stupid unicorn and wizard are gone and it’s just the silver and gold again, I could faint with relief.

Instead I stand so fast the stool falls to the floor, and then I run from our cabin, leaving a hurricane-size mess behind.

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