Farm Girl Meets Bad Boy (#1)

Chapter Thirty-One

“Then why would you say it like you don’t love me?” I whisper through jumbled thoughts. Emery Hastings never made sense, no matter how serious the topic was.

“Because I don’t like lying.” he stares at me intently. “And even though you would think I don’t love you, I would still be telling the truth.” I roll my eyes and turn my head to stare back at the ceiling.

“Are you going to remember any of this in the morning?” My eyes wander to the left to look at Emery, who’s grinning ear to ear.

“If I don’t, don’t remind me.” I grab one of my pillows and smack him with it as hard as I can. He laughs, covering his face as I continue to hit him with it. He grabs it and puts it back where it’s supposed to be as I glare at him.

“You’re mean.”

“Well, you’re nice.” My face scrunches in confusion at the compliment. “Can I change something?” I shrug at his question and he continues. “Can we just forget the bad things that happened between us, and act like we are right now for the time we have left?”

I avoid his eyes and sigh sadly. “You know you can stay here after your probation is up, Emery.” My heart begins to ache like it had been off and on our whole time together. “It’s obvious that you don’t want to.”

“River,” he murmurs, wrapping his left arm around my waist protectively. He pulls me into him and stares into my eyes. “I do, I really do. But I can’t do that to your family.”

“My dad offered,” I retort. “You wouldn’t be doing anything.”

“You don’t understand,” he sighs, closing his eyes. “Now that my dad knows where I am things are just going to get worse.”

I brush his dark hair out of his closed eyes. “He hasn’t done anything. It’s fine.” Emery shakes his head no. “Please, just stay. For me?” My eyes are pleading, and by his facial expression I can tell that it’s extremely hard to say no to me.

“We’ll see,” he sighs, tightening his grip around me. “I’ll think about it.” Mary walks out of the bathroom as our conversation grows quiet. Emery stretches his arms out and yawns. “I guess it’s time for bed.” He climbs off the bed as I sit up. “I’ll be on the couch.” He presses his lips lightly to my forehead then moves them to beside my ear. “I love you.”

I smile up at him as he pulls back and waves to Mary before leaving my bedroom. We crawl into bed and throw the covers overtop of us. Mary doesn’t say much as she’s too lost in drunken thoughts while I lean over the bedside table and blow out the candle. Snuggling deep into the mattress, I wish I let Emery sleep with me. Or at least, I wish he still had the mattress at the end of my bed.

“Do you think we will ever find love?” I ask, brushing Silver outside of the barn beside Ocean and Patch.

Ocean’s expression looks like something along the lines of disappointed. “Why would you even ask that?”

Shrugging, I brush Silver’s back. “Well, for starters we live on a farm in the middle of nowhere, and we are homeschooled.”

“Don’t be silly, River,” Ocean scolds, dropping her brush and walking to my side. Her arms are crossed as she faces me. “Someday a boy will turn up for you.”

Someone laughs darkly, and as I turn to the left, I see Mr. Hastings. He’s wearing his dirty faded white and stained wife-beater that barely covers his beer belly. He smokes a cigarette as he stops a few feet away from us.

“Get out of here,” I snap, my hands clenching into fists. “You’ve hurt Emery too much!” My words only make Emery’s father laugh harder.