What Lies Beneath (Count on Me Series #7) Read Free

could.”
    Another thing she does that even though I don’t quite get it, I love about her.
    Where I spent years making people miserable and getting some level of sick enjoyment out of it because in the moment it was happening, I felt less empty, Belle was the opposite.
    She would do just about anything to make sure the people around her were happy.
    A few months after we got together, she’d even tried explaining it to me.
    Emotions. Reading them, feeling them, and expressing them, it always came harder to her than it did other people. She says it was all part of her diagnosis. A diagnosis that even after years of being with her, I’m still learning new things about.
    But…there I go again, getting off track.
    Belle went through a phase where all she wanted to watch were videos about emotions. She would pause, stop and repeat these things for hours. Reading the expressions, learning the facial cues and ticks until it all made sense to her. It was during that period, she had an obsession with happy.
    Living with her, I have to say the obsession never really went away. Belle is always better when the world around her—the people even—are happy.
    And with the smile she gives when they are, it’s safe to say I’m a big fan of happy too.
    “So what happened to the pen?”
    Shaking her head as she laughs, I catch her eyes and they’re dancing. Lighting up just like her earlier firework reference. Whatever happened obviously a good memory.
    I love her good memories. They’re always so strong they completely demolish all of my bad ones.
    “Tristan flushed it and clogged the toilet. God,” she takes a breath before laughing again. “It was horrible, but so funny. She wanted to be upset with him, but what was she going to say to a baby? It’s not like he would have listened anyway.”
    Bringing up her younger brother, even if it’s a happier memory, makes my stomach twist. Having been there through everything I put her through over the years, even if he might have been too young to understand it all at the time, put a strain on what at first, when Belle and I got together senior year, had looked like a do-over for me in the brother department.
    Tristan getting the Kayden that the daily beatings and mistreatment from my own brother Dean couldn’t kill.
    The better part of me.
    What fell apart the night of the dance and that even though we’ve been on more neutral ground lately, I can still see has a way to go before we can get back to where we were when he was six. The adoration he had for me, the respect, and even love based on the way I was with his sister when he was around.
    I miss all of that and I hate that my years of stupidity didn’t just damage Belle, but him too.
    “He loves you, Kay.” Belle, obviously sensing where my mind had gone, says as she brings my hand to her lips and kisses the knuckles softly. “He’s just a lot like you. Stubborn and protective.”
    “I know that, but you’re not the only one I’ve got to make shit up to. I have to do it with him, and I will. But is it wrong that I hate that there’s no magic fix?”
    “No, but if there’s anyone that can fix things, it’s you, Kay.”
    “You’re a little bias, don’t you think?”
    “Maybe a little.” She laughs. “But I’m also living proof.”
    Can’t argue with that.
    If I could manage to be the boy she knew when we were kids and do things differently with the second chance I was given, then the possibilities really are endless.
    I can right all of my wrongs with everyone.
    “So…” I trail off, wanting to get into what she read, but now that we’re in the moment the words sticking like paste to the roof of my mouth.
    “Did you really start writing in this book because you saw me do it?” she jumps in, and after releasing the biggest sigh of relief known to man, I nod.
    “For like a week straight we’d come over and you had your nose, hell, your entire face, in that diary. It drove me crazy after a while,