Logan couldn’t stand liars. His dad was one. Had his mom lied about Cassie knowing?

No, she’d just said Cassie probably knew. And Cassie hadn’t lied about her dad—she honestly hadn’t known. He’d felt relief and guilt at the same time. She wasn’t with him because of some secret plan of her dad. But Logan hated that he’d made her cry. It wasn’t how he’d wanted the morning to go.

He was leaning against the car with Cassie buried in his arms as she cried, looking out over the lake. It was so peaceful here. What if they’d gone off to school without knowing? Would it have been worse to deal with this from a distance? Or better? Either way, the choice had been made and they knew now and would just have to work through it. Together.

Slowly, Cassie’s sobs calmed and she started sniffing.

“Hey, it’ll be okay,” Logan said softly as he squeezed her tight. Her soft body molded to him perfectly. Her hair was a mess, her eyes ringed in red, but she’d never looked more beautiful. His chest tightened. “I’m not going to stay away from you just because my mom tells me to.”

After all, his mom hadn’t outright asked him to break up with Cassie. She’d just made it clear that was what she wanted. But he’d made up his mind the second he’d seen Cassie’s reaction to the news. It wasn’t fair to punish her for something her father had done.

“You’re not going to listen to your mom?” Cassie’s eyes were wide and disbelieving.

Logan shrugged.

“Do you always do what your parents want?”

She didn’t say anything, so he had his answer.

“It’s not like I’ll parade you around or anything.” He flushed. “Not that I would do that anyway! I mean, I want to. I mean, I’m not—”

She put a hand to his mouth to stop him and giggled a little. The sound flooded him with warmth.

“Let’s just forget it. It’s their issue, not ours. We’ll be in New York in, like, eight weeks. Far away from this.”

“Maybe I don’t want to leave anymore,” Logan said, suddenly realizing what going away to school would mean. “I don’t want to leave my mom dealing with all of this on her own.”

Cassie looked at him with wide and angry eyes.

“Logan, don’t be ridiculous. You can’t give up a full ride to Columbia. This is your shot.”

“My shot at what? Another four years of high school working my ass off while the rich kids party?”

Cassie jerked back, and Logan felt like an idiot.

“That’s not what I meant—”

“No, it’s fine, you’re right.” Cassie sniffed and stepped back, out of his arms. “New York will be really different than it is here. It’s normal to be nervous about it.”

“That’s why they did the match thing though, right?” Logan said. “Do you think that’s why your dad asked you to do it instead? Because of the thing with my mom?”

She looked down at the ground, kicking at a loose stone. The sun had started to make its way up in the sky, and she was bathed in the early morning light, her hair shimmering.

“I don’t know,” she said softly. She looked up at him and shook her head, her eyes red. “I don’t want to talk about him anymore.”

Neither did Logan.

“Do you want to go get breakfast?” Logan swallowed hard. He shouldn’t be nervous asking her out on a date after all that had happened in the past 12 hours. But he still was.

“I’d like that,” she said, and gave him her little half-smile. His breath caught in his throat.

“I don’t need to be at the restaurant until later tonight,” he said. He’d planned on just spending the day with Hideki playing video games, but there were suddenly much more interesting possibilities. “So we could spend the day doing…whatever you want. Not talking about any of this.”

“I’d like that,” she said again, and placed her hand gently in his. Her other hand slid up to his shoulder. “How are you feeling? It must be sore after last night. We should take it easy today.”

He let out a chuckle.

“It’s fine. Don’t get all bossy Cassie on me.”

She raised an eyebrow. He cleared his throat.

“So, where to for breakfast?”

Through the brilliant storytelling of his cousin, Logan’s mother thought he’d been out with Hideki all day. A few texts over breakfast had gotten the details straight so that by the time he walked in the house to change for his shift at the restaurant, his mom was already on her way back to Helena. He’d told her all about his morning run and a day at the lake with Hideki when she’d called before leaving.

He felt guilty lying to her, but he’d never promised his mom he’d stay away from Cassie. She’d just said he couldn’t be with her. Logan had already decided he wanted to be. What difference did it make if it was now or in two months once they were New York?

Cassie and Logan had talked all day about what they’d do once they were there. All the places she wanted to show him, all the things they’d do together. Central Park in the fall and Rockefeller Center at Christmas and Times Square on New Year’s Eve…

He knew it was a long shot that once they were there she’d even still want him. They’d gone from strangers to inseparable in less than a month. And yet, he couldn’t help but picture it along with her. New York would give them freedom from their parents and from the worry this sudden legal drama was bringing them both.

But then he also thought of his mom, alone and dealing with everything. He told himself after his call with her that it would be the last time he lied to her. She’d been honest with him, so he had to do the same.

Exhausted from the day and his long shift at the restaurant, Logan was not in the mood for Hideki’s teasing on the ride home, but he knew it was his payment for all his cousin had done for him that day.

“Time to spill, lover boy,” Hideki snickered as Logan got into his truck.

Logan groaned and covered his face.

“I can’t have, like, one private thing in my life?”

“Of course not. Especially not when I had to lie to your mom about it.”

“You’ve lied to her plenty of times about stupid stuff we did.”

“Yeah, but she looked super upset today.”

Logan’s stomach flipped. Definitely no more lying to his mom. He hated feeling this way.

“Do you know what’s up?” Hideki asked him.

Logan shook his head without any guilt this time. His mom hadn’t asked him to keep the lawsuit a secret, but he knew she wouldn’t want her sister and family to know. Not until it was all over one way or another. They’d just want to step in and help and they already did more than enough.

“What did you guys get up to today?” Hideki waggled his eyebrows. “Checking a few things off the BSE list?”

Logan rolled his eyes. The only entries about girls had been pretty vague: “do stuff with girls” and “do more stuff with girls.”

“Just hanging out by the lake,” he said. “Use your imagination.”

“Hanging out by the lake…talking?” Hideki raised an eyebrow.

“Sure,” Logan said with a smile. “Talking about the best summer ever.”

Hideki rolled his eyes and left it at that, satisfied for the moment to make up whatever he wanted about the day Logan had spent with Cassie.

Meanwhile, Logan leaned back in the seat and closed his eyes, reliving every second of it in the privacy of his own mind.