All That Remains Read Online Free Page A

catching it. “Sorry, hun. I’m taken tonight.” Jules tries to keep a blank face as Madonna pouts and sends her a look before she turns and starts flirting with Bruce Springsteen.
    Once Madonna is occupied elsewhere, Austin looks down at Jules for a few moments as she stands rooted to the floor with her teeth eating her bottom lip in agitation. Finally, he smiles, tugging her into his side and leading her away from the hair band groupies she’d been talking to. Without thinking, Jules follows him, shouldering out from under his arm the moment they reach the relative peace and quiet of the outside.
    “What the -” she starts, taking several steps into the backyard before rounding on him. He keeps pace, and she practically runs into his chest when she turns. “- hell?” she finishes.
    “Sorry.” His hand runs through his hair as he tucks the ball under his arm. “I saw you and I acted. I didn’t think… I needed to get away from that girl.”
    “Seriously? No ‘Hi, Jules?’ No ‘How you been? What’s up?’ How about ‘Sorry I tore the rug out from underneath you and didn’t return your calls after the last time I saw you?’” she fumes, holding her hand up to his chest to stop him from coming closer as she steps back. “Instead, you see me at a party and automatically assume I’ll help keep you safe from your harem of hoes?”
    It’s Austin’s turn to look stunned as Jules shakes her head, drops her cup to the ground, and bumps into his shoulder as she walks past him back into the house without another word.
     
    * * *
     
    “I don’t have a harem of hoes.” Austin’s low whisper carries a note of humor to it as he sneaks up on her.
    She’d stayed clear of him for thirty minutes by talking to the hair band boys and dancing with her classmates. When she snuck into the dark corner to people watch and take a breath, she realizes she should have looked for him first. She didn’t, and now here he is beside her, his demeanor so similar to West’s that she has to close her eyes and swallow hard before she can look at him again.
    “It was one girl, who seemed cool until she opened her mouth. I couldn’t get her to take no for an answer. So yes, I used you.” He leans against the wall, spinning the ball in his hand in front of his waist.
    Taking a long sip of her new drink, she props her shoulder against the wall, too. She lets her eyes look at him then, honestly look at him, and she can see the remorse in his somber face.
    His head dips down, his shoulders hunching forward, as he offers a simple and sincere, “I’m sorry.”
    Her own head bobs of its own volition, in understanding, and her lips curl up in a small smile as she speaks.
    “So you’re saying you’ve lost that loving feeling?”
    She tries not to laugh at her own joke. She bites her tongue, purses her lips, and even rolls her head the other way, but the look on Austin’s face is priceless and when he starts to laugh, the sound makes her heart leap. It’s deep and strong, like West’s, but happier and a little bubblier somehow. She sags against the wall laughing, her hand pressing to her stomach when it starts to ache. It’s been a long, long time since she’s had something truly funny to laugh at.
    “Jules?” His serious voice freezes a giggle right on her lips. She wipes a tear of hilarity from her eye.
    “Yeah?”
    “I’m really sorry. I didn’t want to give you that letter. He’s my brother, and I did it for him.”
    She touches his forearm and he stops.
    “Can we not talk about him?”
    “But, I want -.”
    She huffs, pushing off the wall. “No. Like you said, you did it for him. I’m sorry. My attitude was uncalled for. You don’t owe me an explanation Austin. Let’s just agree to not discuss him, okay?”
    “Deal.”
    Jules leans back against the wall next to Austin, her arm bumping into his as they watch the party around them in silence. She wants to ask about West. She wants to know how he is, where he’s