by Lexi Ryan
Not as beautiful as you. Not even close. “We were just having a beer. I was about to leave.”
She worries her bottom lip between her teeth. “I don’t want to impose. I can go home alone.”
“You need me or Ava there anyway.” I’m already pulling my keys from my pocket. “We installed a new security system while you were in the hospital. I’ll meet you at the house and show you how to disable it so you don’t bring the cops running when you open the door.”
Ellie
I’m grateful Levi is going to the house with me. I felt so brave when I left my mom’s this morning, but now, faced with the immediate task of walking into the place where I almost died, my bravery has abandoned me.
I watch Levi climb into a truck—not the Mustang he was driving in Dyer. When he starts the engine, I turn the key in my ignition. The truth is that I want him to ride with me, but it doesn’t make sense for us to drive together when he still needs to get home. I feel safer when Levi’s close, but I’m not sure what to do with the other feelings I have for him. I loved Colton completely. When did I fall in love with Levi? How could I do that to Colton?
I follow him the few short blocks to a quiet residential area. Levi parks in the street, and I pull into the driveway. I could have found the house myself. When I left the gallery and stopped working for Nelson, I started selling real estate. This little house was one of my first listings. I fell in love with it. Two small bedrooms, one bathroom, a living room, and a kitchen, all in less than nine hundred square feet. I was determined to walk away from what Nelson was offering me, to prove I didn’t need the luxuries his kind of “opportunities” provided, and this house was the perfect symbol of that. Everything I needed instead of everything I wanted. I cut coupons and lived lean so I could help my mom. It wasn’t as much as I’d dreamed of giving her, but Mom, Brittany, and Phoebe had everything they needed. Just like me. We were all okay.
As I climb out of the car, I see flashes of Colton in this driveway. I remember him shirtless and washing an old Corvette in the summer sun. I came out to help him, and he sprayed me with the hose, then pressed me against the car and kissed me.
We did have good times. Maybe I fell in love with him too fast. Maybe I spent those first months with him bracing myself for the moment he’d walk away. But when Nelson came into my house and pushed himself on me, something shifted between Colton and me. It wasn’t just love. We were partners. Colton and Ellie against the world. Against addiction. Against our pasts. I was so damn sure we were only getting started. We were going to spend our lives together. Isn’t that what people do when they love each other and become a team?
“When did Colton move in with me?” I ask Levi as he walks up the driveway.
“After rehab. Those programs are expensive as hell, and you offered to let him stay with you to save some money.” He shrugs, his discomfort evident in the low evening light. “Then he never moved out. Not that you wanted him to.”
“Did it work? The rehab? Did he ever get clean?” My voice breaks on the question. Sometimes I can accept these missing pieces. Other times, it hurts to know my mind is failing me. Did the man I love get sober? seems a question far too important to miss.
Levi grimaces, looking away. “Yes. Sort of. He stopped with the street shit after that. That was a victory in itself, but he never stopped being an addict.” He hesitates before continuing. “He broke a few ribs in a race about a year ago. He legitimately needed painkillers. But I think the line between need and want got fuzzy, and . . .” He shrugs. “It was never easy for him.”
“Right.” I study a patch of weeds sprouting from a crack in the concrete.
“Don’t say anything to Ava about all that,” Levi says. “She never knew about Colton’s drug problems. You and I always handled it ourselves.”
“Yeah, that would be a crappy thing for her to learn while she’s trying to prepare for her wedding day.” I release a dry laugh. “I feel like I’m going to do something like that. Reveal some secret I don’t know is a secret, or accidentally break someone’s heart because I can only see part of the picture.”
He studies me for a long beat, and I’m sucked back into the memory of him above me, his hands cupping my face. “No regrets.” Again, I wonder how we got there.
A car honks down the block, breaking the silence and tension between us.
“Are you ready to go in?” Levi asks.
“Sure. Yeah, let’s get this over with. Just like ripping off a Band-Aid, right?” I walk up to the door with hands that are shaking so hard I can’t get the key in the lock.
Levi takes the key from me, unlocks the door, and pushes it open. The dark interior fills with the staccato beeping of an alarm, and he swings into the house to press the glowing buttons on the panel. After the beeping stops, he flips on the lights, illuminating the living room. “We assumed you’d be coming home and wanted to make sure you’d be safe here.”
“Oh.” Goose bumps prickle to life down my arms, and I try to rub them away. “Thanks.” I step into the house and stare at the panel.
“To disarm it or arm it, just press the star twice and then the code, 102469, followed by the star.” He laughs. “And I guess I could have told you that at the bar. It’s not exactly technical.”
“No, but I’m glad you came.” I look around the living room. “It’s weird to be back here. I’m not sure I’d have had the courage to walk in the door without you.”
He clears his throat. “Directions on how to work it are on the coffee table, and you can change the code with the security company if you don’t want to use the one I set.” He meets my eyes for a long beat. “Just promise me you’ll use it, okay?”
“I promise.”
“Ava and I have been over a few times to check on things, and the neighbors keep an eye out too. Your nosy neighbor across the street is probably the reason you’re alive. The night you were hospitalized, she heard shouting and called the police.”
I wonder what kind of shouting she heard. Was I arguing with someone or simply crying for help? “I guess I’ll write her a thank-you note. The old prude proved useful after all.”
He grunts. “You do remember.”
“She isn’t a fan of PDA, and Colton never had a problem with it. He’d kiss me out front or grab my ass, and she’d flip out.”
He shrugs, clearly not interested in talking about my escapades in PDA with Colton. “Do you remember this place too then?”
I nod. “I do. I bought it not long after I left the gallery.”
He cocks his head to the side. “You never told me. Why did you leave the gallery?”
My instinct is to give him an honest answer, but if I tell him the truth, he might ask why I didn’t call the cops to report the stolen paintings. Even though I trust Levi on a gut level I can’t explain, I don’t know enough about him to know if I should. “Nelson and I didn’t see eye to eye. It was time for me to move on.”
He lets it go with that. “So, I don’t need to show you where the bathroom is or to explain that you need to push and turn the knob on the kitchen sink to keep it from leaking?”
“I think I’m good.”
His broad chest expands, and he points a thumb toward the front door. “Then I guess I’ll get out of your hair.”
“Would you stay for a minute?” I blurt before he can move. “I know I have the alarm and everything, but I’d rather not be alone until I’ve walked through the whole house.”
“Sure.” He shoves his hands in his pockets and looks around. “The place was a little bit of a mess after the police searched it, but Ava and I cleaned it up.”
“You didn’t have to do any of this.” A sharp stab of guilt hits me center mass. My friends were cleaning up my house and installing an alarm system, and I was planning to spend the rest of my life pretending they didn’t exist.
“Of course we did. That’s what friends do.”
That ache again. For friendships I don’t remember well enough to understand
. For a life so different than the one I believed I needed to hide from.
Levi leads the way through the house, flipping on the lights in each room and quietly letting me look around before moving to the next space. When we get to the bathroom, he pulls back the shower curtain and grins at me. “Always have to check behind the curtain.”
I relax a little and move the rest of the way down the hall. I hit the lights to my bedroom but freeze when I catch a glimpse of the other bedroom from the corner of my eye.
I walk into it slowly. The crib. The cartoon animals on the walls.
I feel as if I’ve been hollowed out.
I grip the front of the crib, my knuckles turning white as I hold on tight to something I’ve already lost.
“Are you okay?”
“No.” I shake my head. “This is the hardest part. There was a baby growing inside me, and I failed to protect it.”
“That’s not true.” His words are rough, almost angry. “None of this was your fault.”
Slowly, I turn and meet his eyes. “Do you know that for sure?”
“You would’ve done anything for your child.”
“The doctor in Dyer said there’s a chance I’d have miscarried anyway, that there’s no way of knowing the assault caused the miscarriage.” I stroke the fluffy yellow blanket draped over the side of the crib. “But here we are.”
“I’m so sorry, Ellie.” His eyes flick around the room—to the crib, the walls, the little clothes hanging in the closet. “So sorry.”
I was only sixteen weeks along the night of the assault. Only sixteen weeks when I lost the baby. I’m surprised we already decorated the nursery and bought clothes. Were we just that excited? Did we decorate before or after the breakup? Before or after I slept with Levi?
I turn to him and meet his sad eyes. “I know I was sixteen weeks pregnant, but I don’t even remember enough to know if it was Colton’s baby.” I swallow hard. “Or yours.”
He draws in a ragged breath. “It wasn’t mine.” He holds my gaze, tenderness in his eyes. “You were already pregnant when we . . .”
So why did I sleep with you? “Was I happy to be pregnant?”
His jaw works for a beat, and I can tell he doesn’t want to answer.
“The truth,” I say.
“You were scared to do it alone. It wasn’t in your plans, and you weren’t sure you were ready.”
I press my free hand to my stomach and scan the room. “I think I was trying to do the right thing.”
“Of course,” he says. He steps forward and takes my hand off the crib, squeezing it. “You were scared and not ready, but you were going to be a great mom.”
I look down at our joined hands. Mine looks so small in his. This touch feels so good that I want to curl into him and feel the security of his embrace.
I close my eyes and pull my hand away. I’m sorry, Colton.
I leave the nursery, and Levi follows me into the hall without a word. I shut the lights off and pull the door closed. It clicks, and I bite back a gasp of pain. The sound feels like punctuation at the end of a chapter I never got to experience.
“Christ,” he murmurs, pulling me against him.
I press my face into his chest, hiding the hot tears on my cheeks. I give myself the count to ten to let my grief own me. To let him comfort me. Because there are baby clothes in the closet and animals on the walls. Because Colton is missing and so are all the answers I need. Because I’ll never get to wake up in the middle of the night and scoop a warm little bundle from that crib and into my arms.
“Crap.” I step back, gently pushing him away. “I’m sorry.”
“You’re allowed to cry.” He lifts his hand to my face and drops it before touching me. “You’re allowed to grieve.”
“I know.” I nod, but I don’t really believe it. On some level, I’m responsible for all of this. The Discovery collection. My art. Nelson McKinley. The pieces are tied together, and while everyone is busy either blaming Colton for hurting me or for bringing trouble to my door, the opposite is true. “Thanks for coming over.”
“You’re welcome. I don’t have any plans. Do you want me to stay?”
Too much. I lift my eyes to meet his and shake my head. I lead the way to the front door and open it for him. “I’ll set the alarm after you go. I promise.”
“Good. It was . . . nice to see you tonight, Ellie,” he says.
“You too.” I wish it were simply a polite lie. Having him close again is like coming in from the cold and standing in front of the fireplace. And I don’t know what to do with that.
He heads through the door.
“Levi?”
He stops on the stoop, turning back to me.
“Was Colton happy about the baby?”
He looks away and drags a hand through his hair. “He never talked to me about it, but same as you, I guess.” His voice is thick. “Little scared. Not ready. Wanted to do the right thing.”
“Do you miss him?”
His jaw tightens. “Yeah. It’s more complicated than that, but I do.”
More complicated because of me.
They were best friends, and I came between them. Hell, I remember enough that I can see now that I started coming between them years ago. Colton would be trashed and Levi would come to the rescue. Colton would get pissed and accuse Levi of trying to play the hero, and Levi would lie low for a while. When Colton was in rehab, Levi was my confidant, my shoulder to cry on as I prayed the man I loved would become stronger than his addiction. Colton needed me to be strong, so when I felt weak, I leaned on Levi. And somewhere in there, while I was still fighting for Colton and while I still believed with all my heart that he and I would be together forever, I fell in love with Levi—not as a lover but as a friend, a piece of my world as necessary as the ground beneath my feet.
“What about you? Do you miss him?” Levi asks, a hitch in his words.
“I do. Now that I remember him, I miss him a lot.” I want it to be an explanation for all I can’t say—for why I can’t let Levi hold me even though I want him to. For why I feel so damn guilty for wanting him to.
“He loved you. You might not remember enough to understand, but you were the best thing that ever happened to him.”
Are we still talking about Colton? Why do I feel like Levi is trying to tell me how he feels?
“Good night.” I close the door and watch him through the window as he climbs into his truck. I haven’t been alone anywhere since I woke up in the hospital, and as Levi drives away, the night stretches out before me. Just anticipating the darkness terrifies me.
When I turn to set the alarm, I remember I never brought my bag in from the car. I step outside and jog to the driveway. The sun is low on the horizon, painting the sky in an orange-and-red glow.
I open my trunk and grab my overnight bag. I throw it over my shoulder, then freeze. The hairs on the back of my neck stand up. Someone’s watching me.
I shouldn’t have come out here alone. Not when I’m feeling so paranoid.
I shift the keys in my hand, turning the car key to point out. Colton taught me that after Nelson broke into my house. A key to the eye will give you time to escape. I pull my trunk closed as nonchalantly as possible, forcing myself not to show my panic as I walk back into the house.
Only when the door is shut behind me and I hear the satisfying thunk of the bolt sliding home do I look across the street to find the danger I sensed so acutely.
I don’t see any.
In the driveway across the street, a few kids play basketball. Two houses down, a couple sits on the front porch, beers in hand, enjoying the perfect evening. A patrol car rolls by, and frogs begin to sing. A normal autumn evening.
“You’re being paranoid,” I whisper. Then I arm the security system.
I grab a flashlight from the drawer in the kitchen and head to the hallway. I stare at the attic access for two solid minutes before I make myself muster the courage to pull down the ladder.
&
nbsp; I click on the flashlight. “Just do it, Ellie.”
The wooden ladder creaks with each step, and as I get closer to the hot and muggy space, chills race down my spine. I crawl across the rafters on my hands and knees until I get to the back corner.
Pulling aside the old blankets, I point my flashlight at the modified, extra-wide rafters to illuminate my hiding spot, but there’s nothing there.
The Discovery collection is gone.
Levi
It’s been a long fucking day at the end of a long fucking week, and I stand under the shower spray wondering when life turned so chaotic. Can we rewind time? Would anything be different if I’d never touched Ellie? If I’d never admitted how I felt or held her in my arms and promised myself that one day she’d feel the same? If I’d been nothing more than the friend she needed, would we still be here—piecing together a past she can’t remember, secrets she never shared with me?
Nothing makes sense, but a long shower can’t wash away my worries. I keep imagining Ellie back in her house by herself. She promised she’d use the security system, and it should protect her—we made sure to install the best—but I don’t like it.
Fuck it. I walked away tonight because she looked like she needed to process everything, but I can’t do it. I can’t let her stay there alone.
I turn off the shower and grab a towel. I’m going after her. If she refuses to come home with me, then I’ll crash on her couch. I rub the towel over my wet hair then down my arms and legs.
A sharp rap comes from the front door, and I frown. The clock in the bedroom says it’s after ten, so I can assume it’s not a salesman or a neighborhood kid trying to sell me candy bars.
The knock comes again, and I wrap the towel around my waist and head to the front door. Through the window, I see Ellie standing on my front porch, a duffel bag hanging on one shoulder. She has her arms wrapped around herself, and she’s shivering even though it’s a warm night for October.
I unlock the door and pull it open quickly, panic ripping through me. “Are you okay?”