I peered at her for a moment because her change in demeanor was so odd. Both her ordering Madeline’s exact favorite breakfast and now her reaction to my questioning it. “That’s too fucking weird.” I stared at her for a moment longer then decided to just let it go. “But then I guess you not remembering anything is just as weird.”
I admitted I’d never actually seen her try them. How she’d always refused to when Maddie tried to get her to. It seemed to give us a temporary truce.
We ate the rest of our breakfast with no further incidents or surprises or getting heated over anything until we got the bill. “I got it.” She grabbed it before I could.
“Nah,” I held my hand out for it as I reached for my wallet in my pocket.
“No way. You paid yesterday.”
I pulled out my wallet, ignoring that last comment. “Give it to me.”
The waitress walked by just then, and I attempted to give her my card. “I’m paying,” Maggie said before the waitress could take my card, then turned to me with yet another one of those stubborn glares I was so used to seeing—on Madeline.
Never on Maggie.
For a moment, it made my breath catch, and before I could argue, the waitress was gone with her card. Maggie lifted her chin, waiting for me to say more, but I didn’t. I knew better.
By the time we got out to where her car was stuck, Steve was already there and had the car out. Maggie got off my bike and was greeted very cheerfully. “Just in time.”
Maggie glanced down at her phone’s screen. “You said eleven.”
I stayed on my bike as Steve explained why he was able to get there early then handed her his clipboard for her to sign.
“So, I’m good to go?”
I looked up just in time to see Maggie inspecting what I knew had to be caked on mud all over the bottom of her car.
“Yeah.” Steve walked around to inspect the car with her. “You might wanna take it through a car wash . . .”
I zoned out as I pondered how, in a few hours, maybe less, we’d be saying good-bye. That is until I heard the guy telling Maggie it was so great to see her again. I looked up just as he held his arms open for a hug.
“Good seeing you too,” she said then leaned in awkwardly and hugged the guy, allowing his arms around her.
Feeling a heat I hadn’t felt in years, I straightened out, staring at them until Maggie’s eyes met mine.
“When will you be back?” Steve asked as he finally let go of her and pulled away.
“Not sure . . .”
With my eyes locked on her, I vaguely heard much of what she said after that as she explained how her trip here was on a whim.
“Give me a call next time you’re in town,” Steve said, outwardly flirting now and saying something about having a drink sometime.
He hadn’t even finished when I was already on my way to where they stood. You could almost pinpoint the moment it dawned on the idiot that I might just be someone he should be worried about.
His eyes went wider with every step I took toward them, staring straight at him.”That’s if you don’t mind, of course.”
“I do mind.”
“I’m sorry,” Steve sputtered and backpedaled just as I’d expected him to.
He stuttered something about thinking I was just out here helping her with her car because I was her sister’s ex. “Well, you thought wrong.” I walked past them to inspect her car. “Let’s go get this cleaned up.”
The stuttering went on a little longer with Steve apologizing some more, but I was through talking to his ass. He finished up the paperwork quickly and was gone fast enough.
I turned to Maggie, who was walking toward me with this strange gleam in her eyes. It made me wonder and worry that maybe just like that smile I was greeted with at the hotel, after last night’s kiss, she, too, was feeling more than she should.
“What was that about?” she asked, still wearing that somewhat amused expression.
“I told you I didn’t like the douche.” I straightened out and stood up, trying to make less of this. “Your sister wouldn’t have either. Just looking out.” Swallowing hard, I walked past her, hoping she’d just drop it. “I really think you need to get those rims cleaned up. I know a good place in town. Follow me.”
The ride alone back into town felt as empty as it had those entire first horrid months after Madeline’s death. And this was just the beginning of what I knew now would have to be good-bye. As much as I’d love nothing more than to continue staring in those eyes and listening to that voice, the damage it’d do to my sanity in the long run couldn’t possibly be worth it. Besides, there was no way I could be around her too long before giving into the temptation of tasting that mouth again. That shit would be just too weird.
Already after just one kiss, my heart was feeling entitled enough to make it clear to Stuttering Steve, that I was not okay with him asking her out. If I allowed myself to get even closer to Maggie, I had no doubt I’d be making real claims on her in no time. I’d be breaking one of the biggest unspoken rules between my brothers and me. No matter how long ago Nolan had been with her, Madeline had shared Maggie’s secret with me. Nolan had been her first. Even if Nolan might be okay with this now, given the circumstances and time that had passed, I knew I wouldn’t be able to deal with those kinds of Jerry Springer family gatherings.
I shook my head as I pulled into the parking lot of the auto-detailing place. I was getting way ahead of myself here. You didn’t move in with someone unless it was very serious. And Nolan specifically said her moving out was recent, so who knew if she still wasn’t harboring feelings for the guy or vice versa. This had the potential to get uber complicated and the last thing I needed was more chaos in my life, especially when it involved my dead soulmate’s twin, for fuck’s sake!
“Detailing?” she asked as she got out of her car. “I thought we’d just hose it down or something. Maybe go through a car wash.”
“Nah, you don’t wanna mess with anything being stuck in there or underneath. Looks like your car was in there good and deep. You have a long drive home. Better to be safe than sorry.”
Ignoring her warmed expression, I reminded myself that my concern for her safety had everything to do with Madeline. She’d want Maggie safe too. I was doing this for her.
The guy at the body shop said they’d take an hour. “We don’t have to wait here,” I said, handing the guy her keys, even as my mind raced for safe ideas of what we could do in the meantime.
Luckily, she came up with the idea of a nearby park we’d driven by. A park in broad daylight was as safe as it was going to get. We drove to a park with a big water fountain right in the middle of town, the very park she and her sister used to wait for their mother to pick them up from after school. Of course the first memory it brought back was the day of the pregnancy scare when I went to talk to Jenna at the dollar store and Madeline spotted us.
Despite the temporary mental distraction, my mind was back on another thing, so I figured I may as well just ask and relieve my curiosity.
“Nolan mentioned you’d been living with someone until just recently. Did you live with him long?”
Clearly, my question had come out of left field. Maggie’s expression was an odd one as she got off my bike, but she shook her head. “Um, no, not really. Few months. I’d just moved in with him this past spring. Ryan and I didn’t even make it through the summer.”
Just a few months. Good to know. Wait. What? No. “You feel like sitting or walking?” I asked, chastising myself inwardly for even starting to go there.
“Let’s walk,” she said and we started along.
Not even a minute went by when the curiosity won out, and my mouth was at it again. “So, what happened?”
Again, she glanced up at me for a moment before shrugging. My entire body began to cringe when she spoke of how perfect he’d been in every way until she added, “Then he put his hands on me, like no man ever should.”
Feeling my inside
s instantly light up, I stopped in my tracks and turned to her. “He hit you?”
She shook her head and we continued walking again, but my insides were still simmering. “No. But I wasn’t going to stick around and wait for it to get to that. He just grabbed my arm hard enough to bruise it. I moved out of his house the very next day.”
“Next day? You didn’t leave that same day?”
Shaking her head, she explained how it’d happened at a bar. She’d left and gone back to her mother’s, and the next day, they’d rented a truck and went and got her things from his place.
Deciding to drop the subject of Ryan, I asked about something safer, something that’d keep my irrational mind from wandering into things it shouldn’t. “Any other reason why you’re out here all alone on your birthday weekend?”
For a moment, she turned to me, gazing deep in my eyes, but then she shrugged again, glancing away. “I’ve been obsessing about all this for so long, and you saw how overwhelming my triggers can be. Mama asked if I could just try and let it go, accept that I may never remember anything about my past. I promised I would, and then I started having nightmares and other dreams, and I just had to come back one last time and see if I could find some answers.”
I peered at her. “By going to the pier?”
“Well, yeah.” She huffed. “Thing is I have no idea what I’m looking for. I’m grasping.”
“Did you get any answers?”
She shook her head, staring straight ahead. “If anything, I have even more questions now.”
“Tell me about the flashes.”
She stopped suddenly, surprising me, then stared at me wide-eyed. “Does the photo booth at the vintage theater mean anything to you?”
My heart nearly stopped for a moment until I remembered the expressions on both her and Shelby’s faces the day Madeline showed them the photos of us kissing. Even if she didn’t know it that day, that it was the very first time I’d kissed her sister, I was certain this was why she was bringing it up now. Shaking my head because I knew that’s all it was, I responded, “Maddie must’ve told you about it. She told you everything, right down to the last detail.”
“Told me what?”
“It’s where I first kissed her.”
Her eyes closed tightly, and she clutched her chest. Like yesterday at the river, she seemed wobbly, and again it appeared she might be having some kind of seizure. “What’s wrong?” The question had her eyes opening widely, and I searched them. “Is it happening again?”
Maggie nodded, but didn’t immediately speak. She appeared to be trying to gather herself, but whatever was happening, while she didn’t cry as she had yesterday at the river, she was just as rattled by this as she was yesterday. Maybe more.
“I just had another flashback,” she finally said. “Same as when I had my first of that booth the day Mama and I first came to Huntsville.”
“What was the flashback about?”
“Just of the photo booth. Nothing more,” she added quickly. “It’s why it never made any sense to me.”
There was something about the way she seemed to backpedal. Her reaction was too unnerving for her explanation. Still, as my heart calmed, my mind began to think more rationally. I explained how often she and her sister took photos in there. How close their bond was, which made more sense than the conclusion my heart kept trying to jump to. “It’s like you two were one person, not whole without the other.”
“Mama says the same thing.”
Again, her expression didn’t match her words. She still seemed more troubled by this than she was admitting.
“I had another trigger,” she said, chewing the corner of her lip, “when I came across another painting in our storage unit of a couple on a bridge overlooking a river.”
I knew immediately which painting she was talking about. Madeline had painted one just like the one she’d given me for our anniversary for herself. It was one of her favorite photos of us. This actually made me smile, and in spite of the emotion it evoked, I explained about the painting.
She listened intently to every detail about that first day I kissed Madeline so intently I told her more. How crazy her sister had driven me that first year before I finally made the move. How hooked I’d been on her from the moment I’d first spoken to her and about our unspoken game.
I smiled, trying desperately to not lose it again like I had last night. Instead, I glanced up at the sky like I’d done so many times since her death. “You were mine before we made it official, and we both knew it.”
Turning back to Maggie, I could see it in her eyes. She, too, was feeling emotional, but I was determined to embrace the memories as my shrink insisted I do, so I went on. I told her about how earlier that same day I first kissed her and about running into her outside the Five and Dime and the words she’d said to me that day—words I’d never forget: So this is what they mean by missing someone even before they’re gone.
As painful as the memory was now, it had me smiling big. “I swear to God that’s the moment I knew just how hopelessly in love I was.”
The emotion in her eyes was a familiar one. The only way to explain it was like I’d seen it—felt it—many times before. It was so genuine as if she might be remembering stuff now too, so I continued. I told her everything that might jog a memory. How that first kiss I shared with Madeline was on her birthday. “By the way, I just realized today’s your birthday. I’m sorry.” I shook my head with a frown. “I didn’t even say happy birthday.”
Shaking her head, she assured me I had nothing to be sorry about. Then she mentioned that, with a new man in her mother’s life, even her mama had forgotten, but was quickly back to something she seemed far more interested in. “So, was it a birthday kiss? Is that why you agreed to kiss her?”
That actually had me laughing. As if I would’ve ever stood the chance of rejecting Madeline if she’d asked me to kiss her. Especially given the circumstances the day it happened. I told her more about it, continuing to chuckle even if it felt bittersweet. Talking to Maggie just felt so perfect. In all the years since Madeline’s death, I’d never opened up this much and allowed myself to dwell on the memories this long. I was so comfortable I decided to just ask something I was curious about ever since she first mentioned it. “Those dreams or nightmares you said you had . . .” I stared at her, swallowing hard because I had a feeling this might be too personal, but I needed to know. “What were they about?”
Once again, I was caught in those beautiful eyes as she gazed into mine without saying a word at first. And then she did. “They were about you.”
Chapter 23: A Hunch
For the second time that day, I stopped in my tracks, feeling a strangeness in my chest, and faced her. “About me?”
“Yes.” She nodded, glancing away for a moment as she explained how they didn’t start until the day she’d seen me at the cemetery. “Before that, I didn’t know you existed.”
“And they’re nightmares?”
She nodded and took a deep breath before she started walking again, and of course, I followed along like a puppy dog—hanging on her every word—like I used to anytime I was around Madeline. “I have no idea what to make of them. Maybe I was just in so much shock to learn you even existed, but I started to dream of you that day. That day, when I first saw you . . . there were flashes”—she seemed to hesitate but went on anyway— “mainly of your face, your eyes, everything I was seeing at that moment anyway, so like the others, it didn’t make sense. You’ve seen for yourself. The flashes can be traumatic, so I think there’s this sense of negativity that comes with them sometimes. Fear of the unknown, you know? So maybe it’s why when I dream of that day, when I had one of the more intense triggers, it’s always alarmingly frightening, and I cry out until I either wake myself or Mama wakes me.”
She glanced up at me as I once again stopped—because I had to. This only fed the crazy notion still buzzing in my head now, one I knew would have me back to square one with m
y shrink trying to fix my fucked head, despite all the progress I’d made. “What about it made you cry out? What did you cry out?”
“Ryan pulls me back,” she blurted out, surprising me, “from getting any closer to you in every dream. I think I’m haunted by the way you looked at me and everything I was hit with that day. The sadness in your eyes, being so shocked about finding out Madeline had such a serious boyfriend when Mama never mentioned it, all of it had been a blow to my gut. In my dream, I think I want to console you, but Ryan pulls me away each time and I cry.”
Clenching my jaw, I swallowed back the swarming jealousy I was suddenly feeling, but I had to ask. “Are you still keeping in touch with Ryan?”
She nodded, but said nothing more; though if I wasn’t mistaken, I thought I detected a hint of shame. “Does he know about Nolan? Is that why you think he might be pulling you away in the dream?”
Maggie quickly explained how the only other person who even knew yet about all the stuff her mother kept from her was her friend Clarisse. The more time I spent with her, the longer I gazed into those eyes, the more I felt this connection I knew I was misinterpreting, and doing so would only be disastrous. Yet, I couldn’t bring myself to stop while I was ahead. “What else do you dream about?”
“It’s always a different version of that same dream,” she whispered.
Really? I peered at her for a moment. “You said not all were nightmares?”
“They’re not,” she agreed immediately. “Some are just a replay of that day. They’re not all as emotional.”
I stared at her for moment, wondering if there was anything else I should ask. We appeared to be at a stalemate. But I could feel it as my heart raced in my chest. Something was off. Something just wasn’t right about all this. How could—why—would Maggie be feeling all this? Why was my heart swelling with insane hope. While I knew what my heart was grasping for here was an impossibility, there was one more thing I had to ask. “Do you like M&M’s, Maggie?”