“You look…” His dark eyes scan over me again. “God, you’re so beautiful it hurts.”
Birds chirp happily and the sun warms my skin, and I hate myself for wishing I could be seeing him somewhere else. That I could be someone else.
“You probably shouldn’t be saying things like that to me.”
He must hear it, that brokenness in my voice, and he must care something for me, because he lets out this long, shaky breath, as if he’s as f**ked up over all this as I am. “You’re really going to marry him.” It’s not a question. More like resignation.
I look down to my ring and remember Lizzy’s question. “Does it bother you not knowing what made you choose Max?”
Nate turns to the river and squeezes the balcony rail until his knuckles go white. “When you told me you had amnesia, I wanted to believe he tricked you into taking that ring.”
“Max wouldn’t do that.”
Nate cuts his gaze to me. There’s something in his eyes—a secret locked away—but he doesn’t disagree. “For the record, I knew this was how it would end. We both did. It’s the amnesia that f**ks it all up. Makes this harder than it needs to be.”
“Max is perfect for me.” I say the words because I don’t know what else to say. I need to remind myself that I can’t have this man take me into his arms, no matter how desperately I want him to. Not when I chose Max. “And I’m going to tell him the truth. I’m going to tell him that I cheated on him.”
His face shifts, that sadness and resignation tightening, hardening into anger. “You didn’t cheat on Max.” He drags a hand through his hair, looking like he wants to throw something. “Jesus. Is that what he made you think?”
“He didn’t have to. I remember.”
He draws in breath in a sharp hiss. “Everything?”
“Bits. Pieces. Enough to know I was unfaithful.”
His jaw ticks, and I can tell he’s fighting some kind of internal struggle. Then, as if he can’t handle looking at me anymore, he tears his gaze away. “You weren’t unfaithful. Not at all. The night you met me—”
“Three months ago. In St. Louis,” I supply.
“You remember?” The question is cautiously whispered, but I can’t tell if he hopes I do or don’t.
I shake my head. “Maggie told me.”
“You’d just broken up with Max that night. Come on, Hanna. Use that amazing brain of yours. You aren’t the kind of girl who would date one guy and mess around with another. You wouldn’t have ever gone out with me that night if you and Max hadn’t broken up.”
“A breakup?” I almost laugh. “You don’t understand small towns. If that were true, everyone would have known.”
“But you two didn’t want anyone to know. Your mom was helping him get that grant so his business could stay afloat, and you knew she’d stop if you two weren’t dating anymore. Things had gotten bad for him—he sold his f**king house, for Christ’s sake.”
I don’t like the logic of those words—the way they dig into my skin and crawl like a hundred parasites.
“You didn’t cheat,” Nate repeats. “Tell him whatever you want about us, but you weren’t unfaithful.”
“If we broke up, why wouldn’t he have told me?”
“Maybe because he doesn’t want you to remember that he broke your heart.”
No. “He didn’t break anything. He loves me. He’s good to me. Better than I deserve.”
He backs away. One step. Two. The invisible cords connecting us stretch and groan with every inch.
The feeling scares me so much, I lash out. “If you really love me, you’ll do something for me.”
He laughs, an empty, hollow sound. “You want a favor now?”
“I want you to leave town.” It’s not a fair request. He hasn’t done anything to make me think he’s going to disrupt my picture-perfect life. But I fear I’ll do something disastrous if I keep running into him. “I want you out of my life.” I pray that saying the words might make them true. They’re the right words to say—I know that—but they hurt, like someone taking a dull blade to an exposed wound.
“As you wish, angel.”
Angel. “Why do you keep calling me that?”
Silence pulses between us for a beat. A living thing. “Because you saved me.”
Then I don’t have to walk away. He leaves before I can process his words. And I’m grateful. I’m not sure I’m strong enough to walk away from Nate Crane while knowing I’ll never see him again.
“Where are you tonight?” Liz asks, waving a hand in front of my face.
I take a deep breath and shake my head. “Sorry. I’m distracted.”
We’re at a club in Indianapolis—one of those honky-tonk places where they get female customers to dance on the bar. Maggie, Nix, and Cally are on the dance floor while Liz and I watch our drinks at the table.
Liz frowns at me. “Don’t pull away from me again, okay? You can talk to me.”
“Did Max and I break up before my accident?” I blurt.
She scoots closer. “I’m sorry,” she calls over the music. “I thought you asked if you and Max broke up.”
I nod. “Did we?”
She frowns. “Not that I know of. Why would you think that?”
“I’ve been feeling so guilty about Nate, but what if I don’t need to feel guilty? What if I was only with Nate after Max and I broke up?”
She shakes her head. “Wouldn’t people have known? And then there’s the ring. Didn’t Max say he proposed months ago?”
It’s crazy to have this conversation here, in this bar that is so loud I practically have to scream my secrets to the world. But I’ve held on to Nate’s words for over twenty-four hours now and suddenly I can’t handle it anymore. I need answers.
“I saw Nate at Maggie’s last night, and he said I never cheated on Max. He said Max and I were secretly broken up, and I didn’t tell anyone because I didn’t want Mom to find out. She was helping him get a grant—a grant that was going to keep his club open.”
“The Healthy Tomorrow Grant,” Liz says. She swallows hard. “They’ll announce the recipient next week, but I’m pretty sure Max is going to get it.”
I know this already, yet hearing Liz say it makes my stomach churn.
“Why did you break up?” Liz asks. “And why didn’t Max tell you?”
I stare at my drink, Nate’s words echoing in my ears. “Maybe because he doesn’t want you to remember that he broke your heart.”
Liz narrows her eyes. “What are you not telling me?”
I exhale a long breath full of worry and second guesses. “What if I’m not the only one in this relationship who hasn’t been completely honest?”
“What did he do?”
I tell her about the random text message Max received the night of the engagement party and Max leaving because Meredith needed him. “It’s not that I don’t believe that’s possible. We all know she thinks the world is her freaking oyster, but why is anything she needs more important than being with me? There was something about it that made me feel…”
“Like he was lying,” Liz supplies.
Tears fill my eyes as I nod. “I know it’s not fair. He’s a good guy, and I’m sure I’m just projecting my own guilt onto him or whatever.”
She opens her mouth then closes it again before reaching over and taking my hand. “We’ll figure this out,” she whispers.
“It might not matter anyway. Tomorrow I’m telling him the truth about Nate. If Nate’s wrong and Max and I weren’t broken up, that might be the end of us anyway.”
“He loves you,” she assures me.
“Would you want me to marry him if things were the other way around?”
She doesn’t answer. She doesn’t have to.
I look down at my phone and see the notification light blinking at me. I have a voicemail. “I missed a call. I’m going to go outside and listen to this message.”
I wedge my way through the crowd to make it out the front door of the club. My ears breathe a sigh of relief when the door floats closed behind me and takes the noise with it.
“Hanna Cakes!” the woman on my voicemail chirps. “It’s Elle! I was hoping I’d catch you in person, but apparently I didn’t. Tonight is Cally’s bachelorette party, isn’t it?”
I frown at the phone because I have no idea who Elle is or why she’d know about the bachelorette party.
She sighs heavily. “Well, I hope you’re having a freaking fabulous time because you deserve it. Listen, I’m sorry to throw this at you tonight of all nights. I know you have your own shit you’re dealing with right now, but Nate’s a freaking mess since he got home last night. He’s spiraling out bad. I tried to get him to snap out of it before I left, but he doesn’t listen to me. You’re the only person who can get through to him. Please go to the house and see what you can do. I don’t like to imagine him leaving for his trip in this condition. I’m about to board my plane and then I’m en route to India, and I’ll check in when I get there, but then I’ll be MIA for a few weeks. Remember that spiritual cleansing I told you about? The one Madonna raves about? Well, they gave me a spot, though the timing is shitty because electronics are a total no-no through the program. Go take care of him, okay?”
I’m still frowning at my phone when Lizzy, Cally, Maggie, and Nix push out of the club, all smiles and excitement.
“Who was it?” Liz asks.
I shake my head. “Nothing important. What’s up next?”
“We’re going to crash the boys’ party at the strip club,” Maggie says with a grin.
Nix sidles up beside me. Her request for tonight was that we make her “look like a girl,” and when we put her in fitted jeans and a fitted shirt, she said, “No, a slutty girl.” So she’s wearing a tight black skirt that shows her long, toned legs—apparently I’m not the only runner in this group—and a strapless pink top that shows off her shoulders. She wanted to wear sky-high heels, but we nixed that plan when we saw she wasn’t able to walk in them without falling over.
“My nurse called me yesterday afternoon,” she says as we move down the sidewalk toward the strip club where the guys are supposed to be. “Your blood work results are back. I’m sorry I haven’t been in the office to look at them yet, but I’ll be there tomorrow. I’ll give you a call.”
“I think they took enough blood to give a someone a life-saving infusion,” I inform her.
“Sorry about that. I wanted to do the whole workup again.”
“Don’t go into the office just for that. It’s fine. I’m eating.”
I take a deep breath of the cool night air and think about that voicemail. I scan my memory again and again, but I can’t remember an Elle. Obviously it’s someone I know from Nate’s life.
“Have you told Max yet?” Nix asks quietly.
“Tomorrow. That’s the plan.” I wanted him to be able to enjoy Will’s bachelor party without my nasty secret hanging over him.
“Huh. Maybe we should work out some sort of Bat Signal so I can interrupt with the blood work call if it’s not going well.”
“There it is!” Liz calls, pointing to the building in front of us.
There’s a long line out front, but the bouncer waves us over.
“Does he know we’re coming?” I ask Liz.
She snorts. “No, but we’re a group of five hot-ass girls going into a gentleman’s club. We probably won’t have to pay for a drink all night.”
I laugh, but my moment of good humor is cut off when a familiar voice calls, “Oh, look who’s there.”
When my eyes land on Meredith coming out of the club, I want to puke. She might have just had a baby a few months ago, but she’s as gorgeous as ever in a tiny black dress and heels, her long, silky blond hair hanging past her bare shoulders.
“What are you doing here?” I sneer.
She leans against the building and crosses her feet at her ankles. “Oh, nothing special. Just hanging with some…friends. I hear you lost your memory.”
“What’s it to you?” It’s not just a smartass retort. I want to know.
She shrugs. “I was out of town when it happened so I just heard. Me and baby girl got back last weekend. But I guess you know that since Max came to help me out for a while. He’s such a natural with kids.”
She winks at me like we share a secret, and I want to slap her.
Meredith’s eyes rake over Cally in her bride-to-be shirt. “What’s up, Cally? Are you here to pick up your check?”
Cally’s hands clench and her jaw ticks but she doesn’t respond.
Meredith’s glossed lips curl into an ugly smile. “Quite a step up from your…previous employment.”
Cally seethes beside me, and Liz steps forward. “Don’t you have a baby you should be home caring for?”
Meredith rolls her eyes. “That’s what babysitters are for.”
“You ladies coming in?” the bouncer asks.
“Have fun,” Meredith calls. “I know I did.”
I follow the girls into the club, but the energy of our whole group has changed. None of us are in the mood to party anymore. Instead, we all want to know what Meredith was doing here and if it had anything to do with our guys.
Birds chirp happily and the sun warms my skin, and I hate myself for wishing I could be seeing him somewhere else. That I could be someone else.
“You probably shouldn’t be saying things like that to me.”
He must hear it, that brokenness in my voice, and he must care something for me, because he lets out this long, shaky breath, as if he’s as f**ked up over all this as I am. “You’re really going to marry him.” It’s not a question. More like resignation.
I look down to my ring and remember Lizzy’s question. “Does it bother you not knowing what made you choose Max?”
Nate turns to the river and squeezes the balcony rail until his knuckles go white. “When you told me you had amnesia, I wanted to believe he tricked you into taking that ring.”
“Max wouldn’t do that.”
Nate cuts his gaze to me. There’s something in his eyes—a secret locked away—but he doesn’t disagree. “For the record, I knew this was how it would end. We both did. It’s the amnesia that f**ks it all up. Makes this harder than it needs to be.”
“Max is perfect for me.” I say the words because I don’t know what else to say. I need to remind myself that I can’t have this man take me into his arms, no matter how desperately I want him to. Not when I chose Max. “And I’m going to tell him the truth. I’m going to tell him that I cheated on him.”
His face shifts, that sadness and resignation tightening, hardening into anger. “You didn’t cheat on Max.” He drags a hand through his hair, looking like he wants to throw something. “Jesus. Is that what he made you think?”
“He didn’t have to. I remember.”
He draws in breath in a sharp hiss. “Everything?”
“Bits. Pieces. Enough to know I was unfaithful.”
His jaw ticks, and I can tell he’s fighting some kind of internal struggle. Then, as if he can’t handle looking at me anymore, he tears his gaze away. “You weren’t unfaithful. Not at all. The night you met me—”
“Three months ago. In St. Louis,” I supply.
“You remember?” The question is cautiously whispered, but I can’t tell if he hopes I do or don’t.
I shake my head. “Maggie told me.”
“You’d just broken up with Max that night. Come on, Hanna. Use that amazing brain of yours. You aren’t the kind of girl who would date one guy and mess around with another. You wouldn’t have ever gone out with me that night if you and Max hadn’t broken up.”
“A breakup?” I almost laugh. “You don’t understand small towns. If that were true, everyone would have known.”
“But you two didn’t want anyone to know. Your mom was helping him get that grant so his business could stay afloat, and you knew she’d stop if you two weren’t dating anymore. Things had gotten bad for him—he sold his f**king house, for Christ’s sake.”
I don’t like the logic of those words—the way they dig into my skin and crawl like a hundred parasites.
“You didn’t cheat,” Nate repeats. “Tell him whatever you want about us, but you weren’t unfaithful.”
“If we broke up, why wouldn’t he have told me?”
“Maybe because he doesn’t want you to remember that he broke your heart.”
No. “He didn’t break anything. He loves me. He’s good to me. Better than I deserve.”
He backs away. One step. Two. The invisible cords connecting us stretch and groan with every inch.
The feeling scares me so much, I lash out. “If you really love me, you’ll do something for me.”
He laughs, an empty, hollow sound. “You want a favor now?”
“I want you to leave town.” It’s not a fair request. He hasn’t done anything to make me think he’s going to disrupt my picture-perfect life. But I fear I’ll do something disastrous if I keep running into him. “I want you out of my life.” I pray that saying the words might make them true. They’re the right words to say—I know that—but they hurt, like someone taking a dull blade to an exposed wound.
“As you wish, angel.”
Angel. “Why do you keep calling me that?”
Silence pulses between us for a beat. A living thing. “Because you saved me.”
Then I don’t have to walk away. He leaves before I can process his words. And I’m grateful. I’m not sure I’m strong enough to walk away from Nate Crane while knowing I’ll never see him again.
“Where are you tonight?” Liz asks, waving a hand in front of my face.
I take a deep breath and shake my head. “Sorry. I’m distracted.”
We’re at a club in Indianapolis—one of those honky-tonk places where they get female customers to dance on the bar. Maggie, Nix, and Cally are on the dance floor while Liz and I watch our drinks at the table.
Liz frowns at me. “Don’t pull away from me again, okay? You can talk to me.”
“Did Max and I break up before my accident?” I blurt.
She scoots closer. “I’m sorry,” she calls over the music. “I thought you asked if you and Max broke up.”
I nod. “Did we?”
She frowns. “Not that I know of. Why would you think that?”
“I’ve been feeling so guilty about Nate, but what if I don’t need to feel guilty? What if I was only with Nate after Max and I broke up?”
She shakes her head. “Wouldn’t people have known? And then there’s the ring. Didn’t Max say he proposed months ago?”
It’s crazy to have this conversation here, in this bar that is so loud I practically have to scream my secrets to the world. But I’ve held on to Nate’s words for over twenty-four hours now and suddenly I can’t handle it anymore. I need answers.
“I saw Nate at Maggie’s last night, and he said I never cheated on Max. He said Max and I were secretly broken up, and I didn’t tell anyone because I didn’t want Mom to find out. She was helping him get a grant—a grant that was going to keep his club open.”
“The Healthy Tomorrow Grant,” Liz says. She swallows hard. “They’ll announce the recipient next week, but I’m pretty sure Max is going to get it.”
I know this already, yet hearing Liz say it makes my stomach churn.
“Why did you break up?” Liz asks. “And why didn’t Max tell you?”
I stare at my drink, Nate’s words echoing in my ears. “Maybe because he doesn’t want you to remember that he broke your heart.”
Liz narrows her eyes. “What are you not telling me?”
I exhale a long breath full of worry and second guesses. “What if I’m not the only one in this relationship who hasn’t been completely honest?”
“What did he do?”
I tell her about the random text message Max received the night of the engagement party and Max leaving because Meredith needed him. “It’s not that I don’t believe that’s possible. We all know she thinks the world is her freaking oyster, but why is anything she needs more important than being with me? There was something about it that made me feel…”
“Like he was lying,” Liz supplies.
Tears fill my eyes as I nod. “I know it’s not fair. He’s a good guy, and I’m sure I’m just projecting my own guilt onto him or whatever.”
She opens her mouth then closes it again before reaching over and taking my hand. “We’ll figure this out,” she whispers.
“It might not matter anyway. Tomorrow I’m telling him the truth about Nate. If Nate’s wrong and Max and I weren’t broken up, that might be the end of us anyway.”
“He loves you,” she assures me.
“Would you want me to marry him if things were the other way around?”
She doesn’t answer. She doesn’t have to.
I look down at my phone and see the notification light blinking at me. I have a voicemail. “I missed a call. I’m going to go outside and listen to this message.”
I wedge my way through the crowd to make it out the front door of the club. My ears breathe a sigh of relief when the door floats closed behind me and takes the noise with it.
“Hanna Cakes!” the woman on my voicemail chirps. “It’s Elle! I was hoping I’d catch you in person, but apparently I didn’t. Tonight is Cally’s bachelorette party, isn’t it?”
I frown at the phone because I have no idea who Elle is or why she’d know about the bachelorette party.
She sighs heavily. “Well, I hope you’re having a freaking fabulous time because you deserve it. Listen, I’m sorry to throw this at you tonight of all nights. I know you have your own shit you’re dealing with right now, but Nate’s a freaking mess since he got home last night. He’s spiraling out bad. I tried to get him to snap out of it before I left, but he doesn’t listen to me. You’re the only person who can get through to him. Please go to the house and see what you can do. I don’t like to imagine him leaving for his trip in this condition. I’m about to board my plane and then I’m en route to India, and I’ll check in when I get there, but then I’ll be MIA for a few weeks. Remember that spiritual cleansing I told you about? The one Madonna raves about? Well, they gave me a spot, though the timing is shitty because electronics are a total no-no through the program. Go take care of him, okay?”
I’m still frowning at my phone when Lizzy, Cally, Maggie, and Nix push out of the club, all smiles and excitement.
“Who was it?” Liz asks.
I shake my head. “Nothing important. What’s up next?”
“We’re going to crash the boys’ party at the strip club,” Maggie says with a grin.
Nix sidles up beside me. Her request for tonight was that we make her “look like a girl,” and when we put her in fitted jeans and a fitted shirt, she said, “No, a slutty girl.” So she’s wearing a tight black skirt that shows her long, toned legs—apparently I’m not the only runner in this group—and a strapless pink top that shows off her shoulders. She wanted to wear sky-high heels, but we nixed that plan when we saw she wasn’t able to walk in them without falling over.
“My nurse called me yesterday afternoon,” she says as we move down the sidewalk toward the strip club where the guys are supposed to be. “Your blood work results are back. I’m sorry I haven’t been in the office to look at them yet, but I’ll be there tomorrow. I’ll give you a call.”
“I think they took enough blood to give a someone a life-saving infusion,” I inform her.
“Sorry about that. I wanted to do the whole workup again.”
“Don’t go into the office just for that. It’s fine. I’m eating.”
I take a deep breath of the cool night air and think about that voicemail. I scan my memory again and again, but I can’t remember an Elle. Obviously it’s someone I know from Nate’s life.
“Have you told Max yet?” Nix asks quietly.
“Tomorrow. That’s the plan.” I wanted him to be able to enjoy Will’s bachelor party without my nasty secret hanging over him.
“Huh. Maybe we should work out some sort of Bat Signal so I can interrupt with the blood work call if it’s not going well.”
“There it is!” Liz calls, pointing to the building in front of us.
There’s a long line out front, but the bouncer waves us over.
“Does he know we’re coming?” I ask Liz.
She snorts. “No, but we’re a group of five hot-ass girls going into a gentleman’s club. We probably won’t have to pay for a drink all night.”
I laugh, but my moment of good humor is cut off when a familiar voice calls, “Oh, look who’s there.”
When my eyes land on Meredith coming out of the club, I want to puke. She might have just had a baby a few months ago, but she’s as gorgeous as ever in a tiny black dress and heels, her long, silky blond hair hanging past her bare shoulders.
“What are you doing here?” I sneer.
She leans against the building and crosses her feet at her ankles. “Oh, nothing special. Just hanging with some…friends. I hear you lost your memory.”
“What’s it to you?” It’s not just a smartass retort. I want to know.
She shrugs. “I was out of town when it happened so I just heard. Me and baby girl got back last weekend. But I guess you know that since Max came to help me out for a while. He’s such a natural with kids.”
She winks at me like we share a secret, and I want to slap her.
Meredith’s eyes rake over Cally in her bride-to-be shirt. “What’s up, Cally? Are you here to pick up your check?”
Cally’s hands clench and her jaw ticks but she doesn’t respond.
Meredith’s glossed lips curl into an ugly smile. “Quite a step up from your…previous employment.”
Cally seethes beside me, and Liz steps forward. “Don’t you have a baby you should be home caring for?”
Meredith rolls her eyes. “That’s what babysitters are for.”
“You ladies coming in?” the bouncer asks.
“Have fun,” Meredith calls. “I know I did.”
I follow the girls into the club, but the energy of our whole group has changed. None of us are in the mood to party anymore. Instead, we all want to know what Meredith was doing here and if it had anything to do with our guys.
