CHAPTER FIFTY
Blair
CURRENT DAY
My phone vibrates and my heart jumps, but when I see that it’s Mom, my hope fades. I texted Zane when I landed yesterday and he still hasn’t responded. At the time, I assumed he’d just fallen asleep, since we’d had a long night, but at almost twenty-four hours and three texts later, I’m worried.
“Was that him?” Cade asks, his nagging tone pissing me off.
“Again, why are you still here?”
Cade shrugs like it’s no big deal. “I told you. I needed a mental health break. I’m here on vacation.”
Ugh. No matter how many times he says it, it’s still annoying. I arrived back at Jenna's and found brother dearest still crashing on her couch. I would have sent him packing if I didn’t feel bad for not really supporting him through his breakup.
“I’m sorry. I’m just a little stressed. That was Mom. Happy?”
“She misses you. You should come home. I know the job in San Francisco sounds amazing—”
“And right up my alley.”
“And right up your alley,” he reluctantly agrees. “But I still don’t like it. You’ll be alone in another state. You’ll be starting life from scratch.”
“I accepted the job, Cade. You know that. I’m going home next week to tell Dad in person. Plus, I wouldn’t be alone. Zane lives in San Francisco.”
“You’re alone right now, so I’m worried.”
“So am I. But I’m worried about him.”
“Why?” His tone turns accusatory and it pisses me off even more.
“Because this isn’t like him, Cade. He’s not the type to just disappear.”
“Are you kidding me? Did you hear what you just said? He disappeared for years, B.”
“Because I asked him to.” My loud tone draws Jenna’s attention and she peers around the corner, her expression sympathetic. Like me, she’s worried. But unlike me, she thinks Cade’s just looking out for me.
Cade sighs, his shoulders dropping as he sinks back into the wall behind him. “You don’t even know him anymore.” He runs a hand down his face. “I shouldn’t have let him come back here.”
“Let him? It’s not your choice if I see him or not.”
“I know, but he told us what he was going to do and we laughed, thinking he was joking.” As if to prove his point, he laughs incredulously. “I’m such an idiot.”
“What do you mean?” My brows furrow, my tilting gaze locked on his.
“He said he was going to fuck you and ghost you, and he did, didn’t he? You slept together, right?”
My lips part and I stare at Cade deadpan, replaying his words over in my mind just as Jenna cuts in. “He was joking, Cade. Don’t be a dick.”
“It may have seemed that way. But he did it. Tell me I’m wrong?”
“You’re wrong,” Jenna and I both say at the same time, to which he scoffs.
“Everything’s good then? And you’re moving to San Francisco to be with him?”
“No, Cade. I’m moving for my dream job.” And to be with him.
“I thought your dream job was to be a writer,” he accuses and I freeze. He hasn’t mentioned me being a writer for years and suddenly he’s bringing it up.
“After all this time, you still don’t want me with Zane. I thought it was because you didn’t want to lose a friend? You’re not even friends anymore.”
“I didn’t think you were ‘with Zane.’”
“Well, I am.” I sigh, my body sagging in defeat. I’m never going to make him understand. And whether I’m with Zane or not is beside the point. “It shouldn’t matter what I do with my life, Cade. You should want me to be happy, no matter what I choose.”
“I—”
“You’ve never done that. You weren’t happy when I changed my major to nursing. You weren’t happy I was with Nathan. And you’re not happy now. I can’t win.”
“You don’t know Nathan as well as—” I shoot him a death stare and he stops talking for a beat. We’re not having this argument again. That’s not the point.
“You’re wrong.” He changes direction, clenching his fist, clearly upset.
“If I believed you were truly happy with any one of those life choices, I’d be shouting it from the rooftops.
If you were happy, I’d be so ecstatic, you’d think it was sickening.
But Blair, you haven’t been truly happy since the day Sierra died.
Actually, no. You haven’t been happy since Zane’s nineteenth birthday, and I’m only now realizing why. ”
My breath hitches, and my chest grows tight. Cade turns away and I’m grateful for the reprieve. I don’t want him to see my tears. Because he’s right. Only, it took me until last week to see it.
Cade curses under his breath while I frantically wipe my eyes. And when he glances back at me, his expression distraught, my heart breaks.
“It’s always been him, hasn’t it?” he asks, shaking his head. “It’s my fault you kept it a secret.”
God, the fault game is getting old. “It’s no one’s fault anymore, Cade. It happened. For now, I just want your support with whatever choice I make.”
“If you’re not choosing Zane, will you consider coming home?”
“No. Not for any longer than a vacation.”
“Please.”
“No. You know me, Cade. I’m going to be a nurse for the Heartwood University Lions. For a D1 college football team.” My heart swells with joy and I shake my head in disbelief. “Don’t you see—” I pause when Cade starts smiling, a genuine warmth surrounding him.
“There it is.”
“There what is?”
“Your happiness. That look right there. That’s what’s been missing since you were seventeen.”
He steps forward and reaches for my hands, bending down so he can look me in the eye. “Does Zane make you this happy?”
“He does.” I nod.
“Well, okay.” He releases my hands and pulls me into a hug, his tight brotherly hold almost suffocating me, like it always used to.
“But,”—he steps back, his expression turning serious again—“if he doesn’t have the best fucking excuse for ignoring your texts, I’m going to have to hurt him.”
“If that happens, you can get in line.” I smile innocently, and Cade laughs.
“Bit by bit she’s all coming back. God, help us. I love you, but I’m not sure I’m ready for the full force of the old B to return.”
“Then it sucks to be you. Because she’s already on her way.”
I wasn’t lying when I said Zane gave me the strength to walk away from Nathan, and even if he never calls, even if Cade’s right, which he’s not, and that Zane’s ghosted me—he hasn’t—no one can take that away.
Because deep down, I know Zane cares for me.
I know he still sees me as the girl I once was, the woman with dreams who knew she deserved the world. The woman who’s starting to reappear.
More than that, he sees the woman I am now and he loves them both.
Which is why I’m worried.
But if I’m wrong, and he’s just taking his sweet-ass time to get back to me, then you better believe that I’m hunting him down.
And he can thank himself for that. After all, it’s his fault I’m finally standing my ground. Finally seeing my worth.
The silence on the mountain has me on edge and when a stick snaps beneath my foot, I startle, almost dropping my phone as my heart races, but at least I’ve still got service.
Taking a deep breath, I let the air fill my lungs and walk a little farther, never letting myself go too far in case he’s unable to call.
I’m being ridiculous. I know that. But I needed to get out of Jenna’s apartment and away from their sympathetic gazes. I needed a moment to think. But I also want to be available if Zane tries to call or finally messages me.
For all I know, Cade could be right. Zane could be running away again after I told him I slept with Nathan the night of Sierra’s accident. But something tells me that’s not what’s going on. Something deep within my soul. The part of me that’s always been Zane’s, even when I wasn’t.
I reach another peak on my hike and check my phone again. One bar. If I go much farther, I’m likely to lose it and I can’t risk that.
What if he needs me? Or worse, what if something happened to him?
When he’d kissed me goodbye at the airport, I could tell something was off, but he assured me that everything was okay, and I have no reason not to trust him. He’s never shown me otherwise. Something must be wrong and—
My phone rings, cutting me off mid-thought and I fumble to answer. My heart races but when I see that it’s my old Jacksonville work friend Kayla, I sigh.
“Hey Kayla. How are you?” I try to keep my voice light but I’m struggling.
“Blair. Thank God.” Kayla’s frantic voice filters through the phone before she sucks in a breath.
“Are you running?”
“No. Well, yes. I ran to find my phone. Remember that famous patient we had, the one involved in that knife fight?”
“Yes?” I whisper, a new fear working its way into my chest.
“He died, Blair.”
Her words echo through my head and I pray I heard wrong. “What?”
“He died,” she repeats, and a stabbing pain shoots through me. “It’s not common knowledge yet, but I remember you asking me and Ruth to take over looking after him, along with his teammate, because you had history there. I thought you might want to know.”
“Oh, God.” My head feels light as the blood drains from my face. I never gave Kayla much to go on back then, but I could tell by her sympathetic expression that she understood. And God, am I grateful.
“You knew them, didn’t you?”
“Only the teammate and this is going to break him.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Thank you for letting me know.”
We chat for another minute or so but I’m numb, going through the motions, and when she hangs up, I immediately dial Jenna, though I have no idea what to say.
“Hey, you.”
“Jenna.” My voice wavers as I fight back tears on my way down the mountain, desperate to get home. “He died.” My stomach churns as nausea takes over me, and I can’t stop myself from shaking. Sucking in a breath, I try to get air in my lungs, but nothing I do seems to work.
“Who died?”
“Blair?” Cade’s voice filters through the phone. “Blair. What’s going on? You’re freaking me out.”
“The guy in the coma. The guy Zane hurt. His teammate. He died.”
“Motherfucker,” Cade curses under his breath.
“What?” Jenna’s panicked voice hits me. “Tell me.”
I want to explain, but Zane’s grief-stricken face shadows my mind and all I can do is mutter his name, listening while Cade fills her in.
This is going to kill him. No wonder he hasn’t called.
Images of Sierra’s lifeless body flash through my mind before morphing into Zane and the vision of his devastated expression when he discovered her death.
My breath shakes as I shatter.
This’ll push him over the edge.
I have to find him.