Chapter 43
CHAPTER 43
KINSLEY
“Angel? You find more—” Jace’s words drift off as he steps through the open doorway of the study, finding me clutching onto some of the images scattered across the floor.
“What is this?” I whisper, my gaze slowly drifting from the floor to him.
“Kinsley—”
“What is this?” I yell, holding up the picture of me and him. Except it isn’t us . The us in the picture can’t be more than eighteen and twenty-one.
I look back at the picture, taking in his smooth jaw and longer hair. The image itself is in black and white, reminding me of when I used to take pictures with my older cameras.
As I look at the image of us smiling, I can almost hear the ghost of his laugh. Almost feel the weight of his arm wrapped around my shoulder.
My head pulses, but I push through it and pick up another picture off the floor. This one shows me with a younger Sydney. We’re standing in the pit lanes of the very track I was at today.
“Kinsley,” Jace whispers brokenly. He falls to his knees in front of me and reaches for my hands. “I can explain.”
Slowly I look up into his eyes, tears building as my bottom lip wobbles. “Why do you have pictures of me? Of us? Jace, what is all of this?” I throw my arms out to the mess around us.
He opens and closes his mouth and I raise my eyebrows, waiting for him. To. Say. Something. But he doesn’t and I shake my head, a tear logged hiccup exploding from my chest.
“Nothing. No words come to mind to explain any of this?”
“I have plenty to say, but I can’t,” he says quietly, gritting out the last word like he’s in pain.
“What do you mean you can’t?” Anger laces my words.
“Angel, lis?—”
“Do not call me that right now,” I growl, shooting to my feet and glaring down at him. “Tell me why you have hundreds of photos of us from what looks to be years ago. How do you have these images of me when I didn’t even know you until this year.”
He stands hesitantly, his face etched with agony. “It’s complicated. The doctors said?—”
“The doctors said,” I echo. “What doctors? What are you talking about?”
“Remember how you told me about this?” He steps closer to me and I don’t stop him as he cradles my face and brushes his thumb over my scar. “Remember how you said there was a period of time taken from you because of it?”
My mind races with where he’s trying to lead me with his words, but there’s a black fog blocking my path when I attempt to connect the dots. My head pulses painfully and I wince.
I feel the heat of his body as he steps closer seconds before his hands come up to cup the sides of my face. He looks down at me, worry radiating off of him.
“What’s wrong? Are you okay?”
“I—headache,” I say, my voice void of emotion since they’re all too busy battling to see which one will take over.
“What can I do? What do you need?” he asks, his thumbs swiping over my cheeks.
“Please tell me what all of this is. Why do you have pictures of us? What were we to each other? When did we meet? H-how did we meet? Why weren’t you there after the accident? Why now? Why are we together now? What?—”
“Kinsley,” he whispers, breaking me out of my ramblings. “Breathe, sweetheart.”
I suck in a shaky breath, following along with him and my once rapidly rising chest steadies. Tears skate down my cheeks and I glance around the room at the images scattered across the floor, showcasing a past I don’t remember ever living.
I slowly look up into his eyes and blink, his thumb swiping at my tears. “You knew me.”
His face twists in agony. “Yeah,” he says on a broken whisper. “I did.”
I glance at the door. “They did too, didn’t they? Sydney, Lawson, Nik, and Ryder?” I look back at him. “Your parents?”
He sighs and nods his head, and I drop mine to his chest. My mind races as I mentally catalog all the images I saw, trying to piece together anything I might recognize.
The pulsing in my head increases and I sway on my feet, but Jace is there and he wraps his arms around me. He gently guides me over to the small sofa and sits down next to me as his hand rubs lightly over my back.
“Should I call a doctor?” he asks quietly.
“No. No, I’m okay.”
We sit in silence for a moment as I stare out among the sea of us. My face crumples when my eyes land on a picture of us cuddled up much like we were ten minutes ago around the fire.
In the image, my forehead rests against his, matching smiles on our faces as one of his hands tucks a strand of my hair behind my ear.
We look happy.
I look happy.
My heart breaks for the carefree girl in the photo. It breaks for the years I spent alone and the one I lost without warning.
A sob leaves me and I slip my hand over my mouth to smother it.
“Sweetheart, talk to me,” he whispers, his voice weighed heavy with sorrow.
“What do you want me to say, Jace?” I look at him, my skin prickling with anxiousness. “Want me to tell you how my first thought was that I was stupid?”
“What?” His body tenses, his eyes frantically rolling over my face. “Kinsley, why would you think that?”
I shoot off the couch holding my arms out as I spin to face him. “Because I thought all of this was real. I thought?—”
“Kinsley,” he rushes out, moving to stand in front of me. His hands come up on either side of my face. “This is real. We are real. It has been from the very beginning.”
“Which ‘beginning’ are you talking about, Jace? The one I know from months ago or the one I don’t ever remember us having?”
“Both,” his voice cracks, tears glistening in his eyes. “You are the best thing that has ever happened to me. Both now and when you came into my life all those years ago.”
“Then why hide all of this? Why not tell me?”
His head dips as his arms drop to his sides. I cross my arms to keep myself from reaching for him as my insides wage war against the need to be in his arms.
Maybe that should have been my first sign. The comfort I felt from the moment he was ever near me or touched me and how I quickly grew to yearn for it.
His glistening eyes meet mine. “Because I couldn’t.”
“What do you mean you couldn’t?”
“When Sydney found you and learned about your memory loss, I talked to multiple doctors who all strongly recommended that I not tell you about the past. It could hurt you, sweetheart. If I told you about the experiences, it could distort what little grasp on the memories you had and you could lose them forever.”
He shakes his head, taking the step I so desperately want to and holds my face in his hands as his thumbs swipe at my tear stained cheeks. “And I couldn’t lose you again. I couldn’t be the reason you got hurt like that. Breaking you would have completely destroyed me.”
He swallows and I let go of my already loose hold on my reactions and reach up, wiping away his tears.
“I didn’t even know Sydney had found you. I didn’t know that she showed you the photographer’s job and that you were coming to work for the team. The first time I’d seen you in eight years was in that hallway on your first day. When you looked up at me with golden eyes I’d only seen in my dreams was the first time in a very long time that I felt like everything was finally right.”
His voice cracks and he clears his throat. “When I found out about your memory loss and that it could be dangerous to tell you, I figured that if we couldn’t have our past, then we could build new memories together.”
He looks at me, the first sign of hope flickering over his features. “And we have, haven’t we? We’ve made memories that will last a lifetime.”
I nod and he tilts his forehead down to rest against mine. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you, if I could go back, there are so many things I’d do differently.”
Even though he isn’t saying the actual words, I know he isn’t just talking about the past few months. I feel it in the way he touches me and see it in the way he looks at me that he would go back to the very beginning, changing our path so we wouldn’t ever be apart.
“But I can’t and I’m sorry. Please forgive me and together we can take this one day at a time? Or if the doctors said it was okay, we could even take it one story at a time if you wanted.”
“I—”
My words cut off when my eyes catch on a photo in the corner. Walking over, I bend and pick it up. I trace my finger over the image of me and a blonde girl in a fierce hug, our faces lit up with laughter.
“This is her.”
“Who?” Jace asks, watching me from across the room.
“The girl I saw you talking to today after the race.”
He walks over, looking down at the image in my hand. “Lily.” I glance at him and he gives me a sad smile. “She was your best friend.”
I look back down at the image and walk over to the sofa, collapsing onto it with a heavy sigh. Setting the picture to the side, I drop my head into my hands.
“Tell me what you need,” Jace asks and my heart cracks at the waver in his voice.
“I just—” I look up at him, my chest twisting with my next whispered words. “I think I need a little time.”
His jaw ticks, but he nods before he looks at the ground. “Of course.”
I glance around the room. “Do you mind if I take some of this?—”
“Of course.” He drops to his knees immediately and frantically gathers the pictures, setting them back in the box and placing it on the cushion next to me. “It’s yours. All of it.”
I nod and stand with the box in my arms. “I’ll?—”
“I know, sweetheart. Whenever you’re ready. I’ll be here.”
Every part of me shatters as I leave him kneeling on the floor and with every step I take away from him, my heart cracks a little more.
For the boy who lost his love.
For the girl who didn’t know what she was missing all those years, yet felt it’s absence every single day.
For the future I suddenly feel slipping out of my reach.