Chapter Eleven #3
Her eyes snapped open, speechless, aflame with a gutted glare in his floodlights.
“You know what?” she snapped, slouching her hands on her hips as a husky chuckle rolled up his throat—“Never mind, I’ll figure it out on my own, like always.
” She jabbed play on her video again and turned back to her Rover.
His chuckle waned at her venom, packing more punch than he’d expected. “Hey—”
“No, Thaddeus—” She whirled around, her voice tremoring.
Thaddeus? She knew his given name? He opened his mouth to argue, except those pretty jade greens glistened with unshed distress as she pointed accusingly at him. “You don’t get to give me a wrong freaking number to ghost me—”
Wait what? Wrong number? His heart raced—
“And make me feel like a complete fool, then give me shit on the side of the road at one in the morning.”
Wariness skittered up and down his spine. “What the hell are you talking about?” he croaked.
She scoffed and paused her video again. “Was it just to get back at me? For kicking you out? What, I bruised your ego or something? You have no idea how much I wished that morning had been different. You have no idea what was happening. Just like you have no idea what happened tonight. But I saw you loud and clear. All I was, was just another face on the McClintock’s Alumni wall. ”
No … no she wasn’t. She might as well gut punch him.
Because, hell … he suddenly couldn’t breathe.
His Flower Girl inspired lyrics, warmed his dreams, she was nothing like them and he …
wished he could take it all back. Wished he could go back in time, make different decisions, knowing this woman was going to come into his life one day.
He didn’t want her comparing herself to some nameless, forgotten woman on a Facebook page he couldn’t control.
“Then tell me—”
“Oh, where’s that girl that smiles so pretty?
” She imitated his voice. “She’s here, dealing with crisis after crisis after crisis, but after you begged so hard that morning…
” She shook her head, laughing coldly to herself, staring into space.
“You sure made a fool of me, and validated every single thing my brain had been telling me was true about you that my heart was ignoring, thinking you meant it, that you wanted someone to hold you like they wanted to keep you, too, and I fell for it and … oh God, it’s my fault, I swore I’d never fall for someone like you again—”
“Hey, easy, Charlie,” he murmured softly, pulse spiking.
What was she saying? And this spunky side of her…
Deciding to risk her inner viper, he took her arms, rubbing his palms up and down. She stiffened.
“What d’you mean you called?” He swallowed, gentling further so that his voice felt gruff, mind racing with where to start, what to say.
She called … but she never called me… Fuck. Had he done what he suspected he might have? What he hadn’t done in a long time? That only ever happened when he was flustered, concentration frayed, and she’d definitely flustered him that morning.
“I never got a call.”
Her eyes searched his face that he was certain had drained of color.
“Yeah, that’s because a random guy named Anthony did, and after four calls to the same wrong number, he finally told me I’d obviously been blown off and I was better off without the asshole who’d done it and, after I saw your fan club online, believe me, I was glad I dodged the bullet. ”
Her voice was softer now. Thicker, like she was staving off hurt. “Thing is, I really thought you liked m…” She trailed off, gazing into the cornfields around them.
“Let me see your phone.” He plucked it out of her hand and tapped out of her YouTube.
“Hey,” she protested, but he tapped open her phone log, yanking out of her reach to keep inspecting it, and sure enough four calls to the same number.
The one that should have been his. Except he’d already tapped on the contact and opened up the number. He scrutinized it. Picked it apart. Homed in on the nine and the seven, side by side…
Stony faced, he looked down at her now. She was watching him, silent. She really had called. Four times on two different days.
“I couldn’t believe you’d do that. You’d seemed like such a better person…” she whispered.
Better person. This was the first person to say that other than his sisters.
“I flipped my nine and seven around,” he croaked. He rolled his tongue across his bottom lip, scouring his jaw, handing it back to her. “Seven’s supposed to come first, not the nine. Usually, it’s just letters but … I, uh, screwed up.”
Nothing but a screwup… Nothing but trouble.
That morning, he’d been rushing. He’d been confused and hurt by her hot and cold.
She calculated him with those teary eyes filled with genuine hurt. Then she dared to edit the number, switched the seven and nine, and then, thumb hovering, she dared to tap call.
A second later, his phone chimed. Incoming call. He withdrew it from his pocket and held it out for her to see, illuminated in his palm. She stared at it for a beat, then her eyes lifted to his. He ended the call.
“You called me—”
“You didn’t ghost me—”
They said at the same time, cutting each other off and falling silent again.