Atlas
Four days later
Link
We need to talk. Come ALONE to Hollow Bend.
My friend’s text is the only thing pulling me from a fantasy where I’ve already grabbed mine and Summer’s passports and booked us tickets to her shit-hit-the-fan getaway destination—Spain.
Why the fuck does Link want me alone? He knows I harbor no secrets when it comes to Summer, and I don’t intend on having any. He was here an hour ago. Everything seemed normal. Still, if he makes the case to use caps, I’ll go and see what the fuss is about.
“It’s Link. There’s an issue.”
“Do you need my help?”
“I’ll handle it. I shouldn’t be long. You know how to wait for me, right?”
“Sound asleep?”
“I’m so going to enjoy giving you a proper wake-up call.” I steal a kiss as a promise of what’s to come, but then she grabs my forearm and stops me.
“Hey, have I ever, you know . . . not awakened?”
“Honey, you’re a really heavy sleeper, but if I can’t wake you up with my dick inside you, I’m definitely taking it personally.”
I leave her chuckling as I grab my jacket and head out.
Link waits for me in the dimly lit living room at Hollow Bend, the lack of light doing nothing to hide the sorrow collected between his brows or his unwillingness to say what he called me here for.
“Sit.”
“I’d rather not.”
“Trust me, you’ll want to.”
I stay pinned to the spot waiting for him to spill it.
“Four days ago, when Summer fell into the pool, I was on a video call with Raven, showing her the new place. The moment the incident happened, she screamed out a name—Maeve—then silenced herself and disconnected the call. I tried asking about her reaction, but Raven said it’s a past trauma she was reminded of. She’s a horrible liar.”
He looks off to the side, jaw tight.
“Maeve DeLuca is a name I’ve heard from Raven before, when she didn’t know I was listening.
So I started digging, and an hour ago, the same contact I used before came back with the information I asked for.
A classified FBI record. Maeve’s father, Dante DeLuca, used to work for Raven’s family for fifteen years, until her father passed away.
That’s when Dante took a job for your father. ”
There’s the slightest tightening of his lips, but for the first time, I know it doesn’t come from just the mention of my father. My mouth stays sealed, fighting the urge to spit out: Where the fuck is this going?
“A job that blew up. His family was enrolled in witness protection, and they were in it for more than ten months before they were found by Mason’s people.
The report from the crime scene states that only the body of Maeve’s brother was never found.
But three days later, Summer Night’s current ID was issued.
You’d say that might be a coincidence, right? ”
Link pauses, probably noticing my confusion, but he doesn’t give me enough time to brace for what’s coming.
“The picture of the brother, Milo DeLuca, who supposedly got away, was attached to the report. The resemblance to Summer is unmistakable.”
I take a step back, uttering a silent no.
“Her real name is Maeve DeLuca. And she’s using you to get to your father.”
“Shut up!”
“Mason was the one who killed her family.”
“No. Just shut the fuck up!” I keep shouting at Link, taking another step back, as if taking a million steps away from reality. This can’t be happening.
“I’m sorry!”
“That’s a lie.” A sharp pain grips my chest, leaving me fighting for air.
“Ace . . .”
“I said—” I attempt to shout, but I choke instead. My hands fall to my knees as I bend over, trying to steady my breathing. “Shut. Up! She’s not . . . She couldn’t. She loves me. You’re mistaken.” My words come out strained through the pain that keeps tearing me apart.
Link opens his mouth, but I cut him off with what’s intended to be a firm statement that comes out as a pathetic cry.
“Don’t you look at me that way! I chased after her. She didn’t want me. You’re wrong.”
“She played you. I wish I were wrong, not only because I don’t want to see you hurt, but because this means Raven lied to me, too.”
Through the agony that feels like being torn apart on a cellular level, I straighten up, only to find Link coming my way.
“Don’t!” I put my hand up as a warning for him to stop. I need my space to breathe. I need a moment of clarity . . . or maybe inebriation.
I stride for the kitchen cabinet, rummaging for whatever booze there is, pouring myself what’s left of a whiskey bottle, filling the glass to the brim, and knocking it back. The burn down my throat does nothing to lessen the pain in my chest.
“Do you want—”
“No!”
“No?”
“What she and I have now—” I steady my breathing.
“It can’t be faked. It isn’t something you can ever walk away from.
I fuckin’ love her, Link! Even if she started this for the wrong reasons—” My throat closes up, the words scraping out raw.
“It doesn’t fuckin’ matter anymore. Her love is real now.
The most real thing I’ve ever had. It’s mine. And I’ll never let her take it back.”
Fuck the stages of grief! I’m not getting to the last one. There’s no accepting a reality where her love is a deception.
I take another bottle from the shelf, this time vodka, but before I can open it, a wave of rage hits me, and it flies from my hand, shattering against the wall.
“Fu-u-uck!” A visceral scream comes out of me as my foot finds the lower kitchen cabinet, kicking it over and over again until it no longer hangs in its place.
“She fuckin’ loves me!” Gripping the countertop, I squeeze hard to ground myself in reality.
I don’t know if I say those words to convince Link or reassure myself, but I need them running in my mind as the only thing capable of lessening the pain.
“But does she love you enough to give up her agenda?” Link’s hand lands cautiously on my shoulder.
Would she choose me? I hope . . . No! Vengeance won’t outweigh what we have. She will choose me.
Taking a couple of steps back, the weight of my body feels unbearable, forcing me to drop onto a nearby chair.
She bumped into me. She let me believe I was chasing her, knowing damn well what I crave, even if I didn’t realize it yet. It’s like she was deep inside my mind, before I had officially rolled out the red carpet for her.
The thing about pretending, however, is that no one can keep it up for long. That’s her. No pretense in what she gives me.
Link gets a chair, pulling it closer, taking a seat across from me.
“How big a fool am I to not have seen how she played me?”
“No one saw it. She was too good at the game.”
“That’s my girl!” I choke out. Through the hurt, the betrayal, the shame of being manipulated and lied to, through the uncertainty that twists my core, wondering if she loves me enough to choose me above all, there comes this fucked-up sense of pride.
I have the most special, the most precious one of them all.
The one who stops at nothing for the people she loves.
That’s the thing, I am the one she loves now, and with all her tricks and witchery, she fell into her own trap. Now she’s mine. So, how big a fool am I if I have her? Truth is, if I knew where this road was leading, I still would’ve walked it, ignoring every red flag along the way.
“Do you want me to drive you back to your place?”
I get to my feet, but while Link heads for the door, I choose to deviate and rifle through the kitchen cabinet once more, finding another bottle of whiskey.
“You shouldn’t,” Link warns. “You’ll need your wits for that conversation.”
I snort, brushing past him and heading straight for the car.
“Like that could ever help me.”
Half an hour later, more than half a bottle down, I enter our home still uncertain what it is I’m going to say to her.
The lights are out, and she’s gone to bed, probably already asleep. She won’t like it if I wake her, but she’ll like it even less when she finds out why that is.
Bear trots to my feet, wagging his tail, expecting the same man who left the house more than an hour ago, but I pay him zero attention. I leave the bottle on the kitchen counter and head upstairs to our bedroom.
I get inside, but I don’t turn on the lights. Enough moonlight is coming from outside for me to see her in our bed, sound asleep, that innocent face of hers luring me into forgetting anything and everything wrong, and crawling by her side.
Standing at the foot of our bed, I’m terrified to move, terrified to breathe, terrified to blink and lose her.