Chapter 3
Ethan blinked.
She was still there. Maggie Sinclair was still there. It wasn’t a dream. The woman he’d loved, the woman who’d broken his damn heart eleven years ago, was standing less than a foot away.
“What are you doing here?” The question hung in the air and felt stupid in his ears. He had a million things he could ask her—where had she been? What had she been doing? Was she here to stay?—yet what was she doing here was what came out.
He traced the color of her light brown eyes, eyes that were so achingly familiar they felt like his.
She looked the same. But also different. The years had done nothing to detract from her beauty. If anything, they’d amplified it. Looking at her had always felt like a gut punch. Like a blow to the midsection he couldn’t breathe through.
“I, um, moved back for a bit.”
The soft velvet of her voice wove itself inside him. He had to turn her words over in his head a couple of times, force himself to focus, to make sense of them.
She was living here. In the same town. The woman he’d loved for so much of his life, the woman who’d ripped his heart out in one pull.
He closed his hands into fists to stop from reaching out and touching her, as if needing the confirmation that she was really there. And fuck, he was trying not to blink, because she’d disappear. Vanish. Like she had all those years ago.
He should be angry at her. For ending things. For cutting him off and not letting him fight for her. But he didn’t feel anger right now. He felt longing and hope and this need that ran so deeply beneath his skin that he could feel it in his bones.
Connor cleared his throat. “Are you okay, Maggie? You hit my chest pretty hard.”
Her eyes were only on Ethan for one more second before she looked at Connor. Air whooshed into his lungs, because he hadn’t taken a single breath since he’d seen her. Not one.
“Yeah, I-I’m fine.”
His brows knotted. She wasn’t fine. She was digging her nails into her thumb, something she did when she was nervous or scared.
He’d always had this overwhelming need to protect Maggie. When they were kids and her aunt treated her like trash, all he’d wanted to do was swoop in and save her.
He stepped forward. “Maggie—”
“I should go.” She took a quick step back, her gaze flicking down the path.
Go? He hadn’t seen her in eleven goddamn years and she wanted to go?
“I’ll see you later.” She curved around his team and walked away.
The fuck? She couldn’t just leave. Not again.
He caught up to her in five strides and gripped her arm. Her quiet gasp slipped into the air, and yeah, he almost gasped too. Because the feel of her beneath his fingers made it all disappear. The years apart. The ache. The heartbreak.
He searched her eyes. “We haven’t seen each other for over a decade and you want to walk away?”
Her mouth opened and closed. “I-I don’t know what to say.” Her gaze caged him. “You look good.”
He didn’t know how to respond to that. He wanted to say it back, but that would be a lie. She didn’t look good. She looked like every version of the woman he’d loved all at once.
“How have you been?” he asked.
“Okay.” The answer came quickly. Too quickly.
“Have you seen your aunt?”
There was a small flare of her eyes. It was a mix of pain and apprehension and torment. “No. I know it will happen, but I’m not in a hurry.”
He nodded. Obviously, she hadn’t been in any hurry to contact him either. She had to have known he was here too. “How long have you been back?”
“Not long.” She shuffled her feet like she was uncomfortable. “Polly said you’ve been back a year?”
“Yeah. It’s felt…different.” Mostly because he hadn’t lived in this town since he’d been a teenager. Since he’d had her. “You’ve got a place?”
“I’m staying in an apartment over Polly’s garage for now.”
Did that mean her being here was temporary? Fuck, that idea shouldn’t cause the panic that crawled beneath his skin.
She glanced over her shoulder. “I should go. It was really good seeing you, Ethan.”
He didn’t want her to leave. He wanted to learn everything about her and the life she’d lived without him, even if it hurt.
He wanted to know about her job and her social life.
He wanted to know about the places she’d lived in LA and the countries she’d traveled to.
He wanted to know why she wasn’t working as a flight attendant right now.
Was it a permanent change? Had she taken leave?
Instead, he watched her walk away, each step putting a bit more distance between them. She’d broken up with him. She’d destroyed him. Yet it had done nothing to dull the ache he felt for her.
A hand clenched his shoulder. He turned to see Connor and the other guys not far behind.
Connor was frowning. “You okay?”
“That was Maggie.”
“It was.”
The rest of the guys joined them.
“You gonna be all right with her living in the same town as you?” Zac asked.
They all knew what she’d meant to him. And they knew what her loss had done to him. How he’d had to crawl his way out of the hole in which he’d found himself.
And seeing her tonight felt like the ground had been ripped from beneath his feet.
“I don’t know if all right is the word,” he finally said.
He’d never quite figured out how to stop loving her. Not when she’d broken up with him. Not when she’d disappeared.
And now, eleven years later, she was back, and he had a feeling she still held the power to ruin him.
Breathe. Just breathe.
The quiet words whispered in Maggie’s head. But it was hard. Air wasn’t getting into her lungs. Not enough at least.
She moved quickly down the concrete path, the town square coming into view.
A gazebo centered the grass, the community center and a bunch of businesses around it.
Basil’s Pancake Bar. A small grocery store.
The Wandering Bloom, owned and run by Polly, which technically was a café but doubled as a florist and bookstore.
But Maggie barely saw any of it. She barely felt the pavement beneath her feet.
Ethan had been right there. He’d spoken to her. Touched her.
She pressed a palm to her chest, as if that could somehow ease the ache in her heart. It didn’t. The thing pounded against her ribs. This had to be what a heart attack felt like, right? Or maybe she was being dramatic.
That man had lived inside her for so long that she couldn’t remember a time before him. How many nights had she stayed awake thinking of him? So many that she wasn’t even sure she’d slept those first few years.
The chatter of voices was loud as she stepped inside the community center. It took her a few seconds to spot the back of Polly’s head.
She groaned.
The front row? Really? When she was on the verge of a panic attack?
Maggie speed-walked down the center aisle. Even though her head was down, she felt the stares of locals on her skin. She heard the hushed whispers.
Almost there.
Three more steps and she dropped into the seat beside her best friend. She rubbed her chest in firm circles.
Polly frowned at her. “Are you okay?”
“What does a heart attack feel like?”
“You’re having a heart attack?” Polly gasped.
“I don’t know. Maybe. I saw Ethan outside.”
There was a heavy pause before Polly repeated, “You saw Ethan?”
Maggie nodded, swallowing hard, as if that could somehow dislodge the lump in her throat. It didn’t. She couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t swallow. That was what the man did to her.
Polly shifted closer, voice lowering. “And?”
“It wasn’t just him. It was his team. Connor, Ryan, Joel, and Zac.
I tried to leave but he followed me and grabbed my arm.
” She touched her arm, right over where his fingers had wrapped around her.
She could still feel him there. The heat from his callused palm.
“I don’t think either of us knew what to say. ”
What could she have said? I’m sorry I broke up with you with barely an explanation, but maybe you should have called me back that night?
That was history now. Plus, he was dating someone. So even if in some crazy world they did want to pick up where they’d left off, they couldn’t.
Argh, even saying that in her head felt delusional. Her therapist would have a field day.
“I have to get used to the fact that we’ll run into each other every so often.” And she had to do that without having a mini heart attack or whatever was happening to her right now.
“But…”
The person on the other side of Polly said something, and she turned to them.
Maggie took the opportunity to breathe. She glanced around the room, catching sight of Joe Ferris on the other side of the aisle. He was smiling and talking to locals. Rodney Ward sat on the other side of the walkway a few feet down from her and Polly, eating a chocolate-glazed donut.
Maureen Faulkner dropped into the seat on the other side of her. The older woman had silver hair and wore an orange Bohemian dress with big silver hoop earrings.
“Maureen, hi.” Maggie dropped her hand from her chest, because the town psychic did not need to know she was in crisis mode.
Maureen smiled at her. “Hi, dear.”
Maggie’s brows flickered. She hadn’t seen Maureen in over eleven years, and the other woman said hi like Maggie being here was a normal occurrence.
“How have you been?” Good. There was no tremble in her voice. Maybe the other woman wouldn’t suspect the whole heart-pounding, temple-sweating stuff.
“I’m great. Anthony recently got in these big beautiful tomatoes, so I can make my tomato soup.” Mauren bumped her shoulder. “He has some Hidden Valley Ranch too.”
Maggie pulled away. How did Maureen know that Maggie’s latest obsession was adding ranch to everything?
Before she could ask, Ferris moved to the front of the crowd.
Polly leaned in close. “He looks suspiciously happy tonight.”
“He must have exciting news to share.” And she hoped like hell it was that the missing women had been found.
“Hmm.” Polly didn’t trust people easily. Especially men. But if you were going to trust anyone, it was Ferris. He was like a big teddy bear.
“Good evening, everyone.” Ferris smiled at the crowd. When his eyes settled on Maggie, they widened. “Maggie Sinclair. You’re back?”
Her cheeks bloomed, and she suddenly wanted to sink into the floor. Attention was not her friend.
“What a nice surprise,” he continued.
Polly, being the best friend in the universe, shouted, “What about me? I’m back too.”
“You never went anywhere.”
“So I have to go somewhere to get a big hello?”
The mayor chuckled and turned back to the crowd.
Maggie bumped Polly’s shoulder—a silent thank-you.
Maureen suddenly held out a flask. “Here. You might need this.”
“Why would I—”
“Trust me.”
Still frowning, she took the flask but didn’t open it.
Then, like clockwork, the door beside the stage opened and Ethan stepped in, closely followed by the other four members of his team.
Her fingers tightened on the flask.
“Shit.”
Maggie barely registered Polly’s curse. She was too focused on him.
Out there on the street, she’d tried not to stare.
Now, she could see everything.
His beautiful green eyes, which had always reminded her of that moss on the bottom of shallow water. The way his gray shirt stretched over his broad chest. And his lips… God, his lips. They’d always been beautiful. Wide and soft and so incredibly kissable.
Her belly flopped.
He looked at her, and she knew that had she been standing, she would have caved to the floor. That’s what one glance from Ethan Moore did to her. What it had always done.
The mayor continued to talk, but she barely heard a thing he said. At least until Polly shifted forward on her seat and called out, “What did you say?”
The mayor cleared his throat. “I said, that due to the recent missing people and the increased crime in our town over the last few years, Ethan Moore and his team will be forming an elite search and rescue team to get this town safe again.”
Maggie’s jaw dropped, and she looked back at Ethan to see his eyes directly on her.