Chapter 2
Two
Lacey
"Well, Mrs. Grey," Chelsea the medic says to me, stripping off her blue rubber gloves and clutching them in one hand, "as far as things go, you got lucky. That packing can come out tomorrow. Just have Cole ping me, and I'll find you and take care of it."
I blink. "I, um…do you need my insurance information?"
She grins. "Nah. Friends and family discount."
"But I…how am I supposed to have Cole ping you? I don't have his number. I don't even know where I'm staying."
She gives me a long stare—one suggesting I may be a few popsicle sticks short of a tree house. "He's the sheriff, honey." She points at the nearby municipal building. "Just pop in there and ask to see Sheriff Mannix."
I'd rather stab myself in the eyeball with a hot, rusty fork than face that man, right now. "Got it, thanks."
Chelsea chuckles as she stows the things she got out to treat my broken nose. "Not Cole's biggest fan, are you?"
I sigh. "You didn't grow up around here, I take it."
She shakes her head. "No. Moved up here from Caseville…" she casts a thoughtful glance at the ceiling. "Six years ago? Seven? God, has it been that long?" She leans backward to shoot a look at her partner, in the driver's seat. "Yo, Mikey. When did I start?"
"Eight years this spring, Chels." He pronounces the nickname with a Z-sound: Chelz.
"Eight years? Jesus, I'm old." She cuts another glance at me. "Why do you ask?"
"Because if you grew up here, you'd know why I'm not exactly eager to spend time around Cole Mannix."
"You guys have history, huh?"
Her partner, Mike, chimes in. "Chels, babe. You're stepping in some seriously stinky shit you don't want any part of, I promise."
I blink. “Wait, wait, wait." I move forward to get a better look at him. "Mike Rollins?"
He twists in the seat and gives me a jaunty little two-finger salute. "Lacey Grey. Been a while."
Mike Rollins was on the periphery of our friend group back in high school.
He was always a nice guy, as far as I remember.
He was on the football team's offensive line—he used to be a huge kid, heavy as well as tall.
He's still tall and broad-framed, but he's not built for the line anymore, having trimmed down to a healthy fighting weight in the last fifteen years.
His expression is friendly and warm as he regards me. "Damn, girl. You haven't aged a day. If anything, you've aged in reverse."
I return his smile. "Thank you, Mike. You're very kind. You look well, yourself."
He pats his belly, which is a little…protuberant. "Eh, lyin's not a good look on you, Lacey."
I shrug. "I'm not lying, Mike. Last time I saw you, you weighed four hundred pounds."
Chelsea coughs, then splutters. "The fuck? You did not."
Mike grabs a cell phone from the cupholder, unlocks it, and swipes rapidly through photos until he finds the one he's looking for—it's Riley, Felix, Nyx, Cole, and Mike all in football uniforms, helmets under one arm, sweaty and grinning and grass-stained.
God, they're all so young. And Mike is, in fact, a behemoth in the photo—he was an All-State offensive lineman, as I recall, with speed and agility a guy his size shouldn't have been capable of.
Chelsea is shocked, taking the phone from her partner and zooming in to get a closer look at him and the others. "Bunch of hotties, good lord." She eyes Mike. "You were a big boy, back in the day, pardner."
Mike snorts. "Topped out at four-ten my senior year."
"You were All-State, right there with everyone else in that photo," I say. "What'd you get up to after graduation?"
He pulls one arm out of his jacket sleeve, lifts the sleeve of his navy-blue tee, and shows me the globe-and-anchor tattoo of the USMC.
"Did a tour in Afghanistan. Took a round to the gut, got medically discharged, and moved back up here.
Been a paramedic for Three Rivers ever since. Going on eleven years now."
"Thank you for your service, Mike."
He rolls his eyes, grumbling under his breath.
"Never know what I'm supposed to say when people say that shit to me.
Thanks? You're welcome?" The radio crackles, and then the dispatcher's voice fills the ambulance.
"Ah, shit. That's us, Chels. Lacey, great to see you again, despite the circumstances. "
I scramble for the exit. "Let me get out of your way, then. Thank you, Chelsea."
She waves, one hand on the rear door. "No problem! Find me tomorrow so I can get that packing out of your nose."
She slams the door shut and then the ambulance is gone in a swirl of snow and a howl of the sirens, lights strobing.
And just like that, I'm alone in Three Rivers again, now with a broken and reset nose, nostrils packed with gauze, aching knees and wrists, and nowhere to stay.
Why did I come here? What did I think was going to happen? Granted, there's nowhere else I could have gone, except Florida to see Mom and Dad, but hell no. I see them for two weeks, once a year, at Christmas. That's more than enough.
I head for my car; as I'm about to open the door, three huge pickup trucks slide by going slowly.
The first is a dusty gold F250 with a lift, all-terrain tires, and a bullbar, Felix behind the wheel.
The second is a filthy white Tundra with a matching bed cap, an even bigger lift than Felix's, and even bigger and knobbier tires; the truck is absolutely covered in mud, and none other than Cody Nyx is behind the wheel.
Figures. If he wasn't playing football, he was in that big old tumbledown barn behind his house, wrenching on something.
The last truck in line is a pristine, vintage, cherry-red Chevy Stepside, late sixties, with chrome wheels and a hood scoop.
Dad was a truck guy. I doubt anyone except Cole ever knew, but I used to spend Sunday mornings in the garage with my father, helping him work on his pride and joy: a 1959 Chevy Apache, all original and numbers matching. I was so, so mad when I found he'd sold it. I’d always hoped to inherit it.
Cole's eyes track me as he passes, his head swiveling. He doesn't nod, wave, or otherwise acknowledge me, so I don't either. We just stare at each other until he's past.
My heart cracks in my chest, and guilt boils under my skin, simmers in my gut, sour and acidic. I realize my hand is on my belly again, and I hastily yank it away.
It's history, now. Ancient history. No point bringing it up.
Except he deserves to know, a little voice says, whispering in the back of my head.
"Lacey Grey?" A male voice says behind me. "No fuckin' way."
I turn slowly, suppressing a sigh as I yet again decline to correct whoever this is now—Grey is my maiden name.
I haven't changed it back yet because it's a giant complicated pain in the ass—you need a new license, all new credit cards and debit cards, you have to change your name on utilities and billing statements, and…yeah. I’m neither Ms. Grey nor Mrs. Grey, nor, legally, Grey at all; I’m Lacey Fascinelli, still and unfortunately.
But to these people I haven’t seen since high school, I'm still and always Lacey Grey. And I…I kind of like that. It's like, for a split second, I could almost believe the last fifteen years haven't happened.
"Riley!" I smile at him. "Congratulations!"
He's confused, the poor man. "It just happened. How the fuck do you know we just got engaged?"
I pat the roof of my car. "I was in my car watching when you popped the question."
"Oh." He eyes the direction Cole's truck went, then back at me. "He knows you're back in town?"
"Yes."
"You good?
"Honestly, no." I swallow hard as a blizzard of emotions swirls inside me and threatens to spill out via my eyeballs. "I just kind of ended up here and I don't have anywhere to stay. Does Mrs. Clayton still run that B-and-B North of town?"
Riley shakes his head. "Nah. Mrs. Clayton passed a while back." He rubs the back of his neck, wincing. "To be honest, Lacey, you picked the worst time to show up out of the blue, just in terms of lodging. It's Christmas—everywhere is gonna be booked solid through January."
I tip my head back, squeezing my eyes shut. "Shit. I wasn't planning, I just—" my stupid eyes sting, and my chest feels like it was being squeezed by a giant fist, and I absolutely refused to cry in front of Riley Crowe. "God, this sucks."
The woman beside him, fairly tall, slender, with gorgeous curly strawberry blonde curls and stunning green eyes, nudges him. "You must help her, my love. Can you not see that she is in the depths of despair?"
Riley's lips twitch at his fiancée’s melodramatic—but not entirely inaccurate—description of me. His eyes twinkle with amusement. "Is that what it is, Lace? The depths of despair?"
Eddie never called me Lace. No one calls me Lace anymore. Come to think of it, he almost never actually used my name at all. Just "babe" almost exclusively.
As in, “Hey, babe, grab me a beer, would you?"
Or, "Hey, babe, my boss and six of my coworkers are coming over tonight for some cards. Can you throw together a little something for us?"
Or, "Hey, babe, I need to fuck you. Take your clothes off."
And they say romance is dead.
Unfortunately, that is, quite truthfully and very literally, his idea of getting me in the mood.
And I did.
I took my clothes off and let him fuck me.
Faked my orgasms 99.99% of the time—he gave me, at last count, a total of four real orgasms in the two years we dated and eight years of marriage.
In return, I got to live in a six-thousand-square-foot brick mansion in Bloomfield Hills, sitting on a prized full acre lot in one of the most exclusive subdivisions.
I got to drive Porsches and Mercedes. I wore Cartier and De Beers, Yves St. Laurent and Chanel, and Louboutin.
I got to play tennis at a country club and attend black-tie galas.
All for the low, low price of my soul, my personality, my career, my dreams, and my dignity.
Nothing says, "I've made it!" like sucking your husband's dick for that new diamond necklace/purse/car.
"Something like that," I say, belatedly answering Riley's question.