20. Luke
TWENTY
LUKE
I stood in my backyard, Foo Fighters blasting from my earbuds, hands propped on my rake, as the familiar neighborhood squirrel prepared to launch himself from the fence onto Mrs. Granger’s bird feeder for the third time.
He didn’t give two shits that I was watching him from ten feet away.
I couldn’t decide if it was sheer determination or just a hefty amount of audacity.
The furry critter launched himself and landed on top of the bird feeder, avoiding not only the slippery pole but the spinning device attached to the tray only he was heavy enough to set off.
“Fucking impressive,” I murmured. If he made it this far, who was I to spoil his fun?
Holding on to the top with his back feet, he stretched the length of the cylinder toward the seeds. His little paws were nearly there when the faint sound of barking caught my attention.
The squirrel froze, then slipped. The little guy grabbed the tray, but of course that set off the spinner. He held on as long as he could, but within seconds, he flew backward and landed in Mrs. Granger’s pumpkin patch that had all but taken over her vegetable garden.
I tugged an earbud free and turned to find Ellie on the deck, barking repeatedly. And Maggie said her dog didn’t care about squirrels.
“Ellie, c’mon. He’s not harming anyone.”
She barked louder and faster, and I had half a mind to march up the deck to tell Maggie to get her dog inside before the neighbors got annoyed. I hesitated, though. It wasn’t Ellie I was mad at. Hell, it wasn’t even Miss Mayhem.
It was me.
That kiss fucking unraveled me, and I didn’t want to pick apart what that might mean.
I thought if I put distance between us and reinforced the layers of ice I kept solidly around my heart, I could reset my brain.
Make it forget that kiss ever happened. And if that didn’t work, I hoped being cold would make Maggie steer clear of me until I got my head on straight.
But at the rate things were going, that wouldn’t happen until long after she drove out of town for good.
These past couple of days had been nothing short of torture. No one warned me she’d be spending her days on her laptop at the Legion Hall, helping half our veteran population at the same time I was scheduled to lead the parade float detail.
How the hell was I supposed to focus when I kept catching glimpses of her in the background, hearing her laugh, and watching the grouchiest of the old vets break a smile minutes after they bitched and moaned about computers because she calmly talked them through the process in a language they clearly understood?
Hell, most of them gave her a hug before they left.
Knowing these men as I did, I wouldn’t have believed it for a second if I hadn’t witnessed it myself.
Ellie scrambled down the deck steps, despite the gate at the top of the staircase being closed a minute ago—at least, I swore it was closed—and bolted in my direction, her incessant barking ratcheting up another notch.
I stepped to the side, expecting her to charge the fence. I was debating whether she could jump it when she instead skidded to a stop right at my feet. She barked sharply at me.
“So, you’re mad at me, too?”
That was a shame. I was getting used to Ellie appearing in my kitchen and crawling into my lap. But come to think of it, I hadn’t received a sock since the night I was going through old photos of Mom.
Ellie jumped up, paws against my hips, and grabbed the hem of my shirt with her teeth.
“What the actual hell?”
When I didn’t move, she dropped to all fours and ran two circles around me before biting into my pant leg. She dug her back legs into the ground and tugged. Hard.
“Ellie, what are—wait, is something wrong?”
I lifted my gaze to the deck, and realized there was no sign of Maggie. Surely, if Ellie was barking up a storm, Maggie would’ve come out by now? Even if she’d been in the shower—fuck. What if she fell in the shower and was hurt?
The second I started running toward the deck, Ellie released my pant leg and sprinted in front of me.
The sliding door was pulled open, only wide enough for Ellie to fit through, and I knocked on the doorframe loudly as the pup darted inside.
“Maggie? Are you in here?”
Some strangled version of here sounded faintly from inside.
“I’m coming in,” I hollered, yanking the door open wider. I was rushing toward the bathroom when Ellie started barking again, directing me to the smaller bedroom.
I ran to the doorway and froze.
Maggie sat in the middle of the floor, surrounded by a sea of satin and tulle.
I gripped the doorframe as I fought through the nightmare that assaulted me from every conceivable direction.
It was as though each and every minute of that awful day played out at once in double time—the wedding dress hanging off-kilter, the ring on top of a note, the cake I punched a fist through, the church full of people I had to tell, the empty closet in my bedroom.
“Luke!” Maggie’s voice sounded strangled, and it pulled me far enough back to reality to focus.
“Are you hurt?”
“Ca—can—bree.” She held her neck, and I realized she couldn’t breathe.
“Did you choke on something?”
She shook her head, motioning to her back. “Dress.”
I knelt behind her, thankful as hell I only had a zipper to contend with. But when I yanked it down, my hand slipped.
Maggie whimpered, swaying. Fuck, she was going to pass out. I tugged harder, but the damn thing was stuck.
“I don’t want to break it,” I said, trying and failing a third time.
“Cut.”
“What?”
She patted my upper thigh, then my ass.
“Maggie—”
“Cut,” she said, pulling my pocketknife free from my back pocket.
“You want me to cut you out of this dress?”
“Yes!” she practically cried, and it was then I saw the tears in her eyes. She could scream at me later for ruining her dress. Right now, the only thing that mattered was air returning to her lungs.
“Hold still,” I said, slipping the blade between the satin and her bare back.
I yanked the blade toward me, and the fabric tore easily. I used my hands to rip it free the rest of the way, beads flying, until, at last, Maggie sagged in relief.
“Thank you,” she said, sitting up and wiping at the moisture under her eyes, smudging her mascara further. “I didn’t want to die in this damn dress.”
“I’m sorry I had to tear it. I know someone who can fix it. I can give Carlos a call. He’s the best—”
“It can’t be fixed,” Maggie said, hiccupping a laugh as she wiped again at her red-rimmed eyes. “It’s my fault for putting it on. This whole thing is my fault.”
Fresh tears trailed down her cheeks, and I averted my gaze like the asshole I was because I was fighting the overwhelming impulse to tug her into my arms. But with that bodice so loose and my head clearly not on straight, I couldn’t risk what might happen. It wouldn’t be fair to either of us.
I stared at the dress instead, and it was then the scene before me truly came into focus.
This wasn’t just Maggie trapped in a wedding dress—it was a fucking horror scene.
The dress was torn in multiple places, as though someone had intentionally shredded the fabric.
There were so many stray threads and loose stitches it almost looked like part of the design.
More than half the beading was crushed or outright missing.
The damage I did to the back of the dress was minimal compared to what happened to the rest of it.
“What the hell happened to your dress?”
“I wanted to make sure there wouldn’t be a wedding,” she said flatly, swiping at her eyes with the back of her hand. “Mission accomplished.”
My chest tightened, and those earlier images assaulted me all over again, this time with the internal volume knob cranked high.
You’re going to absolutely die when you see me! Raquel’s voice taunted me. This town will be talking about our wedding for decades.
My throat tightened, and I reached a hand to it, trying desperately to rub the sensation away.
“Luke?” Maggie asked, reaching a hand to my forearm.
Somewhere in the ambush playing out in mind, she managed to get to her feet without my help.
She held the loose bodice with one hand, but it wasn’t enough to hide the soft curve of her breasts peeking out from the sides of it.
I had to get the fuck out of here, because nothing made any sense.
How could I want this woman and hate her so much in the same moment?
You don’t hate Maggie, dumbass.
But I didn’t know her. That much was clear.
“You sabotaged your own wedding?” I asked in a low growl, still battling the chatter in my brain from the wedding guests that day.
The panic, the concern. The fucking pity. I could stomach a lot from well-meaning people, but the pity made me see red.
“Are you okay?”
I looked at her then, but it wasn’t Maggie’s face I saw. It was Raquel, smiling up at me as though she knew something I didn’t. Had she been planning to embarrass me this whole while?
I wanted to make sure there wouldn’t be a wedding.
That was Maggie’s voice.
Maggie’s words.
I pitied the man she jilted, and that pissed me off even more.
“Did you leave him standing at the altar with a church full of people?”
Maggie flinched as though I’d slapped her.
“Luke, stop,” Maggie said, her tone low and firm. “This obviously isn’t about me.”
A voice whispered in the back of my ear to shut the fuck up, but I didn’t listen to it.
“Did you make him explain to all your guests that there wouldn’t be a wedding because you were too much of a coward to do it yourself?”
“Okay, I think you need to leave now.”
It was Ellie’s low warning bark that yanked me back to reality and muted the mental assault from my past. I tried to speak, but the apology on the tip of my tongue wouldn’t form into actual words.
Behind Maggie’s icy glare, there was compassion. Pity. She fucking pities you now. Way to go, jackass.
“Luke?” she said, her tone both a warning and a reminder I’d been told to leave.
“Right,” I answered with a nod.
It was better if I just went. Better if she decided I was a colossal asshole.
We’d steer clear of one another even more than we already did.
It’s better this way. But two steps past the threshold, I turned.
Before I could spit out some semblance of an apology, I caught a blur of black, copper, and white, half a second before the door slammed in my face.
I could handle Maggie being pissed at me—that was just another Tuesday. But Ellie’s judgment broke something inside me.