Forgiven: The Nash Brothers, Book Two

by Aarons, Carrie

  Fletcher says all this like it’s a matter of fact. And his twin nods, raising his eyebrow at me.

  “And now you have to be the best man, while she’s the maid of honor? Awkward much?”

  “Why would it be awkward?” I ask as if I don’t know just how fucking awkward this whole wedding process is going to be.

  “Because weddings make people horny. Love is in the air. Bridesmaids and groomsmen do it in a closet when no one is looking. They take each other home after the after party. Everyone knows that.” Fletcher shrugs, smirking.

  “You’re damn right, I forgot about that. Shit, Presley better have some hot bridesmaids.” Forrest looks deep in thought.

  “But, Lily is yours. You guys are the match during the wedding. The ones who will walk down the aisle right before the bride. You’ll have to escort her into the reception. The best man and the maid of honor … you’ll be a pair that night.”

  Forrest snorts. “How the hell do you know so much about weddings?”

  His twin shrugs. “Not much else to do in rehab than therapy and watch shitty chick flicks on TV.”

  But I don’t hear their banter. Because my brothers are right … and I’m fucking fucked. Worse than I was fucked the day before when I’d cornered Lily and had actually wanted to rip her clothes off with my teeth. Not that I’d tell them that. I would have to walk her down the aisle of the church. The church we’d talked about getting married in, once upon a time when we were naïve high school kids in love.

  “It’s nothing.”

  They both start to crack up, and Forrest steps up to the plate again. “Dude, it’s not nothing. Once you get your head out of your ass and stop pretending you haven’t been pining for Lily for ten years, then you’ll be ready to get married.”

  Maybe if I hit him in the skull with this ball, he’ll shut the hell up.

  5

  Lily

  I hate the Kickoff Carnival.

  It reminds me of childhood days and nights spent posing as the senator’s daughter, instead of playing the kind of games where you shoot water into a clown’s mouth to win a prize or riding the Tilt-a-Whirl until you puked.

  My family was small, just me, my mom, and my dad … but we were as proper and conservative as they came. My father was a Republican government official and had been in some capacity for my entire life. I was the model daughter who stood behind him next to my mother on stage; I always made good grades, wore dresses in public, volunteered, excelled at things like Girl Scouts and 4-H, and when I eventually went to college, I majored in a specialty that would bring me home again. While I loved books, and I became a librarian for me, it also didn’t hurt that my father’s daughter worked in a branch of the local government and gave her time furthering literacy and education.

  Except for that one night, I had always been the perfect child. How my father liked to remind me of that.

  The second reason I hated the Kickoff Carnival was that it reminded me of Bowen.

  Everything in Fawn Hill reminded me of him … but especially the carnival. We’d started dating almost the minute I’d walked into school as a freshman, and by the June before my first year of high school ended, my virginity was a technicality.

  We’d done everything but it, and I was ready. We were two kids madly in love, with the heat of the summer racing through our veins. It was as feverish and lustful as teenagers could get.

  And on the first night of the carnival, long after the ride lights had been turned off and all the townspeople had gone home, I gave Bowen the one gift I could never give anyone else. On a blanket he’d brought, spread on the floor of our gazebo, just feet from the carnival’s back exit in Bloomsbury Park, we lost our virginities while whispering I love you into each other’s ears.

  It was so high school, so cliché. But when I look back at it, it was so sob-inducingly special that I couldn’t help but shed a tear. That’s how everyone’s first time should be; with a person they share love and commitment with. It should be a night looked back on that warms the heart and has a glow to the memory, even if things didn’t work out in the end.

  So as I walk into the fair with my father, I have to literally clench all the muscles in my body. Maybe if I pretend I’m wearing armor, it won’t hurt so bad.

  “Senator Grantham!”

  “Lily, good to see you!”

  “Oh, Senator, Lily, hi!”

  From all around the carnival people call out to us. This is how it is anywhere I go with my father, and I’ve grown accustomed to it, yet tired of it. When I’m out by myself, I get to just be Lily, the friendly librarian. That makes me sound like Spider-Man or something, but I can just be myself. I can chat about their families, or the latest restaurant I tried in Lancaster, or the movie I caught at the Cineplex.

  When I’m with Senator Eric Grantham, I’m just a pretty face. Smile, nod, look up adoringly at whatever boring topic he’s blabbering on and on about.

  These are the times I wish I was holed up in the library, back in the shelves, organizing books and combing through old favorites. When I was there, I felt at home. Everything had a place; each story had its appropriate ending. Books were never jumbled or lost or confusing … like the loop of thoughts playing in my head endlessly.

  Books brought you to a place that helped your mind escape all the troubles reality put there.

  “Lily?”

  When I look up, Dad is staring expectantly at me. “Hmm?”

  “Were you listening to me?”

  I nod, a white lie spilling out of my mouth. “Of course.”

  He eyes me like he knows I’m not telling the truth. “I said I made the rounds. I don’t have a speech or anything tonight, and your mother is at home waiting. I’m going to go, have a big meeting tomorrow. See you in the morning?” Dad leaned over and pressed a kiss to my hair.

  Despite my annoyances with him, he’s always been a good dad. Provided for me, raised me to do the right thing, and was there for all of my big moments. He might be strict, but he means well. And we might have differing political opinions—but if I told him that the world might end, so it’s something I’ve kept to myself for nine years, since I was old enough to vote.

  There are some battles that just aren’t worth the trouble.

  “Sounds great. I’m just going to say goodbye to Presley at her tent, and I’ll walk back to my house.”

  “Be careful, okay? Text us when you get in.” His voice is full of lecture.

  “Yes, I will.” I try not to roll my eyes as he leaves me in the middle of the fairway.

  I’m twenty-seven years old, live in a town with five stop lights, and my parents still insist I text them when I get home to a house I bought myself. Kid gloves don’t even come close to what I’m handled with.

  Making sure to take the long way around, to avoid the tent where the Nash brothers and their mother, Eliza, were making caramel corn, I headed for Presley’s tent.

  Her yoga studio had opened just three days after the proposal at the party for friends and family, and I’d already been to two classes. Naturally, they were just as great as her classes in the park, and the space looked amazing with all its namaste vibes and natural light.

  She’d been nervous to set up her own booth advertising the studio at the Summer Kickoff Carnival, but Penelope and I had convinced her it would be amazing for business.

  And as I come upon the tent, I find that my best friend and I weren’t wrong. Penelope had been right that people would flock to Presley’s booth if they knew she was giving out free water bottles and a coupon to attend one free class. There were people flocking to my redheaded friend as she buzzed about the tent talking about yoga, health, and the need to stretch away your stress.

  I smiled, waving to her as she talked, and she motioned me over. With a tilt of my head, I tried to relay that I didn’t want to interrupt and I’d see her tomorrow.

  Penelope was home with her three kids, and how she managed all those boys at once was beyond me. She was a wa
rrior … and one of the strongest, smartest people I’d ever known. Even if she tried to downplay that with her chatty blond routine.

  So with both of my friends occupied, it really was time for me to head home.

  The people of Fawn Hill, these people I’ve known all my life, smile and wave as I pass. And I suddenly feel very alone in a sea of humans who know me and my life more than anyone should know any one person. It’s been put on display for them, I’ve been the topic of gossip for a decade now.

  Yes, they mean well most of the time, but it’s been hard between my father’s career and my relationship going up in flames.

  The noise dulls as I walk past the last ride, it’s twinkling lights searing into my vision and leaving spots. I don’t realize where I am until the stark white structure is in front of me, and I can’t unsee it.

  The gazebo.

  Gosh, I wish they would raze this thing. Obviously, no one else in Fawn Hill knows the memories that exist here for me, but if I could convince someone to demolish it, I would.

  Aside from the night we gave ourselves to each other, this spot was the one where Bowen took me after we saw our first movie. We would come here when neither of us could stand being in our houses, and on numerous occasions snuck here in the middle of the night just to snuggle under the stars together. It was our spot, and in the last ten years, I’ve tried as hard as I can never to come here.

  But tonight, I walked into a trap. It’s snagged me, a spike stabbed through my heart, pinning me right where I am.

  I should turn around, but something in me whispers to my heart to walk up the three small stairs and stand inside. The minute my sandal hits the wooden planks that comprise the floor, memories assault me.

  Bowen’s hands in my hair. His sparkling blue eyes at twilight. Those three little words he’d whisper in my ear. The giggle fits I’d have knowing that I’d snuck out just to meet him, and how dangerous that could be. Thinking of the risk then had sent butterflies exploding through my stomach. Our love had been wild and exciting … with it, we could do anything.

  That was exactly the reason we’d burned out in such a glorious fashion.

  That was why I left the love stories to my books now. Coming up here was a mistake. I didn’t need to be reminded of how badly damaged my heart was.

  But before I can turn to leave, a scuffling in the dark has me jumping to attention.

  And when I turn, I’m transported back in time.

  6

  Bowen

  My sneaker stubs the first step as I go to bolt silently, and Lily’s head whips up.

  Fuck, she’s noticed me.

  I can’t very well turn around now and act like I hadn’t just come to our spot to be alone. I hadn’t known she was here … hell, I hadn’t seen her here since the last time she came here with me.

  Did she come to our spot often?

  I wouldn’t admit, if asked, how many times I have found myself here over the years.

  “Uh …” Lily stutters, caught.

  Even in the dark, I can tell she’s blushing. It’s difficult to notice when embarrassment creeps over her cheeks, because her skin is the shade of the milkiest cup of coffee. But my degree is in Lily Grantham, I studied her religiously. The slightest shade of pink will flush across the bridge of her nose, work its way down to those high cheekbones, and then settle on the edge of her jaw. I used to kiss that spot, nibble it when she’d get embarrassed around me.

  “Come here often?” My voice is gruff, and I don’t mean to flash the smirk looming behind my lips, but I do.

  Now, Lily’s eyes go wide in the dark, the white of them bugging out at me.

  Her voice comes out in a whisper. “Actually, never. This is the first time I’ve been here since …”

  She doesn’t need to say the car crash for me to know what she’s thinking about.

  Since I’m already here, I may as well stop teetering between the first and second step and just go all the way in.

  “Were you here with your Dad?” I grit my teeth, trying to be civil and not curse at the thought of her father.

  Eric Grantham and I had never liked each other much. Back then, he thought I was a cocky asshole, which I was. But I loved his daughter, I treated her like a princess, and I always put her first. Always. I wasn’t one of those high school boyfriends who ignored her on the weekends or left her at parties. I always took care of her, and he knew that. He just hated that I wasn’t some buttoned-up nerd with the wholesome look that furthered his senate agenda.

  Everything in her father’s life revolved around how much power and influence he could amass. Aside from having totally opposite views as me from a human standpoint, I just … I could never shake the feeling that under the suit and tie, the guy was as smarmy and corrupt as the politicians you watch in movies.

  When we’d almost died in the car crash, he’d used it as the perfect leverage to get me out of the picture. I’d tiptoed around him for years, trying to be on my best behavior so that he wouldn’t split Lily and I up, and then I’d played right into his hand.

  “Yes. Kissing babies, shaking hands.” She blows out a sigh.

  “So nothing has changed then?” I mean it both as a dig and an inside joke.

  The fact that she’s still puppeting around as the perfect daughter at twenty-seven is pathetic. But we also used to joke about this all those years ago, how fake her father could be in public.

  “I don’t really have much of a choice. Or much else to do with my nights. Sitting at home gets lonely,” Lily admits.

  We’re standing on opposite sides of the gazebo, a place that holds so many immortalized nights for us.

  “I know what that’s like.”

  I shouldn’t have said that. Because in this moment, she is looking at me with something akin to tenderness in her eyes, and I can’t have her looking at me like that.

  “Do you come here often?” Her voice is quiet.

  I shouldn’t have even stepped into the space at all. I’ve transported us back to yesteryear, and now we feel as if we have some right to visit it. I should have bolted the moment I saw her standing in here, but I was just too damn curious. What’s that saying? The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.

  No matter how many times we flirted around the subject of us, the end result was that we were doomed.

  But I answer her anyway. “Yes.”

  That one word has her rearing back, her shock palpable.

  What is it about this last year that keeps pulling us together in a magnetic, forceful way? For the nine years before it, I’ve managed to pretty much steer clear of Lily. Yes, we live in the same town so it’s inevitable that I’d bump into her at the grocery store or see a flash of her hair as she walked down the street, but the last year has put my willpower to the test.

  Just like right this instant. When we’re unconsciously moving toward each other, our feet moving of their own accord. Lily’s eyes stay trained on mine as if I might spook. My heart rattles in my chest, the cold, dead organ shaking the dust off because it’s in its matches’ vicinity once more. With shaking hands, she reaches for me, in our gazebo, on a night that we spent together so many years ago.

  Time has stopped, existing only between her and I. In our bubble, there is no animosity. No secrets or history or bullshit.

  There is only Lily, and the love that still burns so brightly between us it could reduce this town to ashes.

  That face, the one I used to kiss for hours, looms right in front of me. So I take it in my hands, and her eyes flutter shut as I touch her for the first time in a decade. My stomach twists, goose bumps cover my skin, because my God, I’d almost forgotten …

  How it feels to be with her.

  “What happened to us?”

  The words fall out of her mouth and detonate between us.

  They rip through the walls of my heart, sending a blast to my gut, and finally, a metaphorical grenade shell to my head. I jerk
back, my hand pulling away from her cheek.

  Because I can’t answer that question. She’s asked it so many times, so many ways, and I’ve avoided it for so long.

  If I kiss her now, I’ll want to talk. Her lips on mine will unlock every secret, every emotion, I’ve packed away since the day my truck flipped.

  And I can’t do that. Not for my sake, or hers.

  So, as I’ve done for ten whole years, I turn, walk away from her, and leave both of the organs in our chest just a little more empty.

  Just a little more hollow.

  7

  Lily

  “I mean really, there are about eight hundred styles of wedding dresses. How is any woman supposed to choose?”

  Presley riffles through magazines as we sit on the living room floor of my townhouse. We have the modern bridal one, the country-themed wedding magazine, the one that has some weird, hipster vibes to it and everything in between. Our glasses are full of champagne, I’ve organized notebooks and fabric samples and even saved a few of my favorite floral arrangements to a folder on the photo app on my cell.

  I’m going to crush this maid of honor gig.

  Now that the sting of the proposal, and my Nash-less heart being wounded, has subsided, I can feel complete happiness for Presley. What’s more, I’m honored she asked me to stand up for her. If wedding planning isn’t the funnest thing, as well, then give me another organizational system I can dive into.

  Everything from keeping track of the flowers, to talking with caterers, to alterations, to guest count … the checklists were endless. And I loved checklists almost as much as I loved spreadsheets.

  Plus, this was the exact kind of monumental planning job that could keep my mind off the almost-kiss with Bowen the night before. Not admitting it to the girls so we can dissect every frame of last night is carving an ulcer in my stomach … but I know that talking about it would be worse. Something is happening between Bowen and me, something that could either blossom, or more likely, bring the entire group down in flames if they were involved. I’d rather have my heart decimated quietly, alone, so that when it’s time to grieve the loss of us once more, I don’t have to answer to anyone.