Plot Twist

by Bethany Turner

  And that wasn’t even my worst February 4.

  “It’s just a day, Liam. Admittedly, it’s a day that has seen a string of dramatic coincidences. But it’s just a day, and we shall not speak of it again this year.”

  He smirked. “We shall not?”

  “We shall not.”

  He turned off the water, dried his hands, and turned to me. “Okay, then. Let’s talk about all those other things. How are you?”

  “How’s work? How’s the screenplay?” I echoed his earlier questions. “Fine. Work’s fine. Nothing new. Graduation-card demand seems to be up, so I suppose that says good things about the state of the American education system.” I shrugged and he smiled. “The screenplay . . . not bad, actually. But that’s all I’m going to say about that right now—”

  “Because we shall not speak of your muse?”

  “Correct.”

  Over the course of the past year, I had dropped some of the freelance jobs—since I once again had a roommate and wasn’t maintaining an eleven-hundred-square-foot glorified storage unit in Los Feliz while attempting to escape all my problems abroad. And with all that free time—while Fiona and Liam were usually preoccupied with each other—I wrote. Some of it was decent, though the combination of pining for my best friend’s boyfriend and seeing the buffer-than-ever Hamish in person (and recognizing the appealing physical attributes he could bring to the role) had resulted in more of a romantic spin to the plot than I had ever intended.

  Name: Jack Mackinnon

  Role: As the newly appointed sheriff recently elected district attorney of Landing’s Edge, Jack is faced with the unexpected fight of his life when he unearths a path of corruption and deceit that affects almost everyone in town, all the way to the top. Possibly including Jack’s estranged wife . . . the deputy mayor. Alicia Moran, the first woman Jack ever loved, and the last person he ever wanted to see again after she broke his heart. As Jack races against the clock to save Landing’s Edge, he realizes that Alicia may be the one person he can trust . . . even if he isn’t ready to trust her with his heart.

  Physical Description: Hamish MacDougal Greek-movie-god Hamish MacDougal. Not Phantasm Hamish MacDougal.

  “And what about the other question?” Liam asked.

  “What other question?”

  “Are you seeing anyone?”

  The question felt too personal, and I hated that. My unrequited feelings for him aside, he had, for a time, been the person I talked to about everything. While he was still in love with me, he had listened to me prattle on about how amazing Malcolm was. He had held me and let me cry on his shoulder when Malcolm broke my heart. And now . . . Now I didn’t even want to talk about the fact that there was absolutely nothing to talk about.

  I cleared my throat. “No. I’m not.”

  My pulse began to quicken, and I felt like I was forgetting how to swallow. I saw a sudden flash of a conversation from more than two years earlier when he had asked me the exact same question, and I had answered in the exact same way. I had thought nothing of it then. Then, he had just been seeking confirmation of what he already knew. If I had been dating someone, he would have known about it. But with my confirmation then that I was unattached, he had begun talking about wanting me to meet his boss.

  I knew I wouldn’t be able to stand it if, once again, he was asking because he had in mind to set me up with some guy he knew.

  “Hmm,” was all he said in reply this time. But it wasn’t a casual “Hmm.” It was the “Hmm” of an attorney.

  “We need to get back out there, I guess.” I sighed, offering a half smile, as if I hated to end our conversation. As if I would much rather discuss my nonexistent social life with my ex-boyfriend than anything else in the world.

  I set down the dish towel and took a deep breath of preparation for dramatic effect and headed toward the kitchen door. But I didn’t quite make it.

  “Olivia, wait.” He grabbed my wrist as I passed. I didn’t turn around to face him. I couldn’t. “There’s something I have to ask you.”

  I knew I had to get away. I just didn’t know if I could maintain my façade through more questions about my love life or another booby-trapped conversation about the past. I once again took a deep breath of preparation—and this time it wasn’t for effect.

  “Liam,” I began with false fortitude as I turned to face him, but I couldn’t continue. I wasn’t prepared for him to be looking at me like that. Like his continued existence was dependent upon the answer I would give to the question he was preparing to ask.

  I stopped breathing as I stupidly allowed myself to create scenarios in my head. Scenarios that made my senses tingle. But I wasn’t without breath for long. This time there was no cheating ex or mango margarita clouding my vision. He isn’t going to kiss you, you idiot. Someday, when I no longer had any lingering romantic feelings for him, Liam and I would have to talk about how misleading it was when he locked eyes with women and made us feel like nothing else in the world mattered. How many poor witnesses on the stand had been sure he was thinking about their lips as he cross-examined them?

  “Sure,” I finally consented. “You can ask me anything.”

  “Do you have feelings for me?”

  I should have been uncomfortable. Actually, I should have been mortified. But I wasn’t. I was surprised, but not shocked. Nervous, but not filled with dread. Certain I couldn’t tell him the truth, but even more certain I didn’t have the strength to lie.

  He released my wrist but not my gaze. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to blurt it out like that. I just . . . It’s important that I know. If you do, I mean.”

  His tone as he finished that sentence filled me with the dread that had previously been missing in action. It became clear. I knew exactly why he was asking.

  “You’re going to propose to Fiona,” I managed to say in a voice that was something between a whimper and a bullfrog. He said nothing, so I rephrased my despair in the form of a question. “Liam, are you going to ask my best friend to marry you?”

  He stepped closer as he took a deep breath, and then he began moving his arms as if he didn’t know what to do with them. Because he wanted to touch me? Shut up! I screamed at myself inside my head. He doesn’t want to touch you! He doesn’t want to kiss you! He . . . he . . . Wow . . . He sure looks like he wants to kiss you.

  Objection, Your Honor. Council is ensnaring the witness with his eyes.

  “I don’t know,” he whispered. “It’s time . . . Don’t you think?”

  “‘Time’?”

  He shrugged and stuffed his hands into his pockets. “We’ve been dating for more than a year.”

  “I didn’t know there was a specific timeline for this sort of thing.”

  I guess I’d always imagined them dating until they didn’t. They were a nice idea, Fiona and Liam, and in so many ways they were great together—so many ways that had made total sense to me even when Fi ran the idea of dating him past me while I was in Italy. But the reality? The two of them forever? Was I going to have to watch him lift her veil and kiss his bride? Watch him hold her hand and stroke her hair while he helped her breathe in rhythm and encouraged her to push? Would I be awesome Aunt Livi who had no life of her own and no greater joy than spending time with her godchildren and therefore babysat on Friday nights so the Howards could keep the romance alive?

  No. No, no, no. Don’t get ahead of yourself, Liv. He’s just thinking. I began to breathe a little easier. He was not spontaneous. This was one of the biggest decisions he would ever make, and there was no earthly way Liam Howard would make that decision on a whim. There was still time for him to decide that as much as he and Fi were a nice idea, they just weren’t endgame. He would prepare. He would calculate. He would make sure the evening was planned to within an inch of its life—

  He would make sure the people she loved most were present to surround her with love and attention. He would stress about the traffic and do strange things like wash the dishes to try to cal
m his nerves. He would pull strings and call in favors in order to get a reservation at the restaurant she had been obsessed with since Vera Wang had invited her to join her for dinner with some friends but Fiona’s car had broken down on the 101 (causing her to miss her chance to be the only other person at the table with Vera Wang, Donna Karan, Diane von Fürstenberg, and Calvin Klein).

  I gasped softly. “You’ve already decided. You’re doing it tonight?”

  “I don’t know, Olivia,” he whispered, and he stepped closer still. “I have a ring in my pocket, but I really don’t know.”

  He seemed to realize he was standing too close, and I knew that meant the spell had been broken—if there had ever been a spell at all. He took a step back and I prepared to make my getaway, though truthfully, I wasn’t certain if my feet would remember how to move. They were glued in place as I tried to interpret the look in his eyes and then convince myself I was interpreting everything incorrectly.

  I held on to the counter and tried to make myself think. Think, Liv. Don’t speak. Think.

  Of course it would be today. Somehow even Landon Mitchell’s work schedule—which had caused them to move their trip back from their planned visit at Christmas—had gotten involved in the February 4 conspiracy against me. Why shouldn’t today be the day?

  “Olivia, I’m sorry. I don’t know what I was thinking, just blurting that out, asking if you have feelings for me, after all this time.”

  Oh my gosh, I’d forgotten he asked that!

  “There are probably a million ways I could have handled this better. It’s just that I’m about to make the biggest decision of my life—”

  “What decision?” I was filled with anger all of a sudden. I’d like to believe that the anger was on behalf of my best friend, whose soon-to-be fiancé was appearing to be a bit of a flake, but truthfully, I think I felt it only for myself. “You have a ring in your pocket, Liam. We have reservations at Matisse. It sounds as if the decision has been made.”

  Would I be able to handle a Mitchell-Howard wedding at which I would undoubtedly be the maid of honor? Could I handle the conflicting emotions? How could I possibly swallow down the despair I would feel each time I looked at Liam and instead focus on the joy that would come from seeing Fiona so happy?

  He was as still as stone as he said, “Except I don’t think it has. I mean . . . It’s time . . .”

  “So you’ve said.”

  “Why wouldn’t I propose tonight?”

  Be a friend, Liv. You are about to see the two most important people in your life happier than they have ever been. Focus on that.

  “I can’t think of any good reason,” I replied honestly, though the awful, selfish reasons were abundant.

  I didn’t have time to congratulate myself on keeping it together and being a good friend to them both before his hands were on my face and his lips were joined with mine.

  Yes, I was taken completely off guard, but that didn’t stop my lips from responding to his desperation, and it didn’t stop my arms from wrapping around his waist and pulling him against me. His hands moved from my face and his fingers tangled themselves in my hair as we finally came up for air. But just as his lips returned to mine—this time gently and with unmistakable deliberation—reality came crashing down upon us.

  “Livi! Where are you? You won’t believe what just happened!” Fiona squealed from the next room. “Hey, guys!” she greeted her parents with exuberance, though she scaled back the squeal. “I thought we were picking you up at your hotel.”

  Liam and I pulled apart and put as much space between us as the tiny kitchen would allow. The horror was evident in his eyes, as I’m certain it was in mine. But I couldn’t help but notice that at least in his eyes the horror was tinged with just a touch of what I interpreted as disappointment—not in himself but in the interruption.

  “What do we do?” I whispered as I ran my fingers through my hair and searched for a mirror. “Here,” I said as I threw him a paper towel. “You have a little lipstick on your . . . on your . . .” I got lost and couldn’t continue. I couldn’t look at his lips, or apparently even say the word, without feeling the heat that was still surging through my own.

  He took the paper towel and he wiped off the lipstick, but there was no urgency. Unlike me, he did not proceed like a panic-stricken first-time criminal fleeing a crime scene. “Olivia—”

  “Liam, we have to get out there! Come on, let’s go.” I heard Landon ask Fiona about the traffic. “Actually, you go first. Make it casual.” Jocelyn complimented her on her outfit. “Or should I go first? Would that make more sense?” I felt horrible. I absolutely hated myself. Fiona and I had been through a lot, and there had been times when neither of us was the model friend, but neither one of us had ever crossed this line before.

  Tears flooded my eyes. “No, no, no!” I seethed at myself. “There’s no time for that right now!” Even the Mitchell ladies wouldn’t be distracted by talk of a Zac Posen skirt forever. I grabbed a magazine from the counter and began fanning my eyes in a fruitless attempt to dry them.

  “I love you, Olivia Ross. I have always loved you. And I guess I love Fiona, but—”

  “Of course you love Fiona!” I blubbered. “How could you not love Fiona?” She was the best, most wonderful, most loyal person on the entire planet, and I was an absolute lowlife.

  “I do. She’s amazing, but—” He walked toward me again, and I felt my heart break into a million pieces. “She’s not you, Olivia. It’s always been you, and I’m sorry it’s taken me so long to figure that out. I mean, I’ve always known. I just didn’t think you felt the same way. I thought it was just something I had to come to terms with.”

  For two years I had wondered if I’d made a horrible mistake by ending my relationship with him, and then for two years I had known that I had. For two years I had thought of him during the day and dreamt of him at night. For two years I had known that maybe someday I would meet a guy who made me happy, and maybe I would even fall in love with someone who wanted to be with me forever, but for two years I had known that no other guy would ever compare to Liam Howard.

  Two years. Compared to almost my entire life that I’d known no one on earth could ever compare to Fiona Mitchell.

  “I shouldn’t have kissed you, Liam. I’m sorry to have misled you.”

  I couldn’t focus on the way his face momentarily fell but quickly rebounded with determination. I couldn’t focus on the fact that I was being handed my heart’s strongest desire and what I knew was probably my greatest chance at happiness. I couldn’t focus on the strange anomaly happening right before my eyes. Superman wanted to cast aside Lois Lane and instead devote his life to Lois’s quirky best friend who made copies and passed around the muffin basket at the Daily Planet. I couldn’t focus on that. If I did, I wouldn’t be able to go through with it. And if I didn’t go through with it, my best friend’s heart would be broken.

  “Didn’t you hear me? I love you.” His hands enveloped mine, but it was as if that wasn’t enough. His fingers moved back to my hair and then onto my face, then brushed up and down my arms, needing to feel me, uncertain where he should land. He was offering me everything he had, and he was desperate for me to take hold. “You are the love of my life. And look, I know I seem like a creep right now, but I’m not approaching this lightly. You know I wouldn’t be doing this if I wasn’t absolutely sure this was the right thing to do. I love you and you love me, and—”

  “I never said that.” Oh, Liam . . . I’m so sorry.

  That took him off guard and his hands, which had been so eagerly searching a moment prior, dropped to his side, lifelessly. “But I know you do.”

  “Liam, I never said that. Ever. In the eight months we dated, or in the years since, I never once said that.” I felt like the scum of the earth, knowing that the words I was saying were true, no matter how misleading they were.

  “Livi! Get in here!” Fi called from the living room before poking her head through the
kitchen door. “I have to talk to you. This is huge!” She walked all the way through the door and was surprised to see Liam. “Oh, hey, babe! I thought we were meeting you at the restaurant. Apparently I got the details all confused.”

  She ran over to him and threw her arms around him. He wrapped his arms around her gently, but he didn’t take his eyes off of me. I didn’t know if I could bear another moment of the sting that I felt in my soul.

  “So, um, what’s this huge news, Fi?” I turned away from them and went back into the living room, knowing Fiona would follow. Hoping Liam wouldn’t.

  “Okay, are you ready for this? Today Shonda had me make some calls to coordinate Katherine Heigl’s shooting schedule for this film she’ll be starring in.”

  Her voice was positively giddy, though of course I didn’t understand why. She came home from the Grey’s Anatomy set every day, and almost every single day she was in possession of some juicy Hollywood gossip. News regarding an upcoming film, which I probably could have learned just as easily by picking up a copy of Variety, if I felt so inclined, just didn’t seem up to her normal standard. Of course even the celebrity bombshell of the millennium wouldn’t have been juicy enough to pull my focus from the way Liam was looking at me as he stepped out of the kitchen. His eyes were an amalgamation of betrayal, confusion, and withering hope.