by Amy Vastine
“Oh my gosh! You’re the strongest and the most annoying person in the world, okay?”
She didn’t stop. “Only the strongest. Say it!”
“You’re the strongest person in the world!” he said in surrender.
She held her arms up in victory. “I still got it.”
“If by it, you mean smelly armpits, you’d be correct.” Charlie tickled her under the arms just as Candice and Trent came out of the room, ready to head over to their parents’ house.
“Are you two ever going to grow up?” Candice asked.
Becca and Charlie exchanged a look. “Probably not,” they said at the same time.
Candice’s smile was wide and a sight for sore eyes. “Good.”
The rest of the day felt like one big goodbye. First, to Kristin and the boys, who had a long drive ahead of them. Then to Candice, who needed to get to the airport early to return their rental car. Last, to Mandy, who had to get home to catch up on the chores she’d neglected while she was planning the big retirement party. Charlie’s parents drove him and Becca to the train.
It was a tearful goodbye for them and Becca. No one knew more about her struggles to get pregnant than their mom. It was nice to see them cry as they rejoiced together instead of over bad news.
Charlie tried calling Emma from the train but it went straight to voice mail. He left her a message to call him as soon as she got it.
“No luck getting ahold of your lady?”
Charlie shook his head. He wondered where she was, what she was doing. He missed her and wanted her to meet Becca. It didn’t seem as if it was going to happen.
“If I don’t get to meet her, I want you to do me one favor,” Becca said. She rested her head on his shoulder. “Don’t hand over your heart until... I can’t believe I’m going to say this... Until she loves you as much as Trent loves Candice, okay?”
“Seriously?” He looked down at her. That was a new one.
“I’m serious. She should want to give you the world and stop at nothing to give it to you. That’s what my favorite siblings deserve.”
Charlie kissed the top of his sister’s head. “You got it, Snow Mama.”
CHAPTER NINETEEN
“WHAT HAPPENED?”
Finally, Kendall had made it to Lucy’s for SSB—Serious Sister Business. That meant whatever they discussed could not leave the premises. Phones had to be shut off and everyone had to swear not to tell their mother anything that was said, no matter how much she begged or bribed them for information.
Emma had already filled Lucy in on the nightmare she’d walked into this morning, so Lucy did the honor of getting Kendall up to speed.
“Apparently, your fiancé’s loser best friend has been leading Emma on this entire time. She stopped by his place this morning only to find a partially dressed woman there claiming she had shared his bed last night.”
“What?” Kendall dropped into the chair. “I don’t believe it. Charlie?” She shook her head furiously. “No way.”
Emma just nodded. It was true. It was all true. Charlie wasn’t looking for a real relationship. She was a fool.
“That’s going to make your wedding so much more interesting, don’t you think?” Lucy asked Kendall, who was not amused.
“I don’t believe Charlie is seeing someone else. I don’t believe it.”
“Good for him, I say.” Emma was determined not to be crushed by this. “He found someone. I’ve found someone, too. I’m sticking to my plan.”
“What I don’t like is him acting like he only had eyes for you when he was obviously still playing the field,” Lucy said. “This is why I hate men.”
“Some men. You only hate some men,” Emma reminded her.
“Most,” Lucy clarified. “I hate most men.”
Kendall broke rule number one and pulled out her phone. “I need Max to go talk to Charlie.”
Lucy and Emma both lunged at their sister. Couch pillows fell to the floor and Lucy’s cat ran for her life. The sound of Kendall’s cry for help echoed through the house.
“You cannot tell anyone anything!” Emma wrestled the phone away and slipped it into her back pocket. She sat back down on the couch to effectively keep the offending device away from its owner.
Lucy rolled off Kendall and gave her a push so they both could fit on the oversize chair.
“Don’t you want to find out if this was a simple misunderstanding?” Kendall asked.
“What? I misunderstood that there was a woman who clearly had just woken up in Charlie’s apartment? There was no misunderstanding.”
“Maybe his cousin is visiting from out of town and he didn’t mention it,” Kendall tried. Neither Emma nor Lucy bought that possibility.
“As much as I don’t believe in ‘the plan’ or there being some mystical signs telling you what you should do with your life,” Lucy said, “I do think Emma’s right. She needs to move on. No reason to let some guy toy with her emotions and make her think she’s the only one when clearly she isn’t.”
Lucy’s words were like a dagger to the heart. Emma was trying very hard to seem unaffected by what had happened. The truth was quite the opposite. She didn’t have any rights over him, it wasn’t as if he’d cheated on her. Still, his date-night-turned-sleepover stung.
Maybe the only person she had to blame was herself. She had kept him at arm’s length, stuck on the fact that Dr. Spencer had to be “the one.” Now she was paying for dragging her feet. Or maybe he liked having options. Either way, Emma wasn’t interested in being in a relationship where she wasn’t the one and only.
“Maybe he heard you were on a date,” Kendall said. She bit down on her lips as she waited for Emma’s reaction.
“What date?” Lucy looked from sister to sister until someone answered her.
“How would Charlie have known? Did you tell him something? Did Max?”
“You went on that date with the doctor?” Lucy was rarely shocked. She had heard and seen it all. This seemed to flabbergast her.
“It was a double date and it didn’t end the next morning at his apartment like Charlie’s date did.”
Kendall frowned. “I can’t believe Charlie would do that.”
Lucy was still reeling. “What are you so upset about, then? You went on a date and he went on a date. His was probably better than yours, but still. I can’t believe you left off the part about being on a date with someone else last night.”
Emma shut her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose. The more Lucy tried to make her feel guilty, the more angry she got at Charlie. It wasn’t as simple as Lucy wanted it to be. Charlie had misled her. He’d let her believe she was the only one. She had made these dinner plans with Scott long ago, and Charlie knew about them. Sort of. He had been standing there when she’d asked Scott out. She hadn’t said anything about canceling those plans. Those were flimsy legs to stand on, but she was going to do it, anyway.
“Here’s what we’re going to do,” Emma said, staring her sisters down. “We are going to forget there was ever anything but friendship between me and Charlie Fletcher. Ken dall’s wedding is going to be unspoiled. I will smile and let him escort me down the aisle after you say ‘I do.’ Then he’s going to go on with his life and I am going to get on with mine.”
“If that’s what you want,” Kendall said, still frowning.
“Sounds like a plan to me,” Lucy agreed.
Any plan was better than no plan. Emma had learned that the hard way.
* * *
EMMA DIDN’T TURN on her phone until she got up for work the next morning. She had several texts from “Her Charlie.” What a joke. Blondie must not have told him he had a visitor Sunday morning. He had wanted to meet her for dinner. He’d had something to tell her. Could it be news of a new girlfriend? That was alw
ays a possibility.
She told herself she didn’t need to worry about it. When she saw him next, she would act as if nothing had happened. The hope was, if she told herself she didn’t care, eventually it would be true.
The ER was quiet for a Monday. Emma was able to ease into things and catch up with the other nurses about their weekends. Tammy wanted to know how dinner with the doctors went and got an earful.
“So, you’re telling me he’s more than just a pretty face. No fair.” Tammy was fanning herself with a brochure for medical supplies. “When’s date number two?”
“I don’t know. We didn’t make plans. I’m worried he thinks I’m not interested.” She wasn’t sure she was interested. She only knew she could do worse than Scott Spencer.
Tammy assured her that was easy enough to remedy. “You two will make cute babies together.”
“I don’t know about that,” Grace chimed in. “Did you ever notice how really attractive people tend to have super-unattractive kids? I see it all the time in Us Weekly. Hollywood is full of gorgeous parents and hideous-looking kids.”
This was the kind of random banter Emma needed today. Anything to keep her mind off a certain paramedic. She enjoyed the laugh with her friends until the patients came pouring in.
Working was the ultimate distraction. Emma helped a mother with a feverish infant and an older gentleman with a bad case of earwax. She welcomed the mundane cases; they allowed her to work on autopilot. Next came the poor woman with an allergic reaction that caused her to get a rash from head to toe. The fifty-year-old man whose wife was sure he was having a heart attack was relieved to hear it was just gas.
“You can print up the discharge papers for the guy in room four,” Tessa said, electronically signing her name to the file. “Ian and I want to know when we can all hang out again. Oh! And I cleared Scott’s schedule so he could take Friday off. Wasn’t that nice of me?”
“I don’t know if my sister’s wedding is the best second date.”
“I thought that was the plan! It’s why I offered to help.”
“Maybe. I don’t know.” Emma decided to wait and see how Scott reacted when they saw one another again. If all the signs of success were there, she’d take Scott to the wedding and really show Charlie.
The morning might have been humdrum, but the afternoon was full of excitement. A woman was brought in after a domestic dispute. Emma cleaned the cut over her eye and let her ice her fat lip. They referred her to Open Arms, the advocacy center Lucy worked for, and she was very grateful. It pained Emma to know some women felt they didn’t have any other options than to go back to an abusive relationship. So whenever Emma got the chance to offer them another alternative, she did.
She also helped Dr. Spencer with the case of a man complaining of abdominal pain. When his X-rays came back, they showed an oval-shaped mass in his stomach. He admitted to getting into an argument with his business partner and swallowing the keyless entry remote to the new and unauthorized car his partner had leased with company money. He wasn’t too happy when Dr. Spencer told him there was no way he could pass it and he’d have to have surgery.
By evening, Emma was certain she was going to get through the entire shift without bumping into Charlie. None of the calls coming in were from Ambulance 43 until Emma was ten minutes away from being finished for the day.
Charlie and his partner brought in a motorcycle-accident victim. The guy had been wearing a helmet and had only suffered minor injuries. Charlie relayed all the details to Tessa and dared to smile at Emma as they transferred the patient into the trauma room.
Even though Emma was supposed to be acting as if nothing had happened, it bugged her that he could act as if nothing had happened so effortlessly. How many times had he had some woman stay the night and then turned around and smiled at Emma the next day?
The good news was that he was nowhere to be seen when Emma finished with the motorcycle guy. She went back to the nurses’ station to finish her shift-change report. Dr. Spencer stopped in front of the desk.
“Have we heard anything on the human car key?”
“I think they scheduled his surgery for tomorrow,” she answered, glancing up from her report. He was smiling, which was a good sign. Maybe she hadn’t given him enough cause to give up just yet.
He cleared his throat. “So, Dr. Gavin informed me I am now off on the Fourth of July. I know you have your sister’s wedding and I don’t want you to feel like you have to do anything you don’t want to do, but I would love to go to the wedding with you. If that’s really what you wanted to do on our second date.”
Emma found his nervousness so endearing. Her eyes lifted again, but it wasn’t Dr. Spencer’s sheepish grin that caught her attention. It was the devastated expression on Charlie’s face as he stood behind Scott that made her heart sink.
He stared at her for a second before taking off in the opposite direction. A sharp pain emanated from her chest. She didn’t know what possessed her, but Emma ran around the desk and chased after him. He had no right to be hurt, she kept telling herself. He had been on his own date on Saturday.
“Charlie,” she said as she followed him down the now-empty hallway to the emergency drop-off.
He stopped but didn’t turn around. “I guess I know why you didn’t return my text messages yesterday.”
“Oh, I had a much better reason for not doing that than Dr. Spencer.”
Charlie spun around, the heat of his temper coming off him in waves. “So much for being straightforward and honest with me from now on. So much for your actions and your words saying the same thing. You go on a date with Dr. Perfect and then text me that you’re thinking of me? Who does that?”
The shame his accusations created was quickly replaced by indignation. “I don’t know. Probably the same guy who sent me a text saying he’s only thinking of me but has some blonde sleeping in his bed the next night.”
“What?” He dared to be confused.
“I know all about her, Charlie. I stopped by your place on Sunday morning while you were out, probably picking up some bagels and juice for your guest. She was kind enough to at least put on your shirt before she answered the door.”
“You met Candice?”
“We didn’t exchange personal information and I didn’t ask for ID,” Emma snapped. Finally, he was going to come clean. He’d be real sorry he had tried to make her feel bad.
Charlie put his hands on his hips and mumbled something to the ceiling. “Candice,” he said, his green eyes glowing as if he was the Hulk, “is my sister.”
For a second, she thought he was kidding. As if he knew Kendall had suggested the whole “maybe it was his cousin” excuse, but it was clear this was no joke. Emma’s legs struggled to hold her up. There was a ringing in her ears that was almost as loud as the blood rushing through her veins.
All the reasons she had to be mad at him evaporated and all that was left was her remorse. She began to explain, but Charlie wanted none of it.
He started to walk away but went for the kill instead. “I would have loved you better than he ever could.”
CHAPTER TWENTY
IF THIS WAS what a broken heart felt like, Charlie never wanted to fall in love ever again. He needed to get into his ambulance and drive away from this hospital. If he could also find a way to never have to step foot in Saint Joseph’s again, that would be great.
“Charlie, please wait.”
He closed his eyes and heaved a heavy sigh. Did she need to turn the knife in his back a little more? Since he was a glutton for punishment, he stopped in front of the sliding door and faced her. Why did she have to be so beautiful? Why was she crying?
“It was nothing but dinner. It was me, Scott, Tessa and Dr. Huntley from Psych.”
Everything clicked into place. The dinner invitation she had extended to D
r. Perfect just outside these very doors floated through his memory. It was a double date. One she set up long before they began spending real time together. He had assumed she would back out. Dating two people at once didn’t seem like Emma’s style. Apparently, he’d been wrong about that. Like so many other things. Would he ever get it right?
“I went because I had to be sure. I needed to be sure about my feelings for both of you.”
“Why do you do that?”
“What?” she asked, fidgeting with her hands.
She really didn’t see it. That was what killed him. “Fight what you feel for me?”
Her arms dropped to her sides. Her voice shook as she spoke. “I told you. I’m scared. You weren’t part of the plan and bad things happen when I don’t have a plan.”
“You think falling in love with me is a bad thing?”
“No,” she said, flustered and wiping her tears. “I don’t know.”
Charlie could feel his own tears welling up. He stared up at the ceiling, willing them to go away. He swallowed down the enormous lump that was getting bigger by the second. He couldn’t do this anymore.
“I give up, Emma.”
“What?” She was startled by his statement of defeat.
“I’m giving up on you. I’ve done everything, even tried to be someone I wasn’t. The funny thing is, I thought you were finally falling for me. Even though I don’t own an expensive car or have a fancy degree. I’m just a paramedic who uses public transportation.” He stopped to keep his emotions in check. He pressed on the corner of his eyes, hoping that would stop his wasted tears. “I was wrong, though. I mean, maybe you like me and there’s a part of you that doesn’t want to hurt my feelings.” This was so humiliating, but all the things that Becca made him promise spurred him to continue. “But I deserve more. I deserve someone who doesn’t second-guess me or believe the worst of me. I deserve someone who sees her future with me and only me. And thinks the only good days are the ones that begin and end beside me. I want true love. Just like you do. I want heart-pounding, world-changing, mind-blowing love. But I can’t be the only one who feels it. So, I give up.”
