Remembering Everly (Lost & Found #2)

by J. L. Berg

  “I know.”

  “Why can’t I hate you, Auggie?”

  “Probably for the same reason I can’t hate you,” I confessed.

  “What?” she asked.

  “Nothing,” I replied, quickly changing the subject. “Shouldn’t you be getting back to your party now?”

  “Probably,” she confessed. “All my friends were texting their guys, making goofy happy grins while I just stared at them dumbfounded. So I got up and peed. And then I called you.”

  It wasn’t exactly a profession of love, but I didn’t miss the fact that she hadn’t called Ryan.

  She’d called me.

  “Why did you leave me, August?” she asked, her voice turning serious.

  “I didn’t. You left me.”

  She groaned, giving a bit of levity to the serious tone. “You didn’t give me a choice. When Trent showed up, you knew I’d never stick around. You basically kicked me out by welcoming him in.”

  My eyes squeezed shut, remembering that day.

  I’d just landed my first placement in an art studio. It was a major step in the right direction for me careerwise and I had been nearly vibrating with energy when I’d arrived home, ready to share the news with Everly.

  But I never got the chance.

  Trent had beat Everly home, and my whole life had crashed around me.

  I had pushed her away, but not because I didn’t love her.

  I’d have to be dead to stop loving that woman, and even then, I didn’t think my soul would ever cease seeking hers.

  “Why’d you do it? Why did you choose money over me—again, August? We were almost there…almost at our perfect forever. And then you pushed me away, like you always do. Why am I never enough?”

  “You’d never understand,” I said softly, knowing I could never risk this kind of truth on a drunken phone conversation.

  “Do you remember our baby name game?” she asked, her voice more steady and clear now.

  “Tell me about it—like before I had my memory. Every detail, Everly,” I requested, grateful for her quick change of pace. I feared she’d ask why, demand to know why a man who said he remembered everything wanted such detail, but in her loose, languid state, she just did as requested and began speaking.

  I could nearly feel her warm smile against my cheek as she began to slowly speak in my ear, recounting the memory as she recalled it.

  “After we moved into our little house with the flower boxes, I would drag you to garage sales every weekend—without fail. You hated it. Garage sales equaled other people’s used shit in your opinion, and the faces you would make sometimes as we walked past boxes of used clothes and baby gear would make me laugh like a hyena. But I loved it. It was decorating on the cheap, and in no time, I was able to turn our little drafty house into something beautiful.”

  I did have a few memories of us in that house, and from what I remembered, it was everything she described. Homey, warm, and comfortable. I hadn’t realized the effort she’d put into making it ours and breathing life into it.

  Had she mourned its absence from our lives when I’d whisked her away so suddenly and given her something so new and shiny? Had I even considered how that might have made her feel?

  “One day,” she continued, “we were walking through a typical sale. This one was heavy on baby stuff, but I’d managed to find a few pieces I thought I could repurpose for our living room. Just as I was about to haggle with the man for a lower price, something caught my eye. A baby name book. Picking it up, I turned to you and waved it back and forth, waggling my eyebrow, figuring you would have a stroke and die right on the spot. Instead, you just grinned, snatched it from me and handed the man a dollar, which was twice the asking price, and started flipping through it.

  “‘Maxim?’ you called out, your eyebrow going all crazy again. ‘For what?’ I asked, thinking you’d gone completely insane. Which you had, by the way.”

  A small chuckle escaped my throat.

  “‘For our future little munchkin,’ you said. And then it was me who had the heart attack and died.”

  My chuckle turned into deep rich laughter, and she joined in.

  “You were never afraid of anything back then. I don’t know what happened.”

  Me neither, Everly. Me neither, I thought.

  “You continued to do this little game all the way home, each name becoming more and more atrocious until I finally caved and gave my opinion. It turned out to be so much fun that whenever we were bored, we’d pull out that battered old book and start going through names, laughing at the terrible ones, highlighting the ones we actually adored, like our own plan for the future, and just enjoying each other.”

  She paused, the silence becoming thick.

  “I never do things like that with Ryan.”

  I didn’t know how to respond to that so I just let silence speak for me.

  “I feel like I’m living a life everyone expects of me, August,” she murmured. I could hear the tears she was trying to keep at bay.

  “Then live the life meant for you,” I urged.

  “What if that life was supposed to be with you?”

  “There’s only one bird in that cage, Everly,” I reminded her. “Let her run free. Let her find her own life.”

  “How?”

  “Isn’t that the first step?” I chuckled. “Figuring out this shit on your own.”

  “This makes my head hurt.”

  “No, I’m pretty sure that’s the alcohol,” I told her.

  “Gross. Don’t remind me. Speaking of which, I need to pee again. I knew I shouldn’t have gone in the first place. Now I’m just going to be peeing all night long.”

  “Drinking 101—never break the seal. You should have known better,” I smiled, hating that our conversation was coming to an end.

  “August?” she said one last time.

  “Yeah?” I asked.

  “When I wake up in the morning, and everything about this night is fuzzy…what should I remember?”

  I took a deep breath, letting it fill my lungs as I put my thoughts together.

  “Remember that you’re a strong woman, that your friends love you and that more than anything, you should stay away from me, Everly. Stay far, far away from me.”

  She sighed, a sad sigh full of frustration.

  “Okay. Good-bye, Auggie.”

  I smiled at the nickname, “Good-bye, Everly.”

  The phone went dead and as I sat there in the darkness, I tried to picture her in the unlit corner of the bar, her hair frazzled and tossed as she made her way back to her friends with the secret of our conversation. I tried to picture what she was wearing, how the fabric would cling to her glistening skin. No doubt she’d have the attention of every male in the room, and not notice a single glance. She never had.

  I hoped she remembered everything I told her, about finding something for herself in this life. For once, my motives didn’t have anything to do with jealousy. If she found all roads pointed to him and that was where she was happiest, at least she’d know that was where she belonged.

  But she needed to take a leap—and no one could push her off that cliff but herself.

  “Lucifer?” she laughed, holding the book so close to her face it almost touched her nose. I swore one of these days I was going to get that girl to the eye doctor.

  I’d love to see her in a pair of glasses.

  Nerdy Everly. So hot.

  “Are you crazy? Do you want a demon child?” I grinned, grabbing the book from her grasp. I flipped through it, loving the many highlights we’d done over the last few months we’d had this book. What had turned into an afternoon joke had become one of our favorite pastimes. While we’d never actually spoken specifics, we loved the idea of ‘what if’. There were no immediate or concrete plans to have a child or to even get married, but the notion that there could be—someday—sent butterflies to our stomachs and made us just…giddy.

  “What about Abstinence?” I said, trying t
o keep my face calm and neutral.

  “That is not in there.”

  “I swear to God.”

  She snatched the book back from me, and her eyes scanned the page full of “A” names as her eyes went wide.

  “No way! Who would do that to a child?”

  “An overprotective father. Just think of her teenage years,” I laughed. “No shotgun needed. Guys wouldn’t touch a girl with that name.”

  “Or,” she debated, “you’d end up with the most promiscuous daughter on the planet, determined to prove her name wrong just to spite her parents.”

  “Ouch. Good point. That’s dicey. Krystianna is looking better and better day by day.”

  “I liked Krystianna!” she retorted, throwing the book at me playfully.

  “Yeah, I know. But it’s never going to happen. Krystianna Kincaid? That’s a mouthful.”

  She climbed on my lap, my eyes roaming her tight little body as our skin came together on the couch.

  “What makes you think I’m taking your name, Mr. Kincaid?” she whispered as my hands wrapped around her ass, pulling her closer.

  “Because I like the sound of my name with yours,” I answered roughly.

  Her eyes rounded as her lips softly touched mine. “I do, too.”

  Sometimes the memories came without rhyme or reason. Sometimes they came because of a certain person or trigger. Often they brought me to my knees, interrupting my day and life, but other times, they came in the form of dreams.

  Last night I dreamed of Everly and our book of names.

  In the morning I felt refreshed and peaceful for the first time in months. Nothing had changed. Everly was still marrying Ryan as far as I knew. Trent was still around and therefore my life was just as fucked up as it had been yesterday, but I awoke with a calming tranquility running through my bones.

  I hoped she took my advice, wherever it might lead her.

  All I ever wanted for Everly was for her to be happy and safe. If that was with Ryan, or in cooking school…halfway across the world…it didn’t matter anymore, as long as she found her footing in this world.

  I knew she’d be safer with Ryan, but I couldn’t be selfish. I couldn’t keep forcing her into his arms to keep her farther from mine.

  I never do things like that with Ryan.

  She deserved so much more.

  Reaching for my phone, I looked at the time and slowly rubbed my tired eyes. I’d slept through more than half the morning. Good thing it was Sunday, otherwise Trent would have had my ass.

  I’d already pushed aside all of my darkroom equipment in the office to move the gigantic desk back into place so I could start working weekends again. Seemed he already had my ass, and I’d handed it to him on a silver platter.

  No. Nothing was going to shake my good mood today.

  Throwing a shirt over my head, I headed for the stairs and the kitchen, where my coffee pot was calling my name. Hell, I might even attempt a thing or two for breakfast.

  Man could not survive on crappy coffee alone.

  The sound of the brew dripping through to the large pot below had started when the doorbell chimed.

  Brick really needed to learn the art of calling ahead.

  Deciding he might want a cup of coffee himself, I quickly added a couple more scoops and water to the pot and raced to the door. The doorbell chime had segued into an incessant pounding, making me wary of who just might be on the other side. Brick might be nosy and perhaps a tad rusty on the principles of social interactions when it came to visiting a friend, but he’d never been outright rude.

  Well, not banging-on-the-door rude.

  Opening the door, I cursed under my breath. Of course it was Trent—because my good mood couldn’t last five goddamn minutes.

  “It’s Sunday,” I said, greeting him with a straight face.

  “Yep,” he replied, pushing past me as if he too owned the damn place.

  I watched him disappear into my kitchen, casually walking in his jeans and henley with a newspaper tucked under his arm.

  I guess we were having coffee together.

  Fun.

  He was already pouring himself a cup and ransacking my pantry for sugar when I joined him, the paper still carefully stowed underneath his arm.

  “Didn’t have anything better to do this morning?” I asked as I watched him finish fixing his cup.

  “Just had some loose ends to tie up,” he answered vaguely as he took a sip and blew out a breath, muttering about it being too hot. “And no, I absolutely have a lot better things to do this morning. Several in fact,” he sneered, the intent clear in his voice as I tried not to look away in disgust.

  I followed his lead, taking a mug from the shelf above, and poured a cup for myself, leaning against the counter in silence as I waited for him to explain why he was here, so he could then get the hell out.

  He’d shown up at my door unannounced. He could do the talking.

  He made a show of adding more cream to his mug, slowly stirring it as I waited. He must have known I was growing more and more agitated with each second that ticked by because I could see the slight grin that tugged at his face when he finally looked up at me.

  “There was a fire downtown last night,” he said, as if we were standing around the water cooler at the office and it was a sleepy Monday morning rather than Sunday afternoon in my kitchen.

  “Okay.” I shrugged my shoulders.

  “It’s all over the news. Big fire. Such a tragedy.” He shook his head back and forth in an attempt to appear dejected. The emotion didn’t look right on Trent, and instead he looked more like a villain than I’d ever seen.

  It sent chills up my back and warning signs went up all around me.

  “Where?”

  He reached for the newspaper he’d been keeping a secret since his arrival, and slowly smoothed it down in front of me in a manner that almost appeared loving.

  “Downtown Fire Claims Local Art Gallery. One fatality.”

  My eyes widened in horror as I gazed down at the photo. The small art gallery I’d been in numerous times, meeting with the owner as he graciously agreed to hang my photos on his walls, was gone.

  Everything gone. Including the owner.

  As I sat there, feeling the shock set in, I saw Trent set something else down.

  The single photo I’d sold.

  When I looked up at him, he just grinned.

  “Let me remind you of something, August. You work for me—for our partnership. There’s no room for lofty dreams or distractions. Is that clear?”

  My portrait, the one I’d taken while Everly and I had walked the streets of San Francisco, covered most of the newspaper heading, but I could still see the flames from the photo, rising around the building as it was overtaken. Had the old man suffered when the fire engulfed him?

  You were never afraid of anything back then.

  The gallery’s address was printed near the bottom, reminding me just how close the art gallery had been to Everly’s new home address.

  Blocks.

  Just mere blocks.

  “Crystal clear,” I managed to say, the words feeling like sandpaper against my throat.

  “Good. Then we’re done here,” he said, patting me on the back as he dumped the rest of the coffee down the drain. “Oh, and I expect the deal with the Yorkes is still going well?

  I nodded, feeling the blood drain from my face.

  “Good. Don’t fuck it up. Oh, and do yourself a favor and get better coffee, man. This stuff is shit,” he said, laughing as he walked away. I could hear his chipper whistle echoing down the hallway as he left.

  And then it was just silence.

  “Holy fuck,” I cursed, my voice breaking apart as I grasped at the newspaper with shaking hands. I’d always known he was crazy—seeing him go apeshit on waiters and pretty much anyone who wronged him—but I’d never had proof.

  Yes you did.

  Yes I did, a voice deep down echoed as that haunting memory from
that fateful night came rushing back. I’d been scared for my life. Scared for both of our lives.

  It was why I’d pushed Everly away for so long.

  Because deep down, I’d known this day would come. I’d known eventually Trent would show his true colors, and when he did, I wanted her as far away from me as possible.

  “When I wake up in the morning, and everything about this night is fuzzy…what should I remember?”

  I took a deep breath, letting it fill my lungs as I put my thoughts together.

  “Remember that you’re a strong woman, that your friends love you and that more than anything, you should stay away from me, Everly. Stay far, far away from me.”

  Shaking my head as I pulled the photo up for a better look, I took a deep breath and prayed.

  Prayed that she took my advice and stayed the hell away.

  I was more dangerous to her than ever now.

  Chapter Nine

  Everly

  Good morning!” My soon-to-be mother-in-law nearly sang as I opened the door. I wondered what in the world she was doing at our apartment at this ungodly hour. Tightening my robe around my waist and rubbing my eyes once again, I squinted in the direction of the microwave clock, trying to see what time it was.

  Eight in the morning.

  My last day off before the wedding. The last day I could spend sleeping in, cuddled under my sheets, pretending things like centerpieces and flower arrangements weren’t things I needed to agonize over.

  Glancing over at Ryan’s mother, and the bags and bags she was slowly carting in, one by one into our small living room, I realized my beautiful morning of laziness had come to an abrupt end.

  Centerpieces were priority of the day.

  Joy of all joys.

  “I’m going to start a pot of coffee and go get dressed,” I announced, hopping over several plastic bags to reach the kitchen. I quickly started my much-needed fuel, figuring I’d need an entire pot to myself to get through the morning, and then promptly headed back to the bedroom.

  No wonder Ryan had insisted on working straight up to the wedding day. I thought he was just being a workaholic.

  Now I realized this had been a strategic move. He was purposely getting out of all of the wedding prep.