The best part of the weekend is that Jade was able to rent the same house we lived in during our memorable summer here. I’m going to be bombarded with memories of Quinn, but it’s a small sacrifice I’m willing to make to have this time with Jade. To get away from everything and relax before I have to grow up and act like an adult.
As the captain pulls the ferry away from the dock, Jade turns to me and takes both of my hands in her. “I want you to know that I love you.”
Shit! What has she done?
Chapter Thirty-One
QUINN
This is a bad idea. A very bad idea. I have no idea how I let Jade and Nathan talk me into this.
Who am I kidding? It’s not like they had to twist my arm to get me to agree. Jade basically suggested the idea, and I jumped on it.
“What ferry are they on?” I ask Nathan as a shiver runs up my spine.
“They caught the last one of the day. It should be coming into view any time now.”
“Are you sure she got on?”
“Jade texted me and I quote ‘the package is secure.’ Don’t worry so much.”
Unlikely.
All I’ve done is worry about her since she walked out of that bar.
Gabby is stubborn. I tried like hell to win her back for over a month. She refused to take my calls. Wouldn’t answer my text messages. She even made it impossible for me to corner her on campus.
It was like she’d vanished into thin air.
The only reason I knew she hadn’t was thanks to Jade. She kept me updated. Made sure to check in on her and report back to me. What she didn’t do was push her to talk about me, but she didn’t need to.
Jade’s fantastic at reading people. She doesn’t need to ask the obvious questions to get the answers she needs. And apparently she can read Gabby like an open book.
Jade knew Gabby would never agree to come here if she knew I was going to be waiting for her on the docks. So we didn’t tell her. Was it a lie?
Honestly, I try not to think about it. For multiple reasons.
First, this is the only way we would be able to get her here, and that’s pertinent to the next part of the plan.
Second, I need to see her. It’s been way too long but not long enough for my feelings for her to change. If anything, they’ve only intensified. I search for her everywhere on campus just to get a glimpse of her.
Some call it stalking. Some call it obsession.
They’d both be right.
I call it love.
I love Gabby. With all my heart. It beats for her. Yearns to be close to her. And I know she feels the same.
If she didn’t, she wouldn’t have cut off all communication.
I get it, she’s hurt. I did a good job of making her believe my intentions to win Kara over were real. What she doesn’t know is that those intentions were meant to save her heartache, not cause it. If Kara hadn’t realized what Gabby and I were up to, things would have turned out differently. My fear of her taking our little scam public, preventing her from doing so, became my focus those last few days when what I should have been focused on was making sure Gabby knew how I felt about her.
I should have been honest with her.
It would have saved us both a lot of heartache.
So here we are. We’ve planned an ambush. If Gabby doesn’t know what’s about to happen yet, she will in a few short minutes. The ferry should round the bend any second, and my one shot to fix this will begin.
It’s a good thing I have a solid plan.
One that involves showing her exactly how I feel about her. Proving to her that we belong together. Winning back the woman of my dreams.
So why does this feel wrong?
“I think I’m going to wait at the house,” I say to Nathan, backing away from the railing.
“What? Why?”
“Well, if Gabby is even a fraction of how pissed I think she’s going to be, me standing here is only going to amplify it. We deceived her. All three of us. We’re supposed to be her friends, and this is a hard-core betrayal even if it was planned with the best of intentions. She’s going to need a few minutes to calm down. Hell, she might need an entire day. I want to give her time before I bombard her.”
Nathan nods in understanding but doesn’t say anything. What could he say? Every word I spoke is accurate, and he knows it.
The ferry sounds its horn as I round the corner onto Main Street. If I’m going to make it back to the house without being seen, I’m going to need to pick up the pace.
Spotting the tavern down the block, I decide to change course. My hands are shaking in anticipation of seeing her, of wrapping her in my arms, but both of those things are going to have to wait, and a drink or two will help settle my nerves.
I’m sipping my first drink when both Nathan and Jade texted me.
NATHAN: Is it too late to abort? She’s livid!
JADE: Gabby’s upset. She needs some time to calm down. We’ll be at the house shortly.
It takes me a second to realize they aren’t headed directly to the house, and if that’s the case . . .
Gabby bursts through the doors of the tavern before I can finish my thought, a murderous glare on her face. I try to hide at the end of the bar, pulling my hat down to cover my face and slumping forward. What I don’t plan on is fucking Karen.
We should have told her why we were really on the island. Instead, we lied and said we were having a reunion, so when she spots Nathan walking in with Jade and Gabby, she points them right in my direction.
Gabby stops dead in her tracks, pivots toward me, walks right up to where I’m seated at the end of the bar, and smacks me across the face. By the time I recover from the shock, she’s already retreating out the door she’d just come through, Jade hot on her heels.
“Dude, you said you were going to the house,” Nathan states, sliding onto the stool next to me and nodding at Karen when she holds up a bottle of Jack.
Two fingers over ice appear in front of him in seconds. I expect Karen to drop his drink and go but, she wants the gossip. She’s practically salivating.
“I stopped for a drink thinking she would need time.”
“You were hiding from her.” It’s clearly a statement and not a question.
“Yes, I was hiding, but apparently I suck at hide and go seek.”
“What’d you do?” Karen interjects. “I’ve seen my fair share of romantic quarrels as you can imagine but nothing like that. She hit you with purpose. Her hands going to sting for a while after that.”
What about my face? I can still feel where her hand landed on my left cheek.
“They fake dated and he fell in love with her,” Nathan offers, leaning back on his stool and taking a sip of his whiskey.
“That shouldn’t piss a girl off. There has to be more to the story than that. Come on. I need details.”
Karen’s attention is on me, waiting patiently for me to tell her everything. The problem is, I have no idea where we went wrong. One second things were great, and then it felt like she was slipping away. Then she was gone and avoiding me at every turn.
Nathan finishes his drink in silence while I explain everything to Karen. She doesn’t offer any words of wisdom as I expect. Instead, she brings me another Crown Apple on the rocks, on the house, and wishes me luck fixing what I broke.
If only I knew what I broke and how to fix it.
There’s only one way to find out.
“I need you to do a little recon for me,” I say to Nathan as he settles his tab.
“Hell no. I did my part in coming this weekend as a favor to you. The last thing I want is to be in the middle of whatever this is. I love you both and want it to stay that way.”
“Dude, if I don’t figure out what I did, I won’t know how to fix it.”
“Shouldn’t you be asking Jade? She’s more likely to talk to her than to me.”
“Maybe, but she’s pissed at Jade right now for tricking her into coming up here. She’s probab
ly not talking to her at all.”
All I need is for him to play the sympathetic friend. For him to find a way to get her to open up about the reason she’s so upset with me.
And it wouldn’t hurt to find out if she still loves me. Jade swears she does, but I’m starting to doubt her skills after what just went down.
“Fine. I’m already in the middle of this shit, so I might as well, but if she asks me to choose sides, I’m standing by her. You and I both know Gabby doesn’t do things without a good reason. There’s more behind that slap than either of us knows.”
Chapter Thirty-Two
GABRIELLE
Un-fucking-believable!
First thing tomorrow morning, I’m catching the ferry back to the mainland and going home. This is bullshit. What kind of friend tricks you into going on a weekend getaway only to shove your problems in your face?
A shitty one, that’s who.
And right now, Jade is at the top of my shit list. Right below Quinn, right above Nathan.
I don’t know what they planned to accomplish by deceiving me into seeing him, but this mission is going to fail miserably.
I have to admit, it felt great to smack him.
But it felt even better to see him. My heart almost leapt out of my chest. And the way he smelled . . . God, I missed that smell. Woodsy with a hint of sweetness. I almost wanted to wrap my arms around him and inhale deeply.
But that would have defeated the purpose of the slap. A contradiction to how angry I was. At him and at Jade and Nathan.
Mostly Jade right now. I’m sure Nathan got wrapped up in this like I did. He knew what was going to happen, but I doubt they gave him much of a choice in the matter.
That’s probably why she followed me to the house in silence and Nathan stayed at the tavern with Quinn. I’d consider it taking sides, but I know that wasn’t his intention. I’m sure he just wanted to make sure Quinn was okay. I didn’t hit him that hard, but it was enough to make my hand tingle for a few minutes.
I wonder if I left a mark on his face.
Not that it matters. He left a mark on my heart that can’t be erased.
“Having fun out here?” Nathan asks.
Looking over my shoulder, I find him walking toward me, a blanket in his hand. He drapes it over my shoulders and takes a seat in the chair next to me.
“Didn’t want to start a fire?”
I’ve been out here for a while, avoiding Jade. Avoiding the moment Quinn arrives. Avoiding everything I should be dealing with.
“I wasn’t planning on staying out here that long.”
Without another word, Nathan begins building a fire in the pit. He has it going in minutes and stokes it until I can feel the warmth on my face.
“You okay?” he finally asks as I stare into the growing flames and contemplate where everything went wrong.
“Not really.”
“If it makes you feel better, he’s not either.”
No, that doesn’t make me feel better. Not even a little. He reaped the benefits of our little plan, he got what he wanted. The fact he’s not okay has nothing to do with me. He made his bed. He can lie in it with Kara.
“You know,” Nathan continues when I don’t respond. “I think there’s more to the story than I’ve been given. I’m kind of hoping you might fill in the blanks for me because I’m having a hard time understanding why both of you are miserable, why you’re not together, when you obviously love each other.”
Good question. I wish I knew the answer.
“He got what he wanted.”
“I don’t think he did.”
“Really?” I challenge Nathan, turning in my chair so my body is facing him. “What bullshit is he selling you?”
“I don’t think it’s bullshit, Gabs. He loves you, with all his heart. All he wants is a chance to prove it to you. To earn your forgiveness even though he has no idea why you’re so upset with him. He has no idea what he did to lose you.”
Are you fucking kidding me?
He has no idea.
Well, for starters, he ran to Kara the way we planned. Leaned on her for support. If he cared about me so much, why would he do that?
And . . .
Well, he also . . .
Fuck! That’s all I have, and I haven’t shared that little detail with anyone.
“If you don’t want to tell me, you should at least tell him. He deserves to know. If the situation were reversed, I’d tell him the same thing.”
“Kara,” I finally say.
“What about her?”
“I saw them together. I went to see Quinn, and he was in bed with Kara. I know that was the plan, but it hurt. It’s what he wanted, but it still broke me. I knew we’d never go back to being friends when I ran out of the bar that night, but my heart still wanted to be with him. So I went to see him, and she was in his room, his sanctuary, in bed, her body wrapped around his.”
The only sound is the crackle of the fire. I stare into it wishing I could rewind time. Go back to the start of the year and do everything over again. I’d never sign that contract. Never enter into an agreement with Quinn that would ultimately break me. I’d accept my breakup with Gavin for what it was, the end of us, and move on.
Only we don’t get second chances like that in life. We don’t get do-overs. You can’t rewind time and fix what you broke. All you can do is learn from your mistakes and try not to repeat them.
“I think you need to talk to Quinn. I know that’s not what you want to hear, but he’s the only one that can explain that situation. He was there, I wasn’t. If it’s the night I’m thinking it was, he told me what happened, but it’s not my place to give his side of the story.”
“I’m not talking to him, Nathan. I don’t need to. I know what I saw. Reliving it won’t change what happened.”
“What if what you think you saw was not what you actually saw? What if you were meant to see it?”
“That doesn’t make any sense.”
“It does and it will if you’ll talk to Quinn. I’m not saying you have to run down to the tavern and get into it right now. Tomorrow maybe—when heads are clearer. We have two full days ahead of us to figure it all out. That’s plenty of time for the two of you to clear the air.”
“There’s no clearing the air,” I protest, not wanting to give in to Nathan’s suggestions. I don’t want to talk to Quinn. The thought makes me sick to my stomach, nervous, on edge. Talking to him scares me, not because of what he might say but because of how I still feel. And those feelings were amplified the second I laid eyes on him earlier.
The sound of his voice will most likely melt my heart, and I’ll give in to whatever he wants. I’m not as strong as I appear, which is why I’ve been avoiding him.
“Just give it some thought. I’m going to head back down to the tavern and have another drink. You should probably head inside and warm up unless you plan to tend the fire while I’m gone.”
Nope. Not doing that. If he’s going to collect Quinn from the bar, I’m going inside to hide in my room.
Shaking my head, I stand and then gather my things, along with the blanket Nathan brought me. After he douses the fire, he walks me back up to the house, his arm wrapped around my shoulder.
“You’re going to tell him what I said, aren’t you?” I ask as we step into the kitchen to find Jade waiting on us.
“I am because he needs to know, and I don’t think you’ll tell him.”
It’ll be easier than me having to tell him, so I don’t protest. Plus, as soon as Nathan leaves, Jade is going to want to know what I’m talking about. I’ll have to relive the events of that night all over again. The images flash through my mind. I’m unable to block them out.
Quinn on his back with Kara next to him, lying on her front. She’s only wearing a tank top and panties. Her hair is splayed across the pillow. One leg entwined with Quinn’s. Her arm across his chest.
They looked cozy. Perfect together. Natural.
What
really pissed me off was that Tess knew what I was going to see when I walked up the stairs. She knew Kara was in bed with Quinn. She knew it would hurt me, and yet she didn’t warn me or try to stop me. Instead, she told me he was in his room and sent me on my way to learn the truth for myself.
She even wrote about it in the school newspaper.
“How to Lose Your Best Friend”
I still haven’t read the article. I’m afraid. There’s nothing in there that will change what happened. I lived through it and don’t need to read about the epic failure along with the rest of campus.
My only saving grace was she left our real names out of it according to Jade. I made her read the article. I’m referred to as Mya and Quinn is Ben. It details our original plan and how we screwed up by faking it so well we fell for each other. I can only imagine she interviewed Quinn for the facts.
There is one thing that doesn’t match up, though. The article gives us a happily ever after. That’s obviously not how it ended. Far from it.
Still, I saved the article on my phone and plan to read it one day. After my heart stops aching. When I’m ready to move on from this chapter in my life.
Soon, hopefully.
Chapter Thirty-Three
QUINN
My head feels like someone is playing with a jackhammer inside it. Painful, rapid, almost-constant pounding against my skull. Everywhere.
Reaching for the drawer in my nightstand for aspirin, I lose my balance and then roll off the bed, hitting the floor with a thud.
I know better than to open my eyes when I have a headache, so instead, I roll onto my back and lay there in pain for a few minutes before reaching for the drawer again. Only, this time, I connect with the nightstand and there is no drawer.
Cracking my left eye open slightly, I find the room bathed in sunlight. One problem . . . it’s not my room.
Shit!
I’m on the island. Back in the room I lived in over the summer. In the house I shared with Gabby, Jade, and Nathan. And last night, I got plastered at the tavern.
For All The Wrong Reasons Page 17
