Her words hit me like a punch to the gut. They struck me silent. They must have had the same effect on her because both of us stayed like that for a while, not moving, barely seeming to breathe.
She was angry at me, or she hated me, or both. Why? Because of what I’d said just now? Because of what I’d done before? For some other reason I had yet to determine?
I’d done plenty of stupid things in my life that Cora had been a victim to, but she’d never acted so hurt before. All I could think of was how the ones we loved the most were capable of hurting us the most.
“I haven’t taken it off yet.” Her voice was a stark contrast to how it had sounded the last time she spoke.
I didn’t understand what she was talking about until I glanced at her lap, where she was staring at the ring on her left hand.
“I haven’t taken mine off either.”
“Why haven’t I?” Her head turned toward me. “Why haven’t you?”
“I don’t know.”
“Yeah, I know you don’t.” She exhaled, smiling sadly at the ocean. “You never know, do you? With me, you’re never sure.”
My brows came together. “What does that mean?”
“It means one minute you’re saying things, doing things, that make me think you might have feelings for me. You might have more than just feelings for me, and the next, you’re at a bar with a strange woman who you stumble back to your room with. Into the same exact bed you fucked me in the night before.” She circled the ring on her finger absently, looking like she was talking to herself instead of me. “What am I supposed to take from that? How am I supposed to make sense of it?”
My mind went blank.
“Just . . . never mind. You have a right to do whatever you want to whoever you want. It’s not like you’re my boyfriend.” She started to stand, looking like she wanted to get out of here and away from me.
But I couldn’t let her go. Not now. Maybe not ever.
My brain finally caught up to what she must have been talking about. “Last night? Are you talking about the woman I was with last night?”
She was crouching on the ground, not getting up but not sitting back down. “Sorry, I suppose I should have clarified that. I’m sure it gets confusing trying to keep all of the women in your life straight. But yes, specifically, the one you were with last night.”
Another mind blank. Was she talking about me? Or someone else? “All of the women in my life? As in you and my friend Maggie, who you saw me with last night?”
Her eyes went wide like she was realizing something. “That was Maggie?”
“Yes, of course that was Maggie.”
“What’s she doing here?” she asked.
“She found out what happened. Wanted to provide moral support or be present to identify a body.”
Cora shook her head, but I didn’t miss how different she looked now compared to when I first showed up. More peaceful somehow, relieved. “So you two didn’t . . .”
She didn’t finish her sentence. She didn’t have to. Her anger at me just now was making sense. It was almost like she was . . . jealous?
“No. Absolutely not. She’s my friend. We’re friends, nothing more.” I crouched beside her, gauging her reaction at having me close. She didn’t flinch or scoot away; she almost seemed to welcome it. “Now that I’ve explained that, you need to explain why you seem to believe I have so many women in my life.”
She sat, turning slightly so she was angled toward me. The way the wind was playing with the hem of her dress was distracting me. Badly.
“Just what Jacob’s mentioned. It’s not like I know who they are or anything, but clearly plenty of women know you.”
I had to look away from her fluttering hem and the skin it was exposing.
“It’s okay. You don’t have to confirm or deny it. I know you’re not the type who kisses and tells.”
“Jacob said this, right? Told you about all of these ‘women’?” I asked.
She nodded.
“And my ladies’ man reputation has been going on for how long now?” I sure as hell wasn’t aware of it.
Cora was looking at me like I was playing a game with her. “Since high school.”
High school. The same time she and Jacob got together. The same time my womanizing ways started. Not exactly a coincidence.
“Sophomore year?” I said.
“I don’t remember exactly.” She picked up a leaf that had blown into her lap and turned it over like she was searching for something. “But yeah, it was right before Thanksgiving break our sophomore year.” When she looked up to see the look on my face, she added, “Give or take.”
My back went rigid as I put the pieces together. The same time she and Jacob got together, he started telling her I was pretty much a manwhore. Which I was nothing even remotely close to. If that title belonged to anyone, it was my brother. Why? Why had he gone so out of his way to try to convince Cora that I was so worthless in the relationship department?
She’d mentioned he’d accused her of harboring feelings for me. What if she really had? What if she still did?
The answer should have been obvious. It should have been so clear it was blinding. I had all of the evidence to support it; why hadn’t I seen it before? I was an Ivy League-educated doctor who’d come out the top of my class—in all of them. And I was the biggest idiot to have ever walked the earth.
“There aren’t any other women, Cora.” My hand reached for hers still turning over the leaf. “There never have been any other women.”
Wasn’t it obvious? Hadn’t it always been? There’d only ever been you.
“Really?” Her fingers wove through mine, turning over in my hand.
I covered her hand with my other hand. “Really.”
A smile started to form on her face. “I didn’t really think so. You didn’t seem like the type.”
“Then what type do you think I am?”
Her fingers brushed across the band on my finger. “The committed type.”
My smile matched hers, careful and unsure. She had no idea just how committed I was. How devoted I’d been to her when she’d never been mine to begin with.
“I need to tell you something.” I lowered my head so it was aligned with hers. “I’ve needed to tell you something for a long time, and I know this might not seem like the right time with everything going on, but this might be the only time I’m stupid enough to say it.”
The breath she’d been taking cut short. “This might be the only time I’m stupid enough to tell you something too.”
A gust of wind powered over us, but I didn’t think either of us really even noticed it.
“Ladies first?”
Her head whipped side to side, her smile still holding. “Definitely not in this case.”
I’d been waiting for this moment for what felt like my whole life, never thinking it would actually happen, but here I was, about to say it out loud. I wasn’t even nervous. Probably because it was the most real thing I’d ever known.
Something over my shoulder caught her eye, and her face changed instantly. I knew who it was before she said a thing.