And her lips are on mine.
My eyes widen but then close on instinct. I’m not kissing her back yet, but I’m also not pushing her away. Because I fucking did it again. I let myself think a girl could see me as more than I was, that I could be more than I was. Maggie saw through the bullshit and stayed, until now.
How easy it would be to let this girl’s soft, willing lips drag me back. To fall into a growing haze of the liquor, into the taste of whiskey and strawberry lip gloss.
“Shit.” The word comes out as a whisper, a realization, and my hands are on Heather’s shoulders, pushing her from me. Have I not changed at all?
“I need to go,” I say. Nat’s eyes meet mine from across the bar, and she strides toward us.
I bring my gaze back to Heather. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have let you think… I’m sorry.”
“Griffin, what’s going on?” Natalie approaches us, the seething look in her eyes illustrating her judgment of me. “I thought Maggie…”
“She’s not coming. She never was,” I tell her.
I grab the bottle from the bar, pour one last shot, and throw it back.
“I’m sorry for being a dick,” I say, handing the bottle to its rightful owner. “But I have to get out of here.”
I push past her and my sister, making my way for the door, but Nat follows me outside.
“What the fuck, Griffin? What happened in there?”
Nat blows into her palms as soon as we hit the outdoors, but I don’t feel a thing. Logic tells me I should be cold, but the growing heat of the alcohol warms me from the inside out.
“It was all bullshit, Nat. All of it. Fucking hell, you had the right idea all along. It’s you, and Vi, and no one to fuck around with your sanity.”
She wraps her arms around her midsection, her shoulder-length sandy waves lifting in the wind. “You mean with your heart. No one to fuck around with your heart. You can’t even say it, can you?”
No I can’t say it. But I don’t say this. Because admitting it makes it real. It means I gave her my goddamn heart, and she lied to me. Maggie made me believe she saw something in me no one else could, but I guess she’s a better bullshit artist than I am.
“She knew how important tonight was, Nat. I know you planned this big party, but it only mattered to me that one person was here—her. She couldn’t even text. Just a big fuck you by not showing up.”
Nat backs through the door and into the bar again, dragging me with her, and for some reason I let her.
“Can I drive you home, then? You’ll freeze out there.”
Her eyes, soft with pity, say it all. I see me the way my family does, the way Maggie must have seen me the day we met, the way she still sees me now.
“Look at me,” I say, holding my hands up as if to say ta-da! “Look at what I almost did in there! I’m still that guy. I’d have stood my ass up, too. But…why now? Why like this? I need to know why she let me hope if it was always going to end like this.”
I kiss my sister on the cheek and back out the door again. “I’m sorry for ruining the party,” I say. I reach into my pocket and toss her the keys to the truck. “Make sure Davis gets home okay. Will you?”
She looks at the keys, then behind her at Davis, who hasn’t left the couch. “Fine. I’ll get him home. Just tell me where you’re going.”
“I need to walk.”
“You’re not wearing a coat,” she says, worry tingeing her words.
“I’ll be fine. I’m not going too far.” Not too far if I was driving, but on foot the statement is a stretch. I’m almost out the door when Nat grabs my forearm.
“It wasn’t a choice,” she says, and my brows pull together. “To have Vi on my own. It wasn’t a choice.” Tears pool in her eyes, but she keeps talking. “He left me before I knew I was pregnant. I loved him, and he left, and he never knew he had a daughter, so I never told him. I didn’t choose this life, Griffin. It chose me. And I wouldn’t trade being Vi’s mom for anything. Not ever. But you have a choice I would have done anything for back then, if I wasn’t too proud to act on it. Don’t choose to be alone, Griffin.”
If she says anything after that, I don’t hear it. I hear nothing but the whoosh of the door as it closes and the pounding of my pulse in my ears.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Maggie
A dull throb beats at my skull as I lean against the cool glass of the passenger-side window.
Miles unscrews the cap from a bottle of water and lifts it out of the cup holder to hand to me.
“Take something before it gets worse,” he says, his voice gentle and reassuring. When I glance at him, his eyes are dark with worry, so I obey, if only to ease his mind.