Page 51 of In Every Chapter

She swatted his chest, but a goofy smile touched her face.

Myles tugged her down onto his lap in the chair across from us, and Greyson’s gaze lingered on me. Before we were interrupted, the word belonged was about to slip out. But he was a stranger. Or at least the brother of my best friend. He didn’t need to know my vulnerability, even if a part of me wanted to let him inside. We were friends in our own way.

Haha, friends. That dreamboat is your husband, that annoying voice in my head chirped. Oh, I couldn’t take these mental gymnastics.

“You still feeling sick?” I asked Juliet.

She groaned and leaned against Myles’s shoulder. “It’s a perpetual state.”

The breeze ruffled Myles’s shoulder-length hair, and he kissed Juliet’s temple.

Cal tromped hand in hand with a little girl around four years old up the stairs from their roughhousing on the lawn. His face was eerily similar to Greyson’s, and they shared the same eye colour, but Cal’s hair was a noticeably lighter sandy brown. Though not perfectly identical, the twin genes still ran strong.

“Daddy, is it almost time for dessert?” the little girl begged, tugging on his hand, her glossy, dark curls bouncing. Pink flushed her cheeks from the exercise and her blue eyes—which marked her as a Satterfield—were bright like only a child’s could be.

“Dessert? You already had birthday cake, Lovebug,” Cal said, indulgently brushing a hand over her wild hair.

She giggled and bounced up and down. “But that was forever ago. I’m hungry!”

Cal shook his head and smiled at her. “We’ll ask Meemaw then.”

She shrieked with delight, then noticed me for the first time. “Auntie Paisley!” And I was enveloped in the crushing hug of a four-year-old flying into my lap.

“Hey, you,” I said slowly, trying to infuse my voice with warmth. In my mind, this ball of sunshine—who had been pointed out earlier to me as Khia—didn’t exist. I didn’t even remember Cal getting married. “You’ve . . . grown,” I settled for lamely.

Khia pulled back from the hug, grinning. She patted her dusty fingers against my cheeks, the sweet gesture striking an aching chord in my chest. “I haven’t grown since last week, silly.” Her face grew thoughtful. “But Meemaw said you forgot a bunch of things when you fell off the ladder. I fell from a tree, and I didn’t forget anything. I didn’t cry either. Does that mean you don’t remember your dead husband? My mommy died, and I don’t remember her. Meemaw said—"

Every drop of blood drained from my head, thunder rolling in my ears, and the porch swing jammed to a halt.

I was vaguely aware of Cal’s look of horror as he scooped his daughter off my lap and bolted inside.

Dead husband. Jared.

“Paisley!” Juliet’s voice was garbled in my daze. Like I was underwater.

Drowning. Drowning. Drowning.

Because I never learned how to swim.

A warm hand touched mine, trying to pull me to shore. I instinctively knew it was Greyson, but I flinched away. It was too much.

Stumbling down the stairs and towards the driveway, I ran. Shouts and footsteps and apologies followed me, but I kept moving, numb to the dark and the spitting rain. Stupid me for wearing flip-flops. But I hadn’t expected to trek through a thunderstorm tonight either.

I ran. And I ran some more. Then when the stitch in my side became unbearable, I walked. Night had completely fallen, but I couldn’t stop. My feet were frozen, thanks to the rain, but the empty road called to me. Just like that song, I might as well walk 500 miles and then 500 more.

Ever since I’d woken up a week ago, I’d asked for Jared. Everyone said he wasn’t here. He couldn’t come. No one said why. He was dead. And I’d married another man.

Tripping over a rock, I stumbled to my knees. The sharp gravel stung my palms, and heavy rain seeped through my skirt. Headlights flooded over me from behind. Fantastic. Growling, I stood up, waterlogged hem and all, and kept walking. The low rumble of a truck approached, but I refused to acknowledge it, keeping my eyes locked ahead.

Closer. Closer.

The truck was even with me now.

The window rolled down, slowly.

“Get in the truck, Paisley.”

Greyson.