Page 51 of Matched By Mistake
“Love you, too,” she said, hanging up the phone.
She took a deep breath and almost got back on the road. But she couldn’t stop thinking about the fact that Jericho might believe she’d broken into his family’s business. She knew she should wait until they were in person to talk but she was both hurt and angry that he might believe the worst of her.
Maggie to Jericho: Just talked to my mom. I’m on my way back from Dallas, where I told you I’d be. I wasn’t breaking into Winters HQ. You should know me better than that. I assume I’ll see you at the sheriff’s office.
Then she put her phone on airplane mode, tossing it on the seat beside her. She tried to stay calm, took a deep breath and then banged her fists on the steering wheel. How could she have been so wrong about another man? Did she have the shittiest gut instincts on the planet? How could she have once again trusted a man who literally felt nothing for her?
The rational part of her mind tried to caution her that maybe he didn’t believe it, but she knew he did. He wouldn’t have sent her calls to voice mail or ignored her texts if he thought she was innocent.
Instead he had assumed the worst. Was it because she was a Del Rio? Or was it something far worse? Was it because she was just the type of woman that no man wanted for who she was. She put her head on the steering wheel, crying and hating herself for crying. But unable to stop.
She loved Jericho. How could he not love her back?
And this wasn’t like when Randall had broken their engagement. Because what she’d thought was love had just been a desire to have a husband. She knew that now. She could see through the lens of her relationship with Jericho how shallow everything had been with Randall.
She saw flashing lights and a car pulled up behind her. She wiped her tears as a highway patrol officer walked toward the car. She rolled down her window.
“Ma’am, are you okay?”
“Yes, sir. Just got some bad news and needed to stop driving for a minute,” she said.
“Do you want me to call someone for you?”
“No, I’m fine. I think I’ll be good to drive,” she said.
“Okay, ma’am,” he said, walking back to his car. She put the window up and signaled to pull back out onto the highway. She wanted to drive out her anger. To put the gas pedal all the way down and bury the needle on the speedometer and scream at the top of her lungs, but she didn’t.
She drove as sedately as she could until the highway patrol made a U-turn and headed back toward Dallas. Still she kept driving slowly. In her mind she toyed with all the things she’d say when she saw Jericho, but she knew that was secondary. His family must have reason to believe she had broken in and she was going to have to do more than bring Cecily with her to the station.
She was going to have to live with the fact that everyone in Royal would believe she’d restarted the feud between their families.
For the life of her, she couldn’t think why Jericho would believe she’d do that. She’d shown him how much he meant to her, shown him how much she wanted a future with him. Or maybe she hadn’t and maybe that was a mixed blessing. Because even though she knew she loved him and how much his distrust in her hurt, at least he didn’t know how much she’d cared. At least he wouldn’t know what was in her broken heart.
Fifteen
Jericho read and reread Maggie’s text. She was pissed at him. Had he been wrong? The woman on the video definitely shared more than a passing resemblance to Maggie. And she’d been cagey about where she’d been going.
“You okay, son?” Joseph asked.
He looked over at his father and for the first time realized he wasn’t okay. He didn’t have everything together and there was no way he was going to be blasé about Maggie. Or pretend he wasn’t hurt by what looked like a massive betrayal by her.
“No. Dad, I can’t believe Maggie would do this,” he said.
His father put his hand on Jericho’s shoulder and squeezed it. “To be honest, I can’t either. It really doesn’t fit with the woman I met or, to be honest, with her parents.”
“Do you think they were just doing that? What was the reason?”
“I can’t tell you, maybe they thought our business deals weren’t all legit. That’s not how I operate so I’m not really sure what her motive would be,” Joseph said.
Her motive.
Maggie had seemed to have no real connection to the Del Rio Group except as a graphic designer. What kind of information would she be looking for? Would she even recognize it when she saw it?
“Dad, I’m not sure—”
“Couldn’t wait to stir up some more trouble with my family, is that it, Winters?” Fernando entered the sheriff’s office with his wife. He’d never seen Fernando like this before and for the first time the reality of the feud was right in front of Jericho.
He could see not only the anger on his face but also something akin to...either hatred or hurt. Wasn’t it funny how those two emotions could blend together? Jericho knew it firsthand because he was battling with betrayal and hurt.
