I’d run into her, and I’d known that I had to fight him for her. She was that kind of person, the kind that made me want to spend the rest of my life fighting for a chance to hold her, to kiss her, to love her.
Evelyn had never liked her. Any woman that could fall in love with two men, and couldn’t decide which one to stay with, was trouble. She’d married Graham. He’d been her one and only. And she was right. Grace loved Elijah too. She worked with him. He was charming. He had all that money.
But she loved me. She’d told me so. And that had been worth it, worth all the heartache and pain of her not being able to decide between the two of us. We had both been running after her since she’d arrived. I should have walked away when I realized I wasn’t the only option. But Elijah hadn’t left when he’d found out, so I couldn’t. One of us had to win.
And now, after everything that had happened, we were back to that. Back to the place where neither of us had won. Because she couldn’t remember who she’d chosen.
And I hoped she never did. I didn’t think I could handle Elijah’s gloating a second time, or Evelyn’s “I told you so.”
I shook my head.
“Do you need some help with the kids tonight?” I asked Evelyn. She nodded.
“I’ve been leaving them with Carolyn the past week and I think the poor woman needs a break.”
I nodded and left the shop. I drove to Evelyn’s neighbor’s house and got out. I had to hammer the door down before anyone heard me, the television was so loud. Her youngest was four. The oldest was thirteen. They were a handful at best.
“I’ve come to take them off your hands,” I said to her. She smiled, relief bleeding through it.
“Thanks, Justin,” she said. I walked into the house. The moment the kids realized I was there they ran for me. I was tackled down and gasping for breath.
“Everyone out and back home,” I called, laughing. They scrambled off me and out of the door. Carolyn grinned when I got up and dusted myself off.
“Give Evelyn my best,” she said, handing me jackets and shoes. I nodded and followed the kids home.
I had them all cleaned and at the table eating sandwiches when Evelyn came home. She put her bag by the door.
“You’re a miracle worker. I don’t know how you do it,” she said, looking at them. “They’re my own kids and sometimes I feel like I have no control.”
“It helps that I’m not here day and night. I’m a treat for them, so they listen.”
She nodded. I watched her go to her kids, ask them about their day and tell them about hers. She didn’t find a lot of time to spend with them, but she was a good mom. She had her priorities straight. I wondered if it was genetic, and why I hadn’t been able to sort out my priorities. But then again, Evelyn was almost forty. She’d had her chance to grow up.
I was thirty-one and I still felt like I was learning how this whole adult thing worked.
After supper I helped her get the two little ones to bed, and then we did the dishes.
“She’s not all bad, you know,” I said when our general conversation lulled.
“Grace?” Evelyn asked. I nodded. “She hurt you, Justin. That’s bad enough for me.”
“What if she doesn’t do it again this time? This is like a second chance. Who gets to do that, ever?”
“You’re being an idiot. You need to find someone who wants to be with you and only you. You need to find a woman you can settle down with. You can’t stay single the rest of your life hoping people like Grace find it in themselves to give you a second chance.”
I knew she was right, but that didn’t make me feel less for Grace. It didn’t change that fact that maybe, just maybe, there was a chance that this time I would be the one she ran to.
“Wouldn’t you jump for it if you got a second chance with Graham?” I asked. I’d said it softly, but she looked at me and her face had turned ashen. Her lips were slightly parted, her eyes were empty, like winter skies.
She lifted her hand and slapped me in the face before I saw her hand coming. She left a wet hand print on my cheek, suds floating in the air around my face. I watched as pain and hurt bled into her eyes, darkening the blue, and finally giving way to tears. They welled up in her eyes. She blinked and turned back to the sink before they spilled over her cheeks.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “That was much too far.”
She took a deep breath and blew it out with a shudder.
“This difference between Grace and Graham is the fact that Grace was a bitch and she left you for someone else because he had more money. Graham left because he was taken away from this family by a drunk driver. I’d give anything for a second chance with him. Grace, on the other hand, doesn’t deserve one.”
I nodded. I felt like an asshole for doing that to Evelyn. The words had slipped out before I’d thought about them. I’d wanted her to understand the depth of what I felt for Grace.
“Grace isn’t the problem though,” I said. “Elijah is. This is his fault. He...“
Evelyn groaned and rolled her eyes, cutting me off.
“Elijah didn’t force her to choose him. She did that. He may be a dick, but she chose him. No one held a gun to her head and made her choose. I have no respect left for that woman.”
I kept quiet. I understood where Evelyn came from. A while ago I would have thought that too. When I’d lost her to Elijah, and there was no chance that she would come back to me. But that had been before the accident. Before the memory loss. Before Elijah had proven how much of a bad guy he was.
It had been before she’d thrown herself into my arms at the hospital and cried about the fact that I was still alive. For the first time in months, I’d seen the real Grace again. The one that had been mine.
The one I wanted back.
“Let it go, Justin,” Evelyn said, and I realized she’d been looking at me. Everything I thought and felt showed on my face, it was a flaw. And she knew what I’d been thinking.
“Elijah and Grace deserve each other. They’re equally twisted, and they will only cause each other pain. Don’t let her suck you back into that. You already narrowly escaped.”
I nodded, and changed the topic. I didn’t want to talk about it anymore. I didn’t want to hear what an idiot I was going to be if I tried again with her. I left the house after the other two kids got to bed as well, and I knew Evelyn would finally have a moment to relax. She hugged me at the door.
“Thanks for coming over tonight. You’re great,” she said. “I know it’s easier for you to pick up and go.”
I’d travelled a lot before Graham had died. I’d lived in a lot of places, seeing most of Texas, Nevada, Wisconsin and even as far up as Montana. I’d been in town three years, just about my limit, when Graham had died. I couldn’t leave Evelyn like that, so I’d stayed. Six years was a personal record.
But at this point I wasn’t staying for Evelyn anymore. She would hate me going, but she wouldn’t die without me. I wasn’t staying for her anymore. Her youngest was four. The worst was over.
I was staying because of Grace.
Chapter 3 - Elijah
No answers. Nothing at all. All that damn doctor kept telling me over and over again was that time would tell if she lost it all, or if it was going to come back. I’d been running after doctors since she’d woken up, and I didn’t have anything new to go by. She’d been in a coma for three days. That had been worse than this, but only just. Now that she was awake, it wasn’t like she was missing anymore, the way it had been when they’d just brought her in.
It was worse. She was stuck in the place she’d been six months ago. She didn’t know that it was me. Justin had been here, and she hadn’t known that she’d rejected him. And I hadn’t been able to get in there and wring his neck before he’d spoken to her.
They’d given her a sedative, so I couldn’t even talk to her until she woke up. Who okayed that? I was furious and no matter how much money I waved in their faces, the medical staff was stiff-necked and standoffish about it.
“Mr. Wilson, do you have a moment?” It was the attending physician. Doctor Stein.
“Yes?”
“I wanted to talk to you about Miss Davis.” He gestured to the chairs where I’d been sitting and took a seat himself. I sat down too, bouncing one leg on the ball of my foot. I’d been in a suit for almost twenty-four hours. I hadn’t had whiskey or sleep and my dress shoes pinched my toes.
“Besides her head trauma, her other injuries aren’t so serious that we need to keep her much longer than the absolute necessary for observation. Things like her black eye and lip will heal.”
“So she can come home?”
He nodded. I nodded. The black eye, the split lip, it would heal. It would all go away, and I didn’t have to be reminded that life with me could be hell. The accident had been a blessing and a curse all in one. They didn’t know because anything could happen in an accident. She didn’t know, either. No one remembered what I’d done except me.