Page 48 of Six Wishes

“I’d appreciate that.”

And with that, they say their goodbyes and I thank Wyatt again for him and Ali inviting me to their special day.

“I’ll get with you in a few days. Don’t avoid me,” he gives me a stern look, and I smile.

“I would never,” I slap a hand over my chest and tease him.

I follow Maci and her husband to their large SUV where he packs her in like she is the most precious cargo. My heart twinges in my chest, and I miss Van already.

I get buckled into the back seat, and Damian slaps his hands together. “You’re in Alison’s old apartment now, right?”

“That’s right,” I smile at him when I notice he is watching me in the rearview mirror. “But I think I want to go to my mom’s. She is couple of minutes closer,” I explain. “She’ll take me home later.”

“Solid plan,” Damian nods and starts the car.

For the first few minutes, we go in silence. And it is not the comfortable kind. I can tell that Maci is bursting at the seams to say something to me. She doesn’t disappoint me when she finally turns around in her seat to look at me.

“Those pictures are photoshopped.” She says it so fast, I almost miss what she’s talking about.

“What? How do you know?” My heart is beating fast in my chest. Ever since the thought of Van not having to put a label on us but doing it anyway popped into my head, I haven’t been able to shake the feeling that maybe I was too hasty in my departure. Maybe there is a little more to the story.

“Well, I am no professional photographer or anything,” Maci’s bubbly voice reaches me again. “But I deal with it all the time. For covers for my books,” she explains and blushes. Ah, yes, the smutty books she writes.

“Okay…” I nod at her to continue.

“And those pictures of Van with that woman have definitely been tempered with. Were you with him last week on Tuesday?”

She is watching me so intently, I feel like I am being interrogated by the police. All she needs is a bright light in my face to make me sweat a little.

I try to think back to last week. Was I with Van at any time on Tuesday? My heart skips a bit when I realize that yes, I was with him for a good chunk of the day.

“Yes,” I finally tell Maci, and she gives me a triumphant smile. “What are you thinking?”

She pulls her cell phone out and starts tapping on it until she finds what she’s looking for. She turns the screen for me to see and I almost slap it out of her hand when I see that she is forcing me to look at the face of the woman Van is having sex with.

“Look at her features. Don’t you think they look too small? Like they don’t match the size of the rest of her body?”

I squint and have to admit that it’s true. The more I look at it, the more the girl in the picture seems to have two hairlines instead of just one. And her one ear that’s facing the camera looks off too. I look at her face again and all of a sudden realize that I recognize it.

“Tinker Bell,” I gasp in horror.

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