Page 13 of In Another Lifetime

My chest tightened, knots twisting in my belly. “Who do you think I am?”

His breath shuddered, and his hand fisted, banging slowly on his leg. He was as nervous as me. “Melonie.”

“Brennan…” I breathed. I wanted to reach out and comfort him, but something kept me frozen in place.

“I’m not wrong,” he exclaimed. “I don’t understand it, but I’m not wrong!”

“I don’t really understand it, either.” Tears burned in my eyes. Brennan had practically been my son. The only child I’d ever had since Dayton had never been ready. I’d missed this teen almost as much as the man who’d been my husband. They’d been my world.

“I’m not wrong,” he repeated, certainty in his voice. Stormy blue eyes fastened on me, searching for confirmation.

“No, Brennie. You’re not wrong. I just couldn’t leave, and this was the only way.”

Taking me by surprise, he threw himself into my arms, sobbing as he crushed me to him. “You were gone for so long. Why were you gone for so long?”

“I didn’t know how to come back,” I whispered into his neck. “I had to wait until you both grieved. You never would have believed me, might not believe me now.”

His arms tightened. “I would have. I would have believed you. I missed you so much. Don’t leave us again. Please.”

I shook my head. “I’ll do everything I can to stay.”

Including helping Dayton to bring down the person who’d murdered Melonie Windsor. I just hoped it didn’t get me—and the people I loved—killed in the process.

“You can’t tell Dayton,” I said. “You can’t. He doesn’t…he can’t see things like you can. Right?” If he did, why hadn’t he recognized me? Why wouldn’t he have told me of the ability when we were married?

“No, he can’t. It’s gonna be a brain fuck for him,” Brennan said, eventually pulling back. He swiped his wrist across his reddened eyes, his cheeks mottled.

“But it’s not to you?” I asked.

“I don’t get how it happened, but yeah, I could tell. The cookies, your soul, no one else—even my mom—ever called me Brennie…”

“Oops.”

He breathed a single thready laugh. “Will you…tell me what happened?”

“I shouldn’t. That’s something I need to tell Dayton. So he can use his legal connections to bring justice. And I don’t want to put you in danger.”

“Do I know who it is? Who it was, I guess?”

“Yeah, Brennan. Yeah, you know.”

Ten

Dayton

“You should have seen him eat the grass,” Brennan laughed, making a sliding motion with his hand while he jubilantly told Vale about his lacrosse scrimmage that afternoon.

Leaning back in my chair, I watched the pair with bemused curiosity. I hadn’t seen this side of my brother in years. The thought brought a knot to my throat, and I swallowed hard around it. Not tonight. Sad memories would not encroach on this evening out with my new neighbor—a new neighbor my little brother obviously adored.

A neighbor who gave him her complete attention while he relayed his stories. I couldn’t help noticing from the way her cute, compact body shook and her eyes sparkled while she laughed at Brennan’s stories about his team.

The connection between them melted the edges of the ice that had lived in my chest for the past five years. I’d been in stasis while Brennan had tried to move on with his life, even though I knew a cloud lived over his head, that dark fog of mourning that never seemed to lift, even in the brightest sunshine.

Sometimes, I thought the sunshine just made things worse for the unfairness of it all because the woman I’d loved couldn’t see it, couldn’t feel its warmth.

But she was in a place were pain and suffering and fear couldn’t touch her—I had to remind myself of that. It was us left behind who endured. It seemed like maybe Brennan was healing, though. The unfamiliar warmth inside me expanded. I was happy for him, if a little sad Melonie slipping even further away.

“Day?”

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