Page 118 of One More Chapter

I head into Pen’s office and find her boxes of books. Luckily, she has a few copies of each. I carefully select one of each title and put them into a Barnes & Noble tote that I find. If I head back to my new place and set these up on the otherwise emptyshelves, I’ll have plenty of time to head to Logan Airport and meet up with the guys for our flight. I’m about to leave when something catches my eyes.

A proof copy of her newest book is cracked open on her desk. By the thin labels sticking out of the prior pages, I can tell she’s been making notes. It isn’t a finished copy, but it’s part of the collection all the same. And besides, it’s the first book we got to celebrate together. I’m sure she won’t mind me adding it to the shelf as a place holder for the finished version. Lifting it from the desk, I can’t help but glaze my eyes over the passages she’s highlighted and underlined. In doing so, my heart falls into my stomach and drowns in the acid.

“You told me I was the best part of your trip. Youtoldme that you woke up every morning wondering where I was, and only went along because I’d be there. Youtold methat you didn’t want to leave us on vacation, and that you hadn’t felt more yourself since you met me. And then when the time came to own your words, you left me out to dry, Finn. You gutted me from the inside out, and you expect me to pretend none of it happened? How am I supposed to forgive you when I’m still putting the pieces you shattered back together?”

His name is Finn, but it might as well be Anthony.

Bile shoots up my throat in an angry river as I make myself read the rest of the page. Delilah walks away, and Finn runs his hand through his sandy blonde hair, watching the redheaded siren leave him in the dust like he did to her.

I collapse into the nearest piece of furniture and start at the beginning, letting my angry tears stain the words she stole from our history.

“You okay man?” Aaron asks as the plane begins to coast at ten-thousand feet.

“Yeah. Just nervous.” It etches out of my throat, still raw from powering through the first hundred pages of Penelope’s book. The one written from her heart. The one stolen from memories I’ve tried to erase.

“She’ll be fine. If anyone can take this on, it’s Penelope. That girl can turn any mountain into a molehill.”

I huff an angry laugh, shaking my head. My leg bounces in the aisle. Being on a plane with this much energy accelerating through my veins is like shaking a two liter bottle full of Mentos.I’ve gotta get out of here. I guess when your two options are jump out the window or land safely and face your greatest fears, there really isn’t a better one.

I pace the aisle to the bathroom just to give my legs breathing room. Once locked in, I pull up our text thread. The last message was before I left my place. Penelope checking in on me, like she’s done so much lately. My message to her makes me feel sick.

Right on schedule, boss. About to head home.

Only, I don’t know where home is anymore. I was starting to think of home as me and her, but now, betrayal is making my body feel out of sorts, like I’m running in a room full of funhouse mirrors with no way to turn that doesn’t shine all of my insecurities back in my face.

I know I messed up. I thought I’d been paying for it, that my debt was almost erased. Now, I get to see it clear as day on store shelves and posters and probably in Times Square, penned by the woman whose heart I broke. My name might as well be on display in neon:Anthony Ellis is a fuck up!

The entire short flight allows me enough time to rethink everything. Is she doing it for the money? Has she been playing me this whole time? Was she ever actually ready to forgive me? Was this all a plot to get her revenge?

Did she ever truly care?

The plane lands before I can truly spiral, and I go through the motions with the guys of taking my luggage out of the overhead bin, getting in the Uber for the hotel, and changing into the outfit I picked out especially for her. It feels wrong. Itchy. Sensory overload between my emotions waging war inside me, and the shirt I wore to our last dinner on that fated vacation clawing at my skin. What I once thought would be a romantic gesture, an homage to how we got here, suddenly gives me hives. When we pull up to the theater, and I see the nickname I gave her in lights, I feel sick.

I head in and head straight for the bathroom, weaving my way through pockets of PJ Layne superfans. While I should be beaming with pride to listen in on their conversations, they make the bees in my head angrier.

I can’t wait for Finn and Delilah’s book!

What do you think he did to break her heart?

I don’t know, but I love seeing a man fight to get his girl back. He’d better grovel.

I want to shout to all of them.

But what if he’s been groveling?!What if he thought he’d paid his penance only to be slapped in the face with a four-hundred page account of everything he did wrong?!

I have to calm down. My breathing is ratcheting at a hundred miles an hour and my reflection is as pale as the ghost of Penelope Barker’s past. I close my eyes, inhale, hold it, and wait until my brain screams for fresh oxygen before I let it all out. Peeling my eyes open, I know that I look wrecked. The pockets of purple beneath my eyes are so deep, you’d splatter trying to jump to the bottom. Creases in my forehead echo all of my unearthed doubts, and the tension in my eyes is so tight, a professional wrestler would bounce from one corner to the opposite.

How can I go in there? How can I join a crowd of people praising her name when I look like I just crawled out of the grave she wrote me into?

On the other hand, how can I not?

She has been let down all her life. I told her I would be her stability, and I will be. Ihaveto be. I just didn’t realize that being her foundation meant letting her walk all over me.

In the process of splashing cold water on my face, I hear the crackle of the bathroom speakers. They’re announcing her entrance to the stage. Applause ping pongs between my ears as I shake my head, and by the time I’m finished wiping the excess water and sweat from my eyes, I at least look presentable—like a nervous plus-one instead ofguy used for book fodder.

I sneak in the side door and join my place in the front row on the end. TheRESERVEDsign crinkles against my back when I sit in the aisle seat, unnoticed save for Juliet who grabs my hand in welcome. She smiles at me, but it tilts into concern when she sees my face. The moment it dips into a sour remorse, I know I’m not the first to find out.

I finally force myself to look up at the stage.

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