Page 49 of Wreck Me

“Kissing? You made out with her?”

“Well…she asked me to.”And I really wanted to and now I’ll never get to again.

Vince eye-rolled with his entire head. “Uh huh. I bet. I’m gone two weeks and you of all people get taken in by some chick who probably carries crystals in her pockets.”

Nico blinked so slowly if felt like his eyelid hinges were sticking. “Dog treats,” he said dully.

“What? You’re not making sense. Just go back to your hotel, okay? I’ll head straight there, and I’ll take care of everything.”

“In her pockets. She keeps dog treats in her pockets.”

Vince huffed out a breath. “More like Nico treats.” There was a flight announcement at the airport, and Vince raised his voice to be heard over it. “Nico, did you fall in love with this squatter?”

23

Atinkling of dishware and a murmur of voices filtered up to the bedroom in Sadie and Grant’s house where Ginny had been staying for the past few months. Some part of her knew the sounds meant something, but they fluttered through her dulled consciousness like butterflies refusing to land. She remained balled up in her bed, trying to make sense of yet another night of maddening dreams.

She’d lost the house, so why did she keep dreaming about Nico? Nico walking toward her with his sexy gait; Nico’s sure hands feeling her ankle for breaks; Nico looking adorably out-of-place on a breezy mountaintop; Nico kneeling before her and taking her hand…

It wasn’t enough thathehad betrayed her—her own subconscious had to betray her too, over and over again!

Someone knocked lightly on the bedroom door.

“Yes?” Ginny said, so softly they might not even hear her.

“It’s Sunday Sister Brunch,” Sadie said through the door, her voice gentle and sweet. “Grant is about to dish up.”

“Oh. Right,” Ginny replied in a mumble. That explained the sounds. For a half moment, she considered going downstairs,but Grant and Sadie would be so chipper and lovey-dovey, and Monique would be so…Monique. “I’m not feeling great. You go ahead and I’ll join you in a bit.”

There was silence from the hall, and Ginny thought Sadie had tip-toed away, but then she saw the doorknob turning. She rolled over to face the wall, feeling like a little kid faking illness to skip school. She felt Sadie sit down on the edge of the bed.

“Hey, big sis,” Sadie said softly. She rubbed Ginny’s foot through the blanket twisted round it. “It’s been two months since…it happened…and other than cleaning properties and taking care of the dogs, you’re like a snail crawling deeper into your shell.”

“If only,” Ginny said. “Somebody smashed my snail house to pieces.”

There was an even longer pause before Sadie said, her voice as tentative as someone reaching to touch something that might be hot, “I know, but…this isn’t like you.”

Ginny rolled partway over to glare at her uncomprehending sister. “I lost everything but the dogs, Sadie.”

“No, no, not that. You have every right to be sad, or mad, or whatever you feel about that. It’s just…you’re letting him win.”

Ginny started to reply, but ended up blinking up at the ceiling, astonished at the truth of it. Not only was moping through her days letting him win, but it was the very thing she’d promised herself she’d never let him do. She flipped the rest of the way over till she was facing Sadie. “I am, aren’t I?”

Sadie bobbed her head up and down, her strawberry-blonde curls shimmering in the late morning light. “It’s just not like you. You’re the strongest, most independent person I know...” She laughed lightly. “…and I knowMonique. Losing a house – as much as I know it meant to you—would only fuel Ginny Heppner’s fire. Is there something else going on here you haven’t told us?”

Ginny swallowed. She’d been beyond furious over the smashing of her house, and she’d grieved it too, hard. But eventually, it felt like she’d accepted that loss. It was only a thing, after all, an object (or a collection of them). She’d even thought she would be ready soon to find a new place to start fixing up. But then the nightly dreams of Nico had started, and her emotional recovery had taken a giant leap backwards.

Should she tell Sadie about her dreams? About how they’d kissed? About their promises to see each other again? Ordinarily, she would have after two months. She and Sadie never kept secrets for very long, but she’d held tightly to this one. Telling Sadie now seemed both pointless and asking for trouble, because she’d never have anything more to do with Nico, and she’d definitely transgressed the spinster pact. Plus, it was embarrassing having been so easily taken in by such a smooth-talking cad. Great Aunt Lydia must be rolling in her grave.

She detangled the blanket from her legs and got up, forcing Sadie to stand in the process. “There’s nothing else,” she said simply. “But you’re right. I have been letting him win. I’m done hiding.” She grabbed the bathrobe Sadie had lent her and slipped it on before heading toward the door. “Is that pancakes I smell? I’m starving.”

Monique and Grant sat waiting for them at the table by the kidney-shaped pool. Mick, Jack, and Annie lay on the other side of the sparkling water, their dripping fur making doggy-shaped dark spots on the brick surround. Unbeknownst to Ginny, her street mutts were really water dogs. They looked up languidly at Ginny, offering up a few soft “woofs” of greeting before returning to their basking.

Hollywood was treating them well.

Grant was his usual relaxed and contented self, but Ginny detected relief in his eyes when she appeared. Apparently, he’d been worried about her too.

Also as usual, Monique was dressed as if her next stop after brunch was the 400-meter Olympic relay. As Grant brought out a platter piled with inch-thick pancakes, Ginny decided to do something nice for her oldest sister. Monique had, after all, let Ginny and her dogs stay with her for three whole days before she’d moved to Sadie and Grants’ place. Ginny was also in a mood to test her resolve as a winner—someone who could deal with anything. She threw caution to the wind and asked her big sister how her running was going.

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