Page 22 of Reuniting with Lucy

“Whose room is that? And how’d you know they wouldn’t be there? I didn’t just break and enter, did I?”

“Not sure what you’re talking about,” he said. “I thought that was your room. That’s what you told me this afternoon.”

Oh. He wanted to pretend the last ten years hadn’t happened.

“So, what year are you?” she asked.

“I’m a senior. You?” He smiled.

“Freshman. So you graduating soon?”

“Yes, in a couple of weeks. What are you studying?”

“Business. You?”

He gave her a mock shocked look. “Me too.”

He took her to a Thai restaurant on Franklin Street, and they shared a ginormous portion of pad thai.

“So, tell me about your family,” he said before shoving a forkful of noodles into his mouth.

She used a napkin to wipe her lips and sipped her Pepsi. “Well, I grew up in New Bern with my four sisters and my parents.”

He mouthed the word “four” around wide eyes, and she chuckled.

“I think my dad kept hoping the next one would be a boy but decided to cut his losses after Daisy was born.”

“Those are some bummer odds for sure,” Jack said.

“Yes, well, he’s very excited to have some men join the family. My oldest sister Kate just got married a month and a half ago. And my sister Emma is dating a guy named Dirk. They haven’t known each other long, but it seems pretty serious. Then there’s Lizzie and me. Lizzie’s my twin.” She gave him a side-eyed glance. “And Daisy’s the baby. Oops. Slipped into current events. Sorry.”

“No worries,” he said. “The teenage years in your house must have been crazy.”

“With a capital C. I’m surprised my parents didn’t ship us all off to boarding school or run away themselves. How about you? What’s your family like?”

“Born and raised in Wilmington with my brother, Nick. Unfortunately, he ended up at Duke, so now I have to hate him on principle. It’s sad, really. He was such a good person.”

She laughed.

“You about done?” He nodded to the near-empty plate of noodles.

“Oh, yeah. I’m stuffed. That was delicious.”

He threw two twenties on the table and put his hand on the small of her back to guide her out. His touch was soft and warm. And for the millionth time, she pondered what might have been. How would their lives have been different had he knocked on her door ten years ago, instead of ten minutes ago? Then, as she always did, she pushed the thoughts aside. She couldn’t change the past, so there was no sense in dwelling on it. She refocused on the future and the handsome man beside her.

Jack asked the driver to stop at a gas station mini-mart, and she waited in the car while he ran inside. Five minutes later, he returned with a brown paper bag, from which he pulled a strawberry wine cooler and a bottle of Corona.

“You seem like a wine cooler type of gal,” he said. “If I’m wrong, I have another beer in the bag.”

“Good thing I’m notactuallyeighteen,” she said, grabbing the wine and taking a sip. The sickening, sugary sweetness melted like candy on her tongue.

“True. Supplying liquor to a minor would not look good on my record.”

“You realize we’ll have to stop this ruse if we want to find out anything about each other from the last decade,” she said, taking another sip.

He cracked open his beer and took a swig. “I know. I want to hear everything about you. But first, I have to do this.”

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

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