If We Fly: A What If Novel Page 8

  Mom had always known there was more to this world, to life, than we can see or touch. Her paintings of mystical women radiated with otherworldliness. She’d known the curtain between here and the beyond was thin enough to be transparent, that all we had to do was pay attention, look hard enough, believe…and we’d know.

  I’d once believed the same thing. My intricate drawings of barefoot girls walking through dense, tangled forests, finding their way with lanterns, moonlight, the help of mischievous animal companions…hadn’t that all been rooted in a belief in magic and mysticism?

  Please show me you forgive me. Give me a sign. Anything. A slight breeze. Mom, let me feel the brush of your hand on my hair. Dad, can I hear you laugh? Teddy, who was your favorite superhero? I can’t remember.

  I struggle to focus on their faces…Teddy’s grin, Mom’s and Dad’s eyes…but the faded memories crack apart in my head. From the broken pieces, horrible images rise of them trapped in the backseat, features twisted with agony, mouths open in silent screams…

  No. No. Please give me a sign that you still love me. That it didn’t hurt too badly. That you’re okay now, that you’re together and laughing and happy again…please.

  Are you there?

  Dad?

  Mom?

  Chapter 8

  Cole

  * * *

  What have I done?

  The question spears through my head over and over. I haven’t slept since I left Josie yesterday afternoon, and my five-mile run still isn’t burning the question out of my mind.

  I run faster, my shoes pounding the dirt trail, my lungs aching. Sweat rolls down my back. I push forward, even faster. I’ll outrun it all—the demons, the lies, the wrong fucking choices. The clawing, piercing guilt.

  Knowing what I do now about how the loss of her memory affected Josie, would I have done things differently? But what would it have done to her if she’d been told she was driving the car, and yet still didn’t remember anything? Would that have made her phobias and nightmares even worse?

  I’ll never know. Hunched in the rain, crushed to the bone, staring at the twisted mass of the wrecked SUV, watching the EMTs cart away three body bags…

  The road had forked out in front of me, neither path leading anywhere good. Lie and hope it would protect Josie. Or tell the truth and know it would devastate her.

  In a split-second, I chose my path. For ten years, I’ve lived with it.

  And now…

  I don’t know what the hell to do. I can no longer trust my instinct to protect her. I can’t even trust myself.

  You couldn’t have known.

  I should have known. Such a fucking asshole to think I could keep it a secret.

  Knowing the truth would have destroyed her.

  My lie destroyed her.

  Chest heaving, I come to a halt in the middle of the woods. Sunlight falls through the trees. Birds chirp and squirrels rustle. I press a hand to a tree trunk and bend to catch my breath.

  I didn’t have a choice.

  It wasn’t your call.

  Yes, it was. It was my goddamned call to do whatever the hell I needed to protect that girl from the devastating truth.

  And how’d that work out for you?

  Fuck.

  Straightening, I wipe my face on my T-shirt sleeve.

  How could I have told her the truth that night? Ever? How could I have told anyone? When Henry Peterson had asked me what happened, how could I have opened my mouth and said, “Josie was driving the car.”

  I couldn’t. Nothing—not even torture under interrogation—could have forced me to implicate Josie in the accidental deaths of her parents and brother. Her sister’s filing of the wrongful death lawsuit only cemented my belief that I’d done the right thing. What if Vanessa had known Josie was driving the car? What would that have done to them both?

  I start back toward Lantern Square. I can’t get my head around how this happened. The keychain? Or was it whatever Nathan Peterson told Josie at the accident site? Or did it all start the second she came back to Castille?

  I should have tried harder to get her to leave but I’m fucking powerless when it comes to her. A decade ago, that girl had been my every weakness. That hasn’t changed. It never will.

  I walk slowly back to the Snapdragon Inn and shower in my office bathroom. Then I dress in a suit and tie in a feeble attempt to reestablish some normalcy.

  Outside the window, a police car pulls up in front of a coffee-house.

  My insides tense. Despite my gratitude toward Nathan for staying with Josie when I couldn’t, I’ve always known he was suspicious about that night. At the hospital, after his father left to take a phone call, Nathan and I had been alone in the room.

  “Hey, can I ask you something?” he said.

  “Yeah.” Every piece of me had shattered.

  “What kind of car do you usually drive?”

  “A Ford.” I glanced at him through swollen eyes. “Why?”

  He shrugged. “Just curious.”

  Even under the suffocating grief, my instincts had sharpened. Stay away from him. He was suspicious. I’d gone out of my way to avoid being alone with Nathan Peterson again.

  So what had he told Josie? Had that jogged something loose in her mind? Set her on the path to finding out the horrible truth?

  Too many fucking questions. No answers.

  A knock sounds at the door and then my uncle enters. I groan inwardly. He’s always ignored my dictate that employees need to make an appointment to see me. With him, I’ve always let it slide.

  “You look like hell,” he remarks by way of a greeting.

  “Feel like it too.” I grab a bottled water from the fridge and crack the lid open. “What do you want?”

  “I heard there was some sort of issue over on Poppy Lane near Josie’s house.” Slipping his hands into his pockets, Gerald draws his eyebrows together. “Officer Peterson was involved. You want to tell me what happened?”

  “No.”

  “Cole.”

  “It’s no one’s business.” My jaw tightens. I stare out the window at the square teeming with people. “Josie and I had an argument.”

  “A public one, from the sound of it. The lawyers are already frazzled. They won’t like hearing that you might be up on assault charges.”

  “I didn’t assault her.”

  “Nathan Peterson has a different view of that.”

  The plastic bottle crumples under my grip. “Fuck Nathan Peterson.”

  “Look.” Gerald approaches me, his tone gentling. “You’ve been working your ass off on the Mischief Whiskey launch. And having Josie back in town has been rough on you. So why don’t you take some time off, go to Europe or find a beach in the Bahamas where you can just do nothing. Let this situation die down and give the lawyers a chance to chillax.”

  “Please tell me I didn’t just hear you use the word chillax.”

  “Hey, I’m hip.” A brief grin pulls at his mouth before his expression sobers. “I’m also serious. You need to leave for a while.”

  I settle my gaze on the half-finished mural. The vibrant colors glow in the sun. A mother and her daughter, a little girl with brown pigtails, have stopped to look at it. The girl is talking animatedly, gesturing to the downtown scene.

  “I’m not going anywhere,” I tell Gerald.

  “It’s one thing for people to think you’re an asshole CEO.” A hard note enters his voice. “It’s quite another for them to think you’re capable of physically hurting a woman. And believe me, that’s not a tough jump in thought for the residents of this town.”

  “Fuck the—”

  The words break off. Fatigue hits me, like the weight of ten years has suddenly dropped onto my shoulders.

  “Cole?” Gerald clamps a hand on my arm. “You okay?”

  I’m not okay. I’m fucking tired.

  If there is one person in this world I’d confess to, it’s my uncle. But I won’t.

  I wasn’t dri
ving the car. Josie Mays was. She lost control at the wheel.

  Nothing on this earth will make me say those words aloud to anyone.

  Below the window, the pig-tailed girl at the mural finishes whatever she was talking about and grabs her mother’s hand. Together they start toward the plaza. The girl skips a couple of times, a little hop of joy.

  I shove Gerald’s hand off my arm. “I’m fine. I’ll talk to you later.”

  “You’ve got that interview in ten minutes with the kid from the Drink Me website.”

  Shit. “Cancel it.”

  “You’re the one who agreed to it. That site is a major influencer, and you have a chance here to get them on our side.” He backs toward the door, his gaze narrow. “Don’t screw it up.”

  I drag a hand through my hair and force my brain to refocus. Maybe if I think about company strategies, I can come up with a way to fix this disaster with Josie. Or maybe I’m an asshole who doesn’t know what the fuck to do next.

  When Billy Grant arrives—slicked-back hair, badly knotted tie—I indicate the chair across from my desk and sit down to answer questions. Somehow I manage to compartmentalize my brain and focus.

  The kid is smart and good. He’s done his homework about hydropower plants, water and wind turbines, and renewable energy technologies for distilleries. I answer all his questions, though impatience simmers under my skin.

  “Last question,” Billy says. “Can you tell me anything about your future plans to expand Invicta Spirits?”

  My chest constricts. For years, expansion has been my main goal. The research and use of new technologies and bioenergy have all been part of that goal. If I don’t work on pushing Invicta past our competitors, I don’t know what the hell else I’d do.

  “The plan is to expand,” I say.

  He smiles. “Can I quote you?”

  “Sure.” I get to my feet and shake his hand. “Thanks for stopping by.”

  “Thanks for talking to me. This has been really great.”

  After he leaves, I sit back down and stare at the wall map, dotted with more red pins than blue.

  A sudden urge seizes me with crushing force. I want to be back in the woods with Josie running after me, ponytail bobbing and red backpack bouncing. I want to lie with her on the sun-soaked rocks in Eagle Canyon, the smell of the forest mingling with the coconut scent of her sunscreen. I want to be back in our apartment, tangled in bed with her, exchanging kisses that taste like cherry Lifesavers, making her morning coffee.

  I want her.

  And I want my old self back. The young man who’d pulled himself out of the quicksand bitterness of his childhood and into something new. Hopeful. The boy who’d loved being out on the ocean. Who’d learned how to believe he was worthy of good things.

  Because of her.

  I pull out my cell phone and text her again. I’m sorry. I love you.

  I stare the screen for what feels like an eternity. There’s no response.

  Chapter 9

  Josie

  * * *

  Dawn bleeds over the horizon. I pull myself off the bed, my whole body empty and aching. For hours, nightmares blistered whatever sleep I managed to grasp. The disembodied heads transformed into full-fledged monsters that jolted me awake, sweaty and terrified.

  There was no sign. No indication that my parents and Teddy are at peace. No hope of forgiveness. Just…dark and terror.

  I manage to drag myself to the shower and dress in clean clothes. I don’t recognize the face staring back at me in the mirror. I’ve become one of my horror-show paintings—skeletal, hollowed-out, bruised.

  I turn on my phone. Messages scroll over the screen, some from Vanessa asking me to contact her as soon as I’m up, and others from Cole. His texts flay open my heart all over again. I’m sorry. I love you.

  I set the phone aside without responding. Think, Josie. What do you do next?

  I don’t know. I don’t know.

  I stare out the window. The entire world is wavering, surreal.

  The harbor and park, alive with a morning crowd, make no sense. How can fishermen take their boats out to sea? How can people walk their dogs? How can two young mothers push baby strollers through the park?

  I squint against the sunlight. At the base of the hill, a police car is pulling into the parking lot.

  Nathan.

  Wrenching open the door, I hurry down the hill. He’s getting out of the driver’s seat, shading his eyes as I approach. Only when I get closer do I realize that Vanessa is in the passenger seat.

  “There you are.” She climbs out of the car and hurries toward me, relief flashing over her expression. Nathan follows, an unmistakable protectiveness radiating from him.

  I slow to a walk. How can I tell my sister? How can I not?

  She meets me on the pathway, her gaze searching my face. “Are you all right?”

  “Sorry.” Attempting a smile, I reach for her hand, somewhat soothed by the sensation of her cool fingers closing around mine. “I’ve been a little…upset.”

  “After what Nathan told me yesterday, and you not responding to my texts…I was getting worried.” She glances over her shoulder at him and squeezes my hand. “He offered to drive me over here to check on you.”

  “You need me to have a word with Danforth, Josie?” he asks.

  Shaking my head, I press my lips together.

  Vanessa frowns. “But what did Cole do to you? Nathan said he was running after you, and you were crying…what happened?”

  God in heaven. Nausea boils in my throat again.

  “Josie?” Her eyes widen with alarm. “What happened?”

  “It’s not…I can’t…”

  “Josie!” She grabs my other hand, her tone sharpening. “What did that bastard do to you?”

  I don’t even know where to begin answering that question. I yank myself from her grip and step back.

  Will I ever regain my full memory of what happened that night? Does it even matter? It’s not as if my knowledge will change anything.

  “Josie, I’m going to Danforth for answers.” Nathan steps forward, his shoulders tensing. “He’s caused enough trouble around here. I won’t have him scaring you like this.”

  “He didn’t…” I take a deep breath. The words dredge up from the dark, slimy pit of my soul. “It was me.”

  “What was?” Vanessa asks.

  Wrapping my arms around my middle, I start shaking. “I was driving the car.”

  Silence. The air thickens.

  “The car?” she repeats, her tone puzzled. “What car?”

  “Dad’s SUV.” I force the confession past the knot in my throat. “The night of the accident. It wasn’t Cole, Vanessa.” I lift my gaze to hers. Pain spears me anew at the widening, incredulous look in her eyes. “It was me.”

  Nathan blinks. Vanessa stares at me, one hand on her belly. “What…what are you talking about?”

  “He lied.” Tears spring to my eyes. “Cole lied to the police. He lied to everyone. He wasn’t driving the car when it crashed. I was.”

  She takes a step back, her features darkening. “What in the world makes you think that?”

  “He told me.” I wipe my eyes with the back of my hand. “I mean, he didn’t say the exact words, but I’d been wondering ever since I saw the photo of me holding Dad’s keychain, and he confirmed it. I was driving.”

  “Holy shit.” Nathan takes off his hat and drags a hand through his hair. His shoulders slump. He walks a few paces away, shaking his head.

  Vanessa meets my gaze, as if she’s begging me to retract what I just said.

  I steel my spine. “I was driving the car, Vanessa.”

  Anger flares over her face, the strike of a lightning bolt. “Bullshit.”

  “It’s the truth.”

  “Cole told you that?” She fists her hands. “And you believed him? Are you fucking kidding me?”

  My heartbeat kicks up. “No. I—”

  “You let yourself get snowe
d by him is what you did.” She backs up, her body vibrating with tension. “That’s what you get for not listening to what the whole goddamned town had to say about Cole Danforth. He uses people, Josie. He fucks them over. That’s exactly what he’s doing to you.”

  “No, he’s not.”

  Nathan hurries to Vanessa’s side and puts his hand on her shoulder. “Maybe we should listen—”

  “There’s nothing to listen to!” She pushes his hand away, her tone bitter. “He’s blaming her so he can clear his name before his stupid investors or the press find out the real truth.” Spinning to face me, she spreads her arms out. “Don’t you think it’s a little coincidental that he told you this right when he’s all over the news with Invicta’s new whiskey brand?”

  An ache constricts my chest, making it hard to breathe. “He didn’t tell me anything. I figured it out.”

  “Because he’s been working you this whole time,” she retorts. “Planting ideas in your head because he knows you’re vulnerable. Look at the facts, Josie. Don’t you think the police would have figured it out if he’d been lying? And he totally caved with the lawsuit…paying it off without the smallest protest. It was a complete admission of guilt. Everyone knows it!”

  “Vanessa, try to calm down.” Nathan holds up his hands, worry etching his face. “The baby…”

  “The baby is fine,” she snaps, swerving her gaze to him. “We both warned her about Cole when she first got here. I know he’s an asshole, but to be so cruel to her? Can you believe this?”

  “Yes,” Nathan says.

  The entire world stops. A dull noise thumps in my ears. The sound of my heartbeat is deafening.

  Vanessa stares at him. “What?”

  “I can believe it.” Desperation darkens his eyes. He turns to me and lifts his palms. “Josie, I…I’m sorry. That night…there were things I didn’t understand. Not only what Danforth said, but his statement and the evidence. It didn’t fit that he could have gotten you out of the passenger seat at the rate the car was getting submerged. And the driver’s seat…it was pushed close to the wheel, but not from the impact. Like the driver needed to be closer to reach the pedal, which didn’t make sense since Danforth is so tall. But now…you driving the car? It makes sense. Everything.”