While all the breath left my lungs and I couldn’t have uttered a word even if I’d known what to say, Brady—a clueless smile still on his face—shook his head. “No, this is the girl I went to London to find.”
Clay’s eyes widened in shock for a second, making we wonder when and how Brady had told him about me and London. Brady was something of a loner and I hadn’t thought he’d told anyone about following me to London. But before I had much time to think about that, Clay blinked but kept his gaze on my face, seeming to assess my features as he processed Brady’s words. “The girl you never found...”
“Hi,” I said, trying to not sound like I was being strangled by panic as I stuck my hand out toward this guy who I now realized was Clayton Henshaw. The guy who had lived next door to me before Dad went deep under cover. The guy I had my first crush on. The guy who knew exactly who I was and where I came from because his parents had been agency people, too.
How was it possible that he was here and no one had warned me? How had I not recognized him? But I knew the answer to the last question was that I hadn’t seen him in several years and we’d both grown up. Although apparently I was still totally recognizable; he’d nailed who I was in one glance.
“Brooklyn,” Brady said when I didn’t fill in my name. “Brooklyn Prescott.”
“Wait a minute. We saw you,” Clayton said, looking from me to Brady. “In London. She walked by the pub and looked in.” he turned back to me. “That was you, wasn’t it?”
Wait a minute; they’d been together in London? How had my past and present collided like this? I had no time to even consider this as they both stared at me, waiting for an answer. I had no choice but to nod, still looking at Clayton, terrified to look at Brady.
Clayton stared at me a few long and very tense moments before he shook his head and took my still-outstretched hand to shake. “Wow. You look just like a girl I used to know. Though she had long brown hair. Just...your eyes...and mouth and even that freckle beside your right eye. But I guess not; it’s been a long time since I’ve seen her. She moved away.”
I waved him off, suddenly wishing my hair was a lot longer so I could bring it forward over that damning freckle. “How could you remember a freckle on a girl you haven’t seen in years?” I said casually, trying to throw him off.
It was meant as a rhetorical question, but he had an answer. “Oh I had such a crush on her back then. I was sure I’d memorized her whole face.”
I had nothing to say to that. Not with Brady and a whole crap-ton of lies between us. Plus, now the admission that my old crush had had a crush on me? Like I needed that information right now? Had they talked about me while they were together in London? Clayton talking about an old crush while Brady talked about his new one, the girl he’d chased halfway around the world, not realizing they were both talking about the same girl?
Ha ha, Universe! Where’s one of those black holes when you need one?
Of course, Clayton wasn’t done with me. “Are you sure your name isn’t Paige Carrington and you didn’t used to live in Denver?” he was smiling like it was a joke. But there was nothing funny. Nothing at all.
Crap.
“You’d have liked her, Brady,” Clayton went on, despite my silent prayers for him to stop talking. “She used to ride horses, too. She seemed to always be coming or going from her riding lessons.”
Brady looked between us, his smile faltering a little. He knew I was from Denver. He knew I used to take riding lessons. And the freckle, well, he was looking right at it.
“Ha ha,” I said, suddenly feeling sick to my stomach. But for the life of me, I couldn’t seem to get my brain and mouth on board to deny who I was. But I had to say something. “All girls love horses,” I managed lamely.
Celia must have clued in then and made a valiant effort to save me. She didn’t know my real name (until right then, of course) but she knew I was using an alias and had kept my entire backstory from Brady. “Hey Brooklyn, want to go get some popcorn?”
“Yeah,” I said, grateful for her lifeline.
I started to stand up, but Brady grabbed my wrist. Not hard enough to hurt, but firmly enough to keep me in place. “Wait a second.”
I swallowed and looked at him, sure he could see my heart pounding in my chest even under the thick sweatshirt. I tried to make my face innocent or at least blank, but knew I was failing terribly. My cheeks felt flushed and there was no way they didn’t look it.
He was frowning. “That was you in London. So where were you? I thought my mother had the wrong address but...why did she have the wrong address? Why couldn’t I find you?”
“I...I can’t...”
As I stumbled, trying to figure out what to say, I could see on Brady’s face how everything seemed to slide into place. He looked at Clayton who had now lost his smile too, before looking back at me.
“What’s going on? Who are you?” he said, his voice so low it was almost a growl. It wasn’t lost on me that it was the same question his mother had asked.
I opened my mouth, but nothing came out. Instead the sounds around us erupted as the hockey game began. Boys yelling, sticks on ice, the echoing shouts of people in the stands.
My heart thudded so hard and I began to feel dizzy as I stared at him, speechless, like maybe I’d pass out from nerves or stress or maybe I was having a stress-induced heart attack. All I knew was that I needed to get out of there before I fainted or worse. I pulled my arm from his grasp as I stood up.
“Wait,” he said, his fingers closing around my wrist again.
I shook him off and turned away. “Let me out,” I blurted as I pushed past my friends to the aisle. I worried that Brady was going to catch up with me but thankfully Jared stood up as I squeezed by. “You okay?” he said and as I shook my head and rushed past him, I heard him say, “Let her go, Fleming.”
Brady was no small guy, but Jared was a lot bigger and I glanced over my shoulder to see him standing in Brady’s way. I exhaled, allowing myself that tiny bit of relief as I bolted down the stairs to get to the bathroom I’d passed by on the way in. Not that I wanted to run away from Brady, but I needed a few minutes to collect myself and figure out what to do without both Brady’s and Clayton’s eyes on me waiting for the truth. Because there was no way around it: I was going to have to tell more lies. I just had to figure out which ones and to whom.
~ ♥ ~
Celia and Emmie found me in the bathroom a few minutes later. I was already in a stall, wiping my face with a handful of shredded toilet paper.
“In here,” I said when they called out what they now knew was my fake name. Well, it wasn’t technically a completely fake name. Brooklyn is my real middle name and the one I was used to, but now they knew my real first name, and—if they were listening—my real last name, also. Dad was going to lose his mind if he found out.
I unlatched the lock on the door and was going to let them into the stall, but realized that would be a tight fit, so I came out into the otherwise (thankfully) empty bathroom and headed past them and over to the mirror to try to salvage my makeup. Good luck with that.
“What’s going on?” Emmie asked from behind me. “What happened out there?”
I looked at her concerned face in the mirror as I wiped the toilet paper under my eyes to try to clean off the smudged mascara. “That guy? Brady’s new friend?” I asked, seeing her and Celia nod before I continued. “I knew him when I was a kid. He recognized me.”
It was weirdly satisfying to see both of their eyes go wide as they realized what that meant.
“Oh,” Celia said.
“Just come clean to Brady,” Emmie said with a dismissive wave, like it was no big deal. “Tell him the truth and he’ll understand. You were going to anyway, weren’t you?”
I sighed. “Yes. No. I don’t know. I guess I probably was, but my dad said I wasn’t allowed to. He said it was too risky.”
“Really?” Celia asked. “Are you still in danger?”
“Probably not,” I said with a shrug, trying to play it down even though I really didn’t know. “He’s paranoid but I guess there’s always a chance...” I shivered as I thought about the threat I’d gotten on my cellphone at Thanksgiving. They’d found me when I’d been undercover, who knew what could happen now if it got out where I was.
Emmie screwed up her face. “You should still be able to tell the truth to the guy you’re dating, though.”
“That’s what I said. But he’s still being really careful. Plus, I don’t want to put anyone at risk after that threat back at Thanksgiving.”
“But your dad got that new job,” Celia said. “Isn’t that why?”
“Yeah,” I said. “But you never know. If someone ever hacked into old files, his name is still on old projects.”
She nodded.
“Well, I still say you need to tell him, anyway,” Emmie said. “At least to explain why you lied all this time. I’m sure if you explain your dad’s situation, he’ll be cool.”
I turned and looked at her straight on. “You’re probably right. He’s a reasonable guy.”
“Maybe you can get your dad to do a background check on Brady so he knows he can be trusted,” Celia suggested.
Why hadn’t I thought of that? “That’s a great idea. Thank you.”
Celia nodded and her cheeks got a little pink like she was shy about it. “What are the chances, though,” she said. “I mean of that other guy being here and knowing you. Didn’t you recognize him?”
“Not at first,” I said, shaking my head. “It’s been a few years...”
“Puberty was good to him,” Emmie said with an eyebrow waggle.
I laughed at that. “Yeah. But Celia’s right. What are the chances? And how were they in London together? I’ve never heard Brady mention any friends. This is so messed up.”
Emmie pulled me into a side-hug. “You’ll fix it. Just go out there and explain it to Brady. He’ll forgive you for sure. He just didn’t like being blindsided.”
I squeezed Emmie back, appreciating that she knew exactly what I needed to hear. “I love you girls so much, you know that?”
“Of course you do,” she said, waving me off. “Let’s get back out there. Celia, did you say you were buying popcorn?”
“Yep. You get the sodas.”
Feeling a million times better, I followed them out, but stopped just a few steps later when I saw Clayton leaning against the wall opposite the bathroom.
He was obviously waiting for me and pushed away from the wall as he saw me.
“Oh hey,” I said, looking around. “Uh, I need to go find Brady and talk to him.”
Clayton glanced at Emmie and Celia before training his eyes back on mine.
“Don’t worry; they know pretty much everything,” I said, reassuring him that he could speak in front of them. “They’re okay.”
Clayton exhaled and shook his head, looking apologetic. “Brady left.”
Emmie gasped right as my heart felt like it dropped into my intestines. “What?”
“Sorry, Paige...er...” he shook his head, obviously not sure what to call me. “He was pretty upset about... Anyway, he left.”
He left? He didn’t even stick around to give me a chance to explain. My mouth dried up and I looked around for somewhere to sit down, but we were in a bare hallway with not a chair in sight. I took a few deep breaths as I tried to sort myself out. Brady was gone.
“What did he say?” Emmie asked. “He had to have said something.”
Clayton looked at her and shrugged before he turned to me. “Not really. He didn’t say much of anything other than a bunch of colorful words I’m not going to repeat. I’m really sorry I blew your cover; I didn’t know.”
“How do you even know him?” I asked, fighting fresh tears over Brady leaving. I tried to tell myself that maybe he needed some time to process what he’d just learned. But deep down, I knew it was more than that. He’d left because I’d betrayed him by not telling him the truth about who I was.
Clayton spoke, bringing my focus back to him, “I met him in the airport right before Christmas; he was heading to California but then we got to talking and he said he was trying to find a girl—Brooklyn—and that she was in London. I was heading there to bum around for the holidays and he decided on the spot to trade in his ticket and come with me. I never would have guessed in a million years that it was you. When we got there and didn’t find you...he thought he had the address wrong, but now...” he sighed. “It was agency business wasn’t it?”
I nodded.
He cursed. “I should have known the second I recognized you. I’m so sorry.”
“It’s not your fault,” I said. Although it was kind of his fault since as a fellow agency brat, I felt like he really should have known.
“My parents are civilians now—they have been for a long time—so it’s not quite second nature anymore. I’m really sorry, Pai...Brooklyn. What can I do?”
The last thing I wanted to do was return to the hockey game and pretend things hadn’t just gone totally fubar. “Please tell me you have a car?”
He nodded.
“Drive me back to campus?”
“We’ll come with you,” Emmie said.
“No,” I said, not wanting to ruin everyone’s day. Danny was on the way to the arena to see her and Celia wanted to watch the game and I didn’t need them to babysit me. “You two stay here. I mean it.”
“You sure?” Celia said.
I nodded. “Yeah. It’ll be fine. I’ll be fine,” I said, lying like crazy. I almost laughed at how easily the lies came out of my mouth. I turned to Clayton. “You okay driving me?”
“Of course,” he said, reaching into his pocket for a set of keys.
“I’ll see you later,” I said to my friends and fell into step beside Clayton as we left the arena.
It felt weird. Like I should ask him how he’s been all these years and what he’s been up to. I hadn’t seen him at any of the dances or other school events before, at least that I remembered. But I didn’t feel like small talk or catching up. I was too worried about what had happened and figuring out how to fix it.
Clayton seemed to understand that I wasn’t up for chatting and kept quiet until we got into his car, a silver BMW sedan. “Maybe we can catch up to him,” he said as he started the car.
“No,” I said, shaking my head. “Please just take me to Rosewood. I need some time. I need to figure this out first.”
But really, I was just terrified that I’d completely ruined things with Brady. Forever.
~ ♥ ~
I got up to my dorm room and closed the door behind me before I took my phone out of my pocket. I wasn’t surprised to see there were no messages from Brady (I had to scroll through several from my friends to make sure—Chelly and Kaylee seemed to have needed to check in with me personally and even Jared had sent a message asking if I was okay) but I was still disappointed at the silence from him. More than disappointed: scared.
As much as I wanted to just hide in the closet, I knew I needed to deal with this right away. Brady wasn’t the kind of guy I wanted to let stew about what I’d done.
I took a breath and opened a new message. Sending him a text was a cowardly way to talk to him, but technically I had been prepared to talk to him back at the arena after a few minutes in the bathroom to regroup; he was the one who had bolted.
I’m sorry about what happened. I wish you hadn’t left-I wanted to explain.
I could see him typing back almost immediately. You lied.
Ouch. But he was right and there was no denying it. I closed my eyes for a second before I responded. Yes. But it was necessary. I promise.
Why?
Security, I tapped out.
What? Are you afraid of me?
No, it has nothing to do with you. It’s a family thing.
There was a long pause while I waited but he sent nothing back, making me panic. When I couldn’t stand it even a second longer, I sent: Can we meet? I need to talk to you in person.
I held my breath for the next long pause before his message came. No.
My heart lurched in my chest. I never would have imagined he’d deny me the chance to explain. Brady, please.
I told you I can’t deal with lies. But then I find out you’ve been lying to me since the day I met you. You would have kept lying to me if Clay hadn’t recognized you.
No, I typed. I was going to tell you.
There was yet another long pause and I could almost hear his thoughts, his doubts. He didn’t believe me and I couldn’t really blame him. It was a thin story and if I had been in his shoes, I probably wouldn’t have believed it either.
Does my mother know who you are? He asked.
No. No one does. Did. Until today. I felt like I should come clean to him about the conversation with his mother, but was afraid that if he found out I’d kept that from him, too, it would be even worse. Keeping secrets with his mother seemed like another layer to my deception, but one thing at a time.
There was a really long moment when he didn’t type anything and I somehow resisted the urge to fill the gap. His response finally came. And while I shouldn’t have been surprised, it still hurt more than anything. How will I ever be able to trust you?
The tears came then, because I knew without a doubt he was done with me.
Still, I couldn’t give up yet. Please, Brady. Let me explain.
No.
You said you loved me. It was the very last card I could try to play.
How can I love someone I don’t know? We’re over. Please don’t text me anymore.
Nope, I’d been wrong before: This last message was the one that hurt more than anything.
~ ♥ ~
When the girls returned, I was thankfully done with the tears, but the effects of my crying jag were still all over my face: red eyes, blotchy complexion. Not to mention the crumpled tissues scattered around me on the bed. I was like a breakup cliché, all I needed was a tub of ice cream.
“Oh no,” Emmie said as she rushed over to me and knee-walked across my bed until she could pull me into her arms. “What happened?” she said into my hair.
So of course that started the tears back up again. The rest of the girls came in behind her and took spots on our beds, looks of pained sympathy on their faces.
I took a breath. “It’s over. He’s done with me.”
“After you explained about your dad and everything?” Chelly asked.
I looked at her over Emmie’s shoulder. “He wouldn’t let me explain.”
“What?” Emmie pulled back out of the hug and looked at me. “How could he not let you explain?”
I shrugged. “He wasn’t interested in what I had to say. He’d made up his mind and wouldn’t even let me start.”
“He hung up on you?” Kaylee asked.
Er... “Not exactly,” I said. “We were texting.”
Emmie shot me a look. “Texting? Really? You need to do this in person.”
“I tried. He won’t meet with me.”
“That’s ridiculous,” Chelly said, incredulous.
“He owes you a chance to explain. Especially after he stormed off from the arena,” Kaylee said.
“I seriously thought he and Jared were going to get into it,” Chelly said. “He was so mad.”
I winced. “I know. He’d asked me not to lie to him and then Clayton recognized me and...”
Chelly shook her head. “No. I mean yeah, he was mad, too, but I meant Jared. He doesn’t really understand what happened other than you and Brady got into some sort of disagreement, but he’s really protective and just assumes Brady did something wrong. He was really worried about you.”
While I appreciated Jared’s concern, what had happened was still my fault. “Brady didn’t do something wrong, though. This one’s on me.”
Chelly nodded. “I know, but still, he didn’t like that Brady just took off on you.”
“He owes it to you to hear what you have to say,” Kaylee said.
I shrugged, pressing a tissue to eyes that now wouldn’t stop leaking. “He knows I lied to him. For him, that’s a deal-breaker. He said he doesn’t even know me.” I hiccupped at that as the emotion overwhelmed me.
“Look,” Emmie said, her stern tone drawing everyone’s attention to her. “All he doesn’t know is your name and about your dad’s job. He still knows you. I’ll even bet he’s in love with you. You. The girl he took riding and made out with in a barn.”
Well, technically, two barns, but...
“He told the dean he loves me,” I squeaked out. “When she caught us kissing.”
My friends all gasped at that.
“He told the dean that he loves you? His mother?” Chelly asked, as incredulous as the rest of us. “Right in front of you?”
I nodded.
Chelly whistled as Kaylee let out a, “Wow.”
After a moment, Emmie went on. “That’s what I mean. Your name doesn’t change who you are. If he loves you, he loves you, not your name.”
“No, but...” I looked down at the shredded tissue in my hand. How could he ever trust me? If I didn’t trust him enough to tell him my secrets, how could he trust me with his heart?
“But nothing,” Chelly said. “We need to fix this.”
Her determined voice got my attention, especially considering the fact that she’d said ‘we’ need to fix it. As much as I appreciated that these girls had my back in all things, Brady was not the kind of guy who would do well to be badgered by my friends, a couple of whom would never take no for an answer.
“No,” I said, shaking my head. “Please. Let me do this. I’m not done trying, but I need to do it on my own.” As I said it, I knew it was the truth. I couldn’t just let our relationship die from a text message. Emmie was right: I did need to talk to him in person.
The good news was, I knew exactly where to find him first thing Monday morning.