I reach up and swipe my thumb over her cheek.
“Bran?” I ask, selfishly wanting to verify.
“His name.”
I nod, filing that away. Then I lean down and kiss her tenderly while the wind whips around us, and the sun warms our exposed skin. I kiss her because somewhere deep in my chest I know—I want to be her healing, too.
Chapter 23
Lily
“One double stack mushroom burger and fries,” I sing, setting the plate down in front of Old Man John.
He stares at me, slack jawed. “What’s wrong with you?”
“What are you talking about?”
“You’re …” His finger drags slowly along his wrinkled jaw, thumb resting below his lip as his index finger continues to stroke in thought. “Happy?”
I roll my eyes. “Maybe I’m just happy to be getting out of here soon.”
I glance at the old clock on the wall. It’s nearly noon, and my shift is almost over. Mitch still hasn’t offered me more hours, so workdays each week are nearly nonexistent. I now share my schedule with three of his relatives, but today I started at 5:00 a.m. and tomorrow I’m working a full twelve because someone requested a day off. I’ll take it.
Today, though, the plan is to meet Noah at 1:00 p.m.
I pull out the notebook paper Noah sketched on the other day. More like a hand-drawn map to an unmarked trail he says I have to hike. It feels like a date. Maybe it is.
I smile. Something shifted last week with Noah. Telling himeverythingabout Bran, what happened, and that I wanted tomove on. I’m not sure I conveyed it well enough, but I want to move onwithhim. I’m not scaredwithhim.
Old Man John studies me, then wipes his face with his handkerchief. “It’s that Sullivan boy, I just know it.”
I shake my head but allow a smirk to twitch in the corner of my mouth, and that makes his expression light up.
After clearing a few tables and helping prep for the early lunch rush, I finally make my way into the kitchen to clock out. Untying my apron, I toss it in the laundry bin as Mitch approaches.
“Taking off?” he asks.
“Uh-huh.”
He rubs his big belly and pulls out a wad of crumpled paper from his baggy chef-pants pocket. “Found this on the floor in the bathroom. Looks like a page from that book you’re always writing in. Remember, do that on your own time, not the diner’s.”
My brains stutters, working to keep up with the words that spill from his mouth. Page from my book? My eyebrows knit together, and I blink, reaching out to take the ball he’s holding in his upturned palm.
“I-I didn’t—” My head tilts, like I’ll somehow be able to understand. I don’t write on the diner’s dime.
Mitch sighs and turns toward the line cook while I examine the paper. Fingers trembling, I smooth it out. The creases create a shattered glass pattern, and the ink is smudged in places, but the words are still clear—my words. It’s the poem I wrote about the bruises he gave me, but there’s more. Two words that cause my breath to hitch and my stomach to drop, hollow and cold.
Shit.
No.
I reread the words, hoping it’s my mind playing tricks on me. That my brain is fighting against the healing of this past week,but the words don’t change. They don’t morph into something less cruel. They stare back at me, sharp and carving terror deep within.
My hands tighten around the paper to keep from dropping it. I wish I’d never seen this.
Fear curls around my ribs—I can’t breathe. This has to be a joke. Someone took one of my poems and is messing with me. I glare at the several guys cooking in the kitchen. Any one of them could’ve done this, right?
Why they would is a mystery, but theycould.
