"I don't know, Wyatt. I was pretty wiped after the asshole burned my fields."
Wyatt took a deep breath then said, "Even so, Dare. You're a trained Navy SEAL. Are you sure you didn't hear anything? A whimper, commotion, something?"
"No Wyatt! I didn't hear—" I started and stopped in front of the fridge.
There was a piece of paper pinned to the stainless-steel door with a pineapple magnet. Wyatt called my name through the phone, but I dropped my hand to my sides and read the note, trying not to feel like I was being gutted alive.
*Letter formatting* "I'm sorry baby. This is the only way. Please don't hate me. I love you and I'll miss you. Zach."
"Dare!" Wyatt screamed on the phone.
I still ignored him. I ran back to my bedroom and opened my closet. Gone. Looked under the bed. Gone. Opened my drawers. Gone.
I checked the guest room. Patted the blanket on the bed hoping he was there, lying under it in the freezing cold despite the fact the bed was still made. I checked the closet and drawers there too.
"No. No. It can't be," I muttered under my breath and kicked the bathroom door open.
My head started to spin. His toothbrush was gone. His stuff was gone. Everything was gone.Hewas gone.
"Dare, talk to me!" Wyatt shouted and his voice did something to me and I collapsed, there on my cold tiled bathroom floor.
My guts flared, my heart thumped, and my mind...it went still.
"He left me," I mumbled. "He left me."
"What? Speak louder, Dare. I can't hear you!"
I raised my hand to my ear with so much effort I could have passed out and spoke softly, defeated, to my ex.
"He left me, Wyatt. Zach left me."
Wyatt didn't miss a beat. He spoke loudly and with authority that couldn't be questioned.
He was always good in a crisis. Other people's crises. Never his own.
"What do you mean? How do you know?"
I looked up at the ceiling and fought the sting in my eyes.
"His stuff is gone. He left me a note. He abandoned me. He did a you." I choked a laugh, but it turned into a sob.
"What does the note say?"
"What do you think?" I snorted. "He's sorry. That's it."
Wyatt huffed.
"Dare, I need you to pull yourself together and tell meexactlywhat the notes says."
I sighed and pushed myself off the floor and stumbled into the kitchen so I could read aloud the words that would torment me for the rest of my life.
"I put my trust in him, I let my guard down, I let him in and he left me. Hefuckingleft me!" I shouted.
Rage filled my head. My temples throbbed. My eyes blurred and my blood boiled.
"Dare—" Wyatt started but I couldn't take it anymore.
I growled. I screamed. I punched the note on the fridge, and it dropped to the floor along with the magnet leaving a fist-sized dent in its place.
