Levi:Delilah?
I stare at the screen, at his words and the promises I want to believe.
Then I look at the gossip article.
At her arms around him.
Penelope’s voice echoes in my head:You’re going to leave again, we both know it. You always do.
She’s right.
That is what I do.
I’ve done it my whole life. Every time things get hard, every time it feels like too much and I start to believe that maybe this time will be different…I run.
I left my first husband when things got boring. My second husband when things got complicated. I left Twin Waves the first time because I was scared. Left the second time because I was terrified.
And now I’m sitting here, terrified again, and Levi is in LA with a woman who probably has a skincare routine that costs a fortune, and I’m supposed to believe he’s going tochoose me?
Me, with my flower shop and my Honda and my history of leaving?
I know how this story ends.
I’ve read this book before. The girl with the baggage doesn’t get the rock star. That’s not how it works.
I pack a bag.
Not much. Just the essentials. Clothes, toiletries, my phone charger. The basics of starting over. I’m disturbingly good at this. If running away were an Olympic sport, I’d have a wall full of gold medals.
Ruffy watches me from the doorway, his head tilted in confusion.
“Don’t look at me like that,” I tell him. “You’re coming too.”
His tail wags. At least someone’s excited about this terrible decision.
I catch my reflection in the mirror above the dresser. Red-rimmed eyes. Pale face. I look like someone who’s just been gutted, which is accurate.
My phone lights up again. Another text, another call. I’ve lost count of how many.
Part of me wants to answer. Part of me wants to hear his voice, let him explain, believe whatever story he tells me. That’s the part that believed him on the pier. The part that laughedwhen that fish slapped him in the face. The part that’s apparently a sucker for punishment.
But I’ve believed before. I’ve stayed before. And every single time, I’ve ended up exactly where I am right now, alone, packing a bag, running away from something that was supposed to be good.
I pull open my closet. The dress I wore to book club hangs there, next to the jeans I put on this morning thinking today would be a normal day. Thinking Levi would come home tomorrow and we’d figure things out and everything would be fine.
I was so stupid.
I grab a few more things. Throw them in the bag without folding them.
The house is quiet. Mom’s still at bridge club. There’s no one to stop me, no one to talk sense into me, no one to tell me I’m being ridiculous.
Maybe I am being ridiculous. Maybe I should wait for him to explain. Maybe I should give him a chance.
But every time I think about staying, I see that photo. I hear Penelope’s voice. I feel the familiar panic rising in my chest, the certainty that this is going to hurt, and the only way to survive is to leave before it does.
I’ve been here before. In my marriage, when Irealized I’d rather be anywhere else. And now here, in Twin Waves, with a man who promised me he’d come back.
His mom promised too. She said she’d send for him. She said it was temporary.
