Maverick shook his head. “I played our last day in the cabin over and over until I nearly went crazy, trying to figure out what I’d done or said.” Maverick was aware he was brushing over too many of the details—about the sex and the letter—but he just couldn’t make himself say them. “By Thursday of that week, I was sure it had all been a misunderstanding. I went to the library to find her, to confront her, and ask her to explain. Ms. Pauleysaid Ella wasn’t volunteering anymore. So I drove to her house…and she was gone.”
“Gone?” Grayson’s brows furrowed in confusion.
“The whole family was. They’d moved, and I didn’t know where. I had no phone number, no way of contacting her. I overheard Edith talking to Mom at church that Sunday, saying Mr. Decker had shown up at her house and asked to break the lease, despite the fact he’d only just renewed it a couple months earlier. He told her that he’d gotten a job offer out of the state. That was all Edith knew. That they’d moved out of the state.”
“That’s kind of crazy.”
“What it was…was permanent,” Maverick said gruffly. “She completely cut me out of her life with a fucking letter. Jesus, Gray, for most of that summer, we’d been planning our future together. We talked about getting married after graduation and living on the farm. I told her I’d ask my parents if we could move into Hideaway and make it our home.”
“You were awfully young for plans like that,” Grayson pointed out. “Only seventeen.”
“I know,” Maverick replied, “but she…” He sighed, his head bent low.
“She?” Grayson prodded, when Maverick shut down.
“She was the one for me. I knew it the second I touched her hand.”
Grayson didn’t reply to that for a moment, letting it soak in. And when he did, he responded just as Maverick anticipated.
“I thought the legend was bullshit.”
At least Grayson wasn’t saying it to be a smart-ass or to tease him. In truth, it felt as if his brother was trying to figure out if Maverick truly meant it.
He shrugged. He’d said lots of things about that damn legend. “I’m pretty sure I said it’s a curse—which it is.”
“Is?”
Maverick shouldn’t have used the present tense, because it revealed too much.
“Was,” he corrected, wrapping himself up in an air of indifference. “Ella Decker is ancient history.”
Grayson scoffed. “Yeah. You might want to tell your face that.”
Maverick dismissed his brother with an eye roll, taking a long sip of his water.
“You know, if you really want an answer to what happened between you,” Grayson jerked his thumb over his shoulder, “she’s right over there. You could ask.”
Maverick shook his head. “Nope. Not interested in rehashing the past. She broke my heart when we were kids and I moved on.”
Of all his brothers, Grayson was the one most likely to know just how full of shit Maverick was about the moving-on part. “Oh, is that what you’ve been doing? Moving on?”
Yep. Fucker knew him way too well.
Maverick didn’t bother responding to that. “What we’re talking about happened fifteen years ago. None of it matters anymore.”
Grayson didn’t look convinced.
“Look,” Maverick continued, clearing up his plate and napkin, ready to make good on his escape. “Her visit is almost over. She’s here for less than a week at this point. I’ll just keep my distance until she’s gone and then things will return to normal. No harm, no foul.”
Grayson looked evenlessconvinced by that.
“Maverick Storm,” Edith called out from across the tasting room.
He looked her direction, groaning softly as the older woman waved him over.
Grayson chuckled. “Doesn’t look like that keeping-your-distance thing is breaking your way.”
Maverick rose, flipped his brother off, then tossed his trash.
