Blurring the Lines-nook (12 page)

My eyes coasted over the small blue numbers on the alarm clock. It was just past two
in the morning. Burke had said that I needed to visit the crossroads before dawn.
Having him give credence to such woo-woo instructions proved that this island had
turned everything upside down.
Go to a crossroads during the witching hours and listen.
It was the kind of thing some voodoo poser in New Orleans would tell a tourist and
something Burke would’ve dismissed out of hand. 

Hell, I didn’t even believe in those old school superstitions. Herbs and the natural
medicines we sold in my gran’s shop, sure. But all the spells, rituals, and such always
seemed silly. No ritual would make someone love you or help you win the lottery…or
get memories back that your brain had blocked.

So why was I so goddamned scared to walk out to the road and just see? At least if
I tried, Burke would know I’d made an effort. Maybe then he could accept that we couldn’t
force my memories back. We’d have to wait for them to come back in time—if they ever
came back at all.

He’d admitted he loved me tonight. In that moment, everything inside me had soared.
I’d wanted to say it back, to show him I felt the same way. But I knew he wouldn’t
be able to hear it. This version of me was a stranger to him. He didn’t trust me or
my feelings.

I was a clone. A shell with missing parts.

I slipped on my sandals and headed to the door.

I couldn’t remember everything about the woman I was supposed to be, but I didn’t
remember her being a coward.

~

The castle loomed large in the distance, as I carefully made my way along the sandy
trail toward the small road I’d searched for on the island map. There were no lights
along this path, and the foliage seemed to tangle more tightly around me as I got
farther from the cabana. But fingers of moonlight peeked through here and there, giving
me enough illumination to avoid tripping and falling—well, as long as I kept my cool
and took my time. Not the easiest things to do at the moment.

I’d felt brave at the beginning, convincing myself that this was a peaceful walk with
the sounds of the ocean and the breeze though the palms. But then the night birds
started to call to each other, and unknown things rustled in the bushes around me,
making me jump each time a leaf twitched. Now all I could think about were poisonous
snakes, wild boar, and God knows what else that could be plotting my demise. If I
got into any kind of trouble, I doubted anyone would hear me scream over the sound
of the water.

There was a comforting thought. I hugged my arms around myself and rubbed at the chill
bumps. Maybe I should just turn around and try this tomorrow night. I could ask Burke
to come with me. But when I peeked over my shoulder, I couldn’t see the cabana anymore.
So I was at least as far away from it as I was to the road. The path would be just
as treacherous going back as it would forward.

I sighed and kept moving, using the castle as my compass point. The wind whipped along,
chilling the air, and tugging my hair from the knot I’d hastily secured at the nape
of my neck. Dread like I’d never felt before spread through me with icy fingers. The
urge to run back to the cabin beat hard in my gut.

Breathe, Gretchen.

I forced air into my lungs, counting my breaths, and tried to stave off the panic
attack. I was barely winning the fight when the path finally widened and the snarl
of vegetation cleared. A narrow paved road stretched across my view. A choked sound
of relief rose from my throat, and I put my hands on my knees to catch my breath.
Thank God for small miracles. I stepped onto the blacktop, wiping the sweat off my
forehead, and glanced in both directions. This had to be the place. A few yards to
the right was an intersection and a weather-beaten sign with blue letters that crookedly
pointed one way to the beach and the other to the castle. A crude wooden bench was
perched in the sand beside the marker.

“My throne awaits,” I mumbled.

The solid road beneath my feet felt strange after sinking in sand all day, but it
made the journey much quicker. I reached the bench and brushed the sand and leaves
from it before sitting down to wait for…well, nothing most likely.

I pulled my feet onto the bench and hugged my knees, sitting my chin on top of them.
What had Burke said I needed to do when I got here?

Listen.

Well, that was oh so helpful. I closed my eyes and tried to concentrate. There was
a lot to hear, but nothing different from what I’d heard on the trek over. Birds,
bugs, wind, water. After awhile, the steady sound of it all seeped into my bones,
making my limbs heavy and my mind quiet, my body yearning for the sleep I’d deprived
it of for so long.

But there was no way I could let myself fall asleep out here. I might sleepwalk right
into the damn ocean. I lifted my head and rubbed my face in an attempt to revive myself.
When that didn’t work, I did what every sane person does—talked to myself.

“All right. You can do this. Focus.” Just because no magic had happened didn’t mean
I couldn’t get what I came here for on my own. I massaged my fingertips along my brow
bone and tried to probe those blank spots in my mind, tried to relax everything else
and reach for them. “You loved someone, Gretchen.
Remember
him.”

But no matter how hard I tried, nothing came. I couldn’t tell if it was my own fear
blocking me or if something really had injured my brain. I banged a fist against the
bench, frustration welling in me. “Just show me what I need to see!”

Breathe.

The word whispered past my ear even as my ridiculous outburst was swallowed up by
the dense landscape. I glanced around with frantic eyes, searching the dark, but saw
nothing. It’d just been the sound of the breeze through the leaves. I rubbed my hands
over my legs, trying to chase away the goose bumps and the edgy feeling that had overtaken
me.

I was stupid for coming out here in the first place. What did I expect to happen?

I’d had a head injury. My memory had been affected. Sitting in the middle of a crossroads
in the dead of night wouldn’t change that. I needed to go back to the cabin and get
some sleep. The only thing that would fix this was healing time.

I stood and took two steps toward the path, absently grasping for my Benedict medal.
But a sound behind me had me halting my stride. I spun on the ball of my foot and
braced myself for some rabid hog charging my way, but there was no animal coming at
me.

No. There was a man, stepping out of the trees and staring straight at me.

A jolt of terror went through me, freezing my muscles. But when our gazes connected,
and he gave a tentative smile, everything inside me burst wide—doors swinging open,
memories flooding, and then rip-your-guts-out grief tearing right through the center
of me.

No.

It couldn’t be.

It wasn’t him.

I was asleep on the bench. I was dreaming.

But then he said my name. I dropped to my knees on the blacktop and wept.

Harris
.

~Gretchen~

I should’ve been scrambling to my feet and bolting. Dead guy shows up—you run. That
was the protocol. But I couldn’t move. I couldn’t do anything but stay there on my
knees, palms pressed to the blacktop, and heave sobs like some inconsolable child.

This was a dream. I was sleepwalking or in a trance state. This was why I’d been told
to be here and listen. The ritual had brought me the dream.

But regardless of what this was, I couldn’t take my eyes off him. He was as handsome
as I remembered, maybe even more so, with his windswept blond hair and pale green
eyes. The bizarre fact that he was dressed like any other tourist on an island—crisp
khaki shorts and a light blue polo shirt—barely registered. All I could fixate on
was how alive he looked, how real.

“Gretchen,” he said again, moving closer with slow, measured steps, his hands out
in front of him as if to soothe a crazy person. “Baby, it’s okay. I swear. It’s okay.”

I hiccupped on a sob and shook my head vehemently. “Not. Okay. You can’t be here.
I saw you. I…I buried you.”

Anguish filled his eyes. “Don’t think about that. Please. I’m here now.” He touched
his chest as if to prove it—whether to himself or to me, I wasn’t sure. “You’ve been
asking to talk to me, right? You know you have.”

I shook my head again, unable to process any of this.

“That night at your house, we were so close. I know you felt me. Baby, I was trying.
With everything I have, I’ve been trying to reach out to you. I’ve been with you.”

My hands fisted at my side as memories cascaded over me, pictures and emotions flashing
through my head like a slideshow at warp speed. “No.”

“The night my brother taunted me by kissing you…” Hurt flashed though his eyes.

Bile rose in my throat.

He knelt down in front of me, the lines in his face becoming soft with concern and
sadness. “Never mind. It doesn’t matter. It’s okay, sweetheart. It’s okay now.” He
reached out and stroked my arm. His hand was as warm and solid as the ground beneath
me. “In this place, those barriers between us aren’t there. You just had to want me
here. You only had to ask.”

When the breeze blew, I could smell his familiar cologne. The hollow ache that had
plagued me for the last year seemed to yawn wider. “Harris.”

“Yes, baby, it’s me. I’m here.”

Everything hurt. Every part of me. I could shatter. He wrapped his arms around me,
and I let him. But every emotion was trying to bleed out of me at once.

“God, I’ve missed you,” he said against my hair, his own voice choked with grief.
“I’ve missed you so much.”

I was cold all over despite his surprising warmth. My face pressed into the crook
of his neck, the formerly familiar terrain strange to me now.

“You left me,” I whispered, the words scraping across my aching throat. “You
left
.”

“I’m so, so sorry.” His arms tightened around me as he rocked me. “It wasn’t supposed
to be that way. I didn’t want to leave you. You have to believe me. It was a mistake.”

I stilled at that and extracted myself from his embrace, sitting back on my calves.
“What?”

He swiped tears off my cheeks with his thumbs, his gaze solemn, beseeching. “It was
a mistake.”

The words pounded through my brain with the force of a mallet. “A mistake?”

He exhaled loudly, and I was momentarily distracted by the fact that Harris was here—breathing.

He took my hand and caressed the spot where my wedding ring used to be. “I was drunk
that night—pissed off and not thinking straight.” He raised his gaze from my naked
finger. “I took too many pills. I only wanted to sleep.”

“Pissed?” I tried to think back to that day. I’d gone over it my head a million times,
searching for clues, some sign that would’ve explained things. I remembered him smelling
like whiskey, but that hadn’t been completely out of the ordinary. Often after business
meetings, the guys would go out and drink. I’d been annoyed he was home late, but
we hadn’t fought or anything.

He sighed. “I’d lost a lot of money that day. Most of my money, actually. Made a shady
deal with someone I shouldn’t have and screwed myself—and you.” A muscle in his jaw
flexed as he continued to rub that bare spot on my left ring finger. “All the money
for the house I’d been planning to build for us. The money for the wedding. I thought
you’d leave me. You would’ve had a right to.”

Everything inside me went cold. This had been about
money
? “Harris, I would’ve never left you for—”

“When I came home early to break the news to you, I heard you talking on the phone.
With my brother. I’d already had too much to drink, and you were laughing. ” He grimaced.
“You sounded so happy and…like you were flirting with him. I got angry. You’d just
gotten back from visiting family in New Orleans. And all these thoughts raced through
my head. That you had something on the side with him, that you’d always wanted him
and had settled for me. I went back out before you even knew it and got tanked at
the bar across the street. By the time I got home, I just wanted to pass out. I don’t
remember taking the pills.”

“You thought I was
cheating
on you with Burke?” For some reason, this was more shocking than the fact that I
was talking to my dead fiancé.

He sat on his heels and raked a hand through his hair—a very Harris gesture. “I know
now that there wasn’t anything going on. But the bond you had with him made me question
things. You liked him first. He was your first kiss.”

“I dated
you
. I was going to marry you.”

“After I lied and told you Burke had hooked up with every hot girl in the school.
After I insisted we go to college up north. When we were together, I never doubted
that you loved me, but I couldn’t help but wonder if you loved him, too. And in a
way you’d never have for me. That if I hadn’t made up those stories about him, if
I hadn’t moved us to New York, you would’ve chosen him.”

His confession was like getting hit in the chest with a sledgehammer. He’d lied about
what Burke did in high school. Had purposely moved me away from home. All to make
sure I chose
him
?

Harris grabbed my hands. “I realize now that it was stupid insecurity. I was a paranoid
idiot. I’ve seen what you’ve gone through since I left, and baby, I’m so sorry I ever
questioned you. So very sorry. To see you this broken and sad has ripped me apart.
I hate myself for doing this to you. I can’t bear it.”

I climbed to my feet on shaky limbs, all the information making me dizzy and light-headed.
Harris followed suit, hurrying to a stand and taking my elbow—like he was the strong
one, like he wasn’t some specter in a dream.