Page 65 of Fight from the Heart

Mae isn’t wrong, and we find ourselves at Town Tavern on a Monday where cheeseburgers are their specialty. I’m so hungry I could eat three of them when I hardly finish half of one on a typical night. To my surprise, my sister, Tricia, and Leon enter the bar.

“Hey,” Tricia says, nearing our booth. I’d invite her to sit with us, but I can’t handle happy. Glancing from Leon to Tricia, their fingers entwined and rings on each of their left hands, I just can’t deal with their happily ever after tonight. Instead, I want to get drunk off my ass kind of happy. “How was New York?”

I groan, and Mae shakes her head. Tricia’s face falls. “What happened?”

It’s a familiar question, one I answered over and over and over again when Brendan and I broke up. People who heard we were engaged, assumed we were married, or those who knew we fell apart wonderedwhat happened. At least this time, it won’t be the entire town that knows my plight. Just my family and Mae.

“He…” Suddenly, I don’t feel like telling Jacob’s tale. It isn’t my place to spread his situation to others, and honestly, it makes me feel like even more of a fool for falling in love with an unobtainable man. “It just isn’t going to happen for us.”

Tricia skeptically eyes me for a second. “Leon and I were in Traverse City looking at baby things the other day.” Her voice lowers on both his name and the future baby. “We saw Spencer Campbell. Remember him? He had the biggest crush on you in high school.”

Mae’s brow arches as she knowingly gazes at me over the table. What she knows is Spencer asked me out, and I went to New York with Jacob instead.

“He said he’s been trying to connect with you. Saw you here a few weeks ago and wanted to see you again.”

Both Mae’s brows lift, and I’m curious why the man is telling my sister he wants to see me.

“Maybe you should call him. You know, see where it goes.”

“Maybe,” I state.

While I appreciate my sister trying to play matchmaker, I also don’t. She knows I’ve had feelings for Jacob for years, even if I didn’t discuss him much. It won’t be so easy to give him up. I recall how less than two weeks ago, we sat in this bar where he kissed me before my family, making a statement to them about who I was to him. They even had that freaking bet going, which Ethan won, claiming he knew Jacob had fallen for me. Ethan knows nothing about literature, so he doesn’t realize it’s always the angel who falls and never the villains.

My chest pinches at the thought. Jacob isn’t evil, just misguided. He’s been hurt and never looked at the source, initiating and encouraging the same kind of abuse in adult relationships. I feel sorry for him when I shouldn’t feel anything for him.

“Okay, well, be safe tonight,” Tricia breaks into my thoughts and smiles at Mae before excusing herself.

“Maybe she’s right. You should call this Spencer guy. Get back in the saddle as they say,” Mae teases once my sister and her happily ever after walk away.

“Who is ‘they’ and why does it have to be a ‘saddle’?” I joke.

“Whatcha want? A Harley? The point is to get anything between those thighs that would rev them up again.”

I laugh. “I’m not ready, Mae.”

“Honey, you’ve been ready for years. You got sidetracked.”

Sidetracked, I want to snort. More like waylaid. It’s been eleven years since Brendan. There’s a reason I’ve been single for so long. I suffered from a fear of opening my heart. Maybe my interest in Jacob was because he was unobtainable. I didn’t have to worry about losing him because I never had him. But then I let him have a taste, and like a victim to the vampire, I can’t seem to walk away from my monster, falling deeper and deeper under his spell. Falling until he’s sucked me dry.

My phone lays on the table, and before I know it, Mae has it in her hand, tapping at the screen and holding it to her ear. Then she passes it to me, and a deep masculine voice says, “Hello.”

“Spencer?” I question, narrowing my eyes at her. “I’m so sorry, could you give me a minute?”

He laughs while he says he can wait, and I cover the receiver, glaring at my friend. “What do you think you are doing?”

“Okay, maybe he doesn’t have a horse or a Harley, but he runs an adventure shop. I’m sure he has something to put the wind back in your sails.” Mae’s idioms are not lost on me, but I don’t appreciate them.

“Or maybe you could put the wind back in his.” She sets her lips around the straw of her drink, imitating what she means, and I can’t help but laugh a little for the first time in two days. Shaking my head, I excuse myself and walk to the back of the bar to speak with Spencer.

+ + +

Near the end of the week, I absentmindedly answer my phone from an unknown caller.

“Hello?”

“Pam Carter?” The stern feminine voice surprises me. It’s not an automated system sound or even the crinkle of a telemarketer calling.

“May I ask who’s calling?”