Page 132 of Big Dill

Lauren reaches for my hand, her fingers tight, protective. Her eyes flash with anger. “What did he do? How did he hurt you?”

“I…I…” My voice fails.

“Give me his address.”

That pulls a laugh from me, but it’s tangled with a big, ugly sob that rips straight out of my chest. It takes a minute before I can breathe again, before I can even form words. When I finally do, I tell her everything. The meeting. Elise. Toronto. The way the past crept up on me wearing a different face.

When I finish, Lauren doesn’t say a word. She stands, disappears into the kitchen, and comes back with two mugs of coffee. We sit side by side, steam curling between us, sipping in silence while she processes it all. The quiet feels heavy, but safe.

Finally, Lauren exhales, letting a fraction of the tension drain from her shoulders. Even though she’s still my friend, I can feel it, her counselor side is flicking on, scanning my words, my tells. “Tristan is a real asshole.”

A broken laugh escapes me, catching painfully in my throat. “Yeah.”

“I say this with love, Jami,” she continues, her voice steady. “But he really messed with your head.”

“Tell me something I don’t know.”

“Okay, I will, but I think in here…” She lightly pokes my chest, right around the vicinity of my heart. “I think you do know it.”

“Know what?”

“Brody isn’t Tristan.”

That makes me sit up straighter. Really look at her. “Did you not hear the part where I look just like her? Where we’re both designers? Where they sent me on a wild goose chase just to get me out of the way?” My chest tightens. “That feels…familiar. Too familiar.”

“You said they,” Lauren says gently. She stands, takes my empty mug, and refills it before handing it back to me. “What if it was just Elise?”

I frown.

“From everything you’ve told me,” she goes on. “It doesn’t sound like Brody was part of this. Your brother is one of the best guys I know. Do you really think he’d be best friends with—or open a business with—someone capable of doing something like that? To him… to you?”

“I…” I shake my head, so confused. “Elise and I have so much in common. Not only do we look alike, we’re both designers. I think I was a stand-in.”

“Let me see this woman. Is she on socials?”

I nod and she hands me her phone to do a search. A sound catches in my throat and my stomach sinks when I see she’s tagged in a photo with Brody, Nicola and Susan. “She’s wearing my clothes.” Again it feels all too familiar.

“Ugh, she looks terrible in your clothes. Kidding, you could design a potato sack and it would look good on anyone. Sure, there are similarities, but she’s not you. There’s only one Jami Grant and she’s sitting beside me.” She looks at the photo again. “Wait, is that Nicola Fairfax?”

“It is. Her husband was fishing and she accompanied him. She even took one of my yoga classes.”

“Wow, now she looks amazing in your clothes. I’m going to need a pair of those yoga pants.” She lifts her head, going serious again. “If you were a stand-in,” Lauren says gently. “Don’t you think he would’ve run straight back to her the second she came home and showed interest?”

She’s not wrong. He didn’t go running back to Elise. He stayed. He’d been hurt, sure, but he’d still said they could be friends.

He’s a really nice guy, Jami.

“Maybe,” I begin, though the doubt won’t let go even though my inner voice is battering me. “Maybe he was just expecting her to leave again.”

Lauren studies me, clearly unconvinced. “Or maybe that’s a coincidence, Jami.”

“I don’t know if I believe in coincidences.”

“Maybe he just has a type,” she says. “But what’s on the outside isn’t what matters. And after the stunt she pulled, I think you’d agree that you’re completely different people on the inside.”

“Yeah.”

“I’m sure Brody knows that too.”