A Matter of Truth (Fate Series 3) Read online

  I pad toward the kitchen sometimes around three a.m., in search of a glass of water after awaking in a cold sweat from another nightmare in which I lost Jonah. Months after leaving Annar, I still dream about him nearly nightly—not the lucid dreams we shared for so long, but the kind where I have no control over what happens. Tonight we’d been in a forest, and when the dream died, all that’d been left behind was blackened bits of trees upon charred ground.

  I was the one to leave, and yet, every single time I lose him in a dream, it cuts me to the core.

  My hands are still shaking when I flip on the kitchen light, and then I jump when Will’s still form at the table comes into view. He jumps, too, his chair clattering loudly in the night’s silence. “Jesus, Zoe! You scared the shite out of me.”

  “I’m not the one sitting in the dark!”

  He smiles sadly, and it’s then I see his cell phone on the table. I drop into one of the chairs as he rights his fallen one. “Want to talk about it?”

  He shakes his head, just like I knew he would. He and I, we’re excellent at avoiding the big issues in our lives, which is probably why we gravitated toward each other so quickly. I resisted getting to know him all of a week before I couldn’t help myself. I needed a friend and Will seemed like he’d fit the bill nicely. And I was right—I’d heard the term kindred spirits before, but never had it applied like it does now with this guy. It sounds awful, but one of the biggest draws toward Will is that, like me, he puts on a good front. Inside, he’s just as much damaged goods as I am.

  Helpless that there’s nothing else I can do but be here for him, I motion to the stove. “Want some warm milk?”

  “Shouldn’t I be asking you that?” He stands up before I can protest and digs a pan out of the cupboard.

  “The better question is, why are the two of you up at three-bloody-o’clock in the morning?”

  I turn around to find Cameron Dane shuffling into the kitchen on well-loved slippers. His barely graying, sandy blonde hair is wild, his thin robe riddled with holes, but his handsome face is one of kindness. Acceptance. And, at the moment, paternal amusement. My eyes go wide in guilt. “Did we wake you up? I’m so sorry!”

  He drops a kiss on my forehead before sliding into the chair next to me. “Just worried about you two, that’s all.”

  Will pours milk into the pan, adding a few ingredients that make it his special recipe. As he stirs it, I stare at his phone and wonder how long he was in here. How long the call was tonight. How much heartache he’s in.

  “Want some, Dad?” he asks without looking up from the stove.

  “Don’t mind if I do.” It’s then that Cameron also spies the phone. His dark eyes are troubled but unsurprised. Like me, he knows better than to push, though. “What’s got you up at this god awful hour, hen? Everything alright?”

  As I cannot tell him the truth, I smile weakly. “Just thirsty.”

  Will looks up from the pan. “Coming right up.”

  “Learned this from his mum,” Cameron tells me, arranging the mugs down in a straight row, handles aligned nicely. I already knew this, but I love hearing stories about Molly Dane, so I gladly listen anytime Will and Cameron reminisce about the woman whose influence on their lives still runs strong.

  And yet, despite their happy memories, there’s so much heartbreak in this kitchen, it’s nearly dripping off the walls and ceilings, into our hair and skin. I try not to think of my own mother, who never made me anything to help me sleep. Or my father, who never asked what was wrong, let alone spent time with me in the dark of night to ease my worries.

  The chair creaks when Cameron sits back down. “I heard there was a mugging not far from your boarding house this week.”

  I’m not surprised by the crime or by Cameron’s gentle disapproval. He’s letting me off the hook for why I’m up in the middle of the night, but he won’t let me off for where I live.

  The Dane boys have been after me for weeks to just move in with them already. Both object to where I live, citing “shifty characters” in an “unsavory neighborhood” filled with “transient workers” that apparently think of nothing but “accosting innocent women” after being at sea for weeks or months.

  The guys have a point. It’s not like I think of where I live as home anyway. The boarding house is cramped; I share a bathroom with some old dude who smells like the Preparation-H he must buy in bulk, and there’s some other guy missing teeth who’s always on the stairs, ready to pummel me with his requests for a date, or, worse yet, a night of “raging, unencumbered sexual gratification.”

  But living here? With Will and Cameron? That’d be the same as putting down roots, which doesn’t seem fair to them, or me no matter how much I want to. Because, sooner or later, somebody is going to come looking for me. And when they do, I’ll have to run. And yet . . . I feel safe with the Dane boys. Their house has been my sanctuary. The love they’ve shown me, the utter acceptance into their lives and home, have been a lifeline. For nearly twenty years, I’ve been starved for what they offer so freely. Security. Acceptance. Love. Honesty.

  And most importantly: family.

  “Having a girl around full-time will cramp your bachelor style,” is what I finally say, even though I know it’s a lie.

  This amuses Will. “You spend the night at least five times a week anyway. You’re over here every day as it is. There hasn’t been a single dinner we haven’t had together as a family—except when any of us work—since the week I met you. You have a toothbrush in the bathroom. Deodorant. Your clothes hang in the closet. You picked out our Christmas tree. You buy Nell food. Hell, I even heard you call her your ‘good girl’ the other day.”

  I glance down at Nell, who’s curled up underneath the table. She snorts in her sleep and kicks a leg; unlike the rest of us, Nell only dreams of good things, or so I hope. But he’s right. This old girl is the dog I’d always wanted growing up but was denied due to my parents’ beliefs that pets were irrelevant and burdensome to their crafts.

  “I mean, I found one of your bras in the hamper this past weekend.”

  My cheeks burn. I’d wondered where I’d put that one.

  Cameron chuckles at my shame. “Nothing either of us hasn’t seen before, lass.”

  Could this get any worse? What’s next? Did I leave behind stray tampons, too?

  Will turns away from the pan to face me, hip propped against the counter. “We can even go over to your place right now and box everything up. It’ll take, what—a half hour at the most, between the three of us?”

  I study his dark eyes, gauging his seriousness. It’s three in the morning, after all. And he’s just gotten off what was, no doubt, a hellishly difficult phone call with his technically ex-girlfriend, even after all that’s happened between them. “I would never ask you to do such a thing in the middle of the night.”

  Cameron rubs at his neat beard. “You need not to ask. We’re more than happy to go and pack you up and bring you home.”

  Home.

  After resisting it for so long, I finally allow the word to sink into me and spread out. This place is home to me, has been for weeks. Months, if I’m being honest with myself.

  Cameron must see the sheen of tears in my eyes—they won’t fall, I refuse to let anyone see me cry anymore—but he must see them, because his large hand covers mine. “I cannot stand the thought of you being alone in that place when you have a room here to call your own.”

  I should say no. It’s the smart move. I’ll only hurt them in the long run when I have to disappear. But the truth is, I love Cameron Dane like a father. More than my actual father, which sounds awful yet liberating to admit, if even just to myself. And I love Will, too. In these short months, these two have truly become more of a family to me than anyone I share blood and genetics with. So I take a deep breath, count to ten in my head, and say the only thing that I can and be completely true to myself. Something expands in the hollow of my chest, something warm and comforting, when I murmur, “O
kay.”

  They both blink, startled, like they can’t believe I finally caved in.

  I exhale another fragile laugh. Two in one night. I’m on a roll. “This will be fuel to Frieda’s fire, you know. Did you hear her earlier at the bowling alley? She was egging Ginny into a bet over when we’ll seal the deal.”

  Will fills our mugs with the milk; more importantly, he fills the kitchen with his addictive laughter. “How much?”

  I’m smiling. Oh, gods, I’m smiling and almost laughing and it’s amazing. “Twenty bucks. Paul collected the bills from both girls.”

  Both men are amused. Will asks before sipping his drink, “What were the conditions?”

  “I think Frieda thought we’d last a week at most. Ginny says we’ll wait until we’re married.” And . . . the smile drops right off my face. Because I should’ve been married by now. My last name, my real one, would’ve no longer been Lilywhite. I should be a Whitecomb, but I’m not.

  And that hurts more than I can articulate.

  “You two are too young to even contemplate marriage,” Cameron grumbles.

  If he only knew.

  Will joins us at the table. “Hypocrite, thy name is Cameron Dane. Didn’t you get married at twenty-two? Sired me at twenty-three?”

  I mouth, sired? He winks in return, the corners of his lips tilted upward.

  “Times were different.” Cameron wipes at lingering milk on the edges of his moustache. “You two have your whole lives ahead of you.”

  Will’s long fingers curl around his mug. “Luckily, Zoe and I have no intention of ever marrying one another. Or shagging, despite all of Frieda’s urgings.”

  I stretch my mug out to clink his in agreement. It relieves me to no end that he and I are on the same page about that. But I need to shift the conversation to something less likely to drown me in what-ifs and what-could-have-beens. “Think we can figure out a way to collect the money instead?”

  His dark brown eyes, so similar to his father’s, light up. “Listen to you, wanting to encourage our friends’ gambling tendencies. I’ve finally corrupted you, haven’t I?”

  I swat at his arm and he laughs all the more.

  Fifteen minutes later, while we nurse our milk and eat slices of homemade banana bread, Cameron raises his mug. “Zoe White, we officially welcome you home.”

  The urge to cry this time doesn’t stem from the overwhelming anguish I drown in daily. Instead, I’m swaddled in relief. And a belief that maybe, just maybe, I can do this after all.

  Cameron is upstairs in the boarding house, taping up the last two boxes of my meager possessions, while Will and I slide the pair we’ve brought with us into the back of his truck.

  “Earlier, in the kitchen, we were joking around about that ridiculous bet of Frieda’s. You were happy, and then . . .” His head tilts toward me. “It was like someone punched you in the gut. What happened?”

  He knows me, knows how easily I can go from being okay to being decimated within seconds, because he’s the same. But even still, I shake my head, hating the pain that spreads at the thought of what could have been. I ask, whisper soft and white in the frigid January air, “How do you know whether you made the right choice?”

  He knows what I mean. He knows I’m asking about Becca.

  “I don’t.” Another cloud forms between us from his deep sigh. “I fucking kick myself nightly, wondering if I have.”

  I wipe a dirty slush off the tailgate and think how I reevaluate my decision on an hourly basis.

  “My parents were this grand love story. I grew up knowing nothing differently.” He kicks his boot against one of the large tires. I know this story, and yet, I love to repeatedly hear it. It gives me hope that there are true love stories out there filled with people who make it work. “I thought I had it and . . .” He stares into the distance.

  Part of me wishes I could fall in love with Will, how this could solve so many problems for all of us. But even considering such a betrayal leaves me rotting in guilt, an emotion I try desperately to outrace on a daily basis. Because, the fact is, my heart belongs elsewhere. It always will, which makes accepting harsh truths a bitter pill.

  “Sometimes I drown in the What Ifs,” he tells me quietly.

  “Love isn’t always enough,” I whisper into air. My words lift up and dissipate before my eyes. I wish it were. I wish love were easy. Gods, I wish that so very much.

  “No matter what you do, love never fails to kick you in the arse,” he agrees, but there’s no vehemence behind his words. “Look at Dad. Happy as can be until his wife dies, leaving him to be a single parent to a teenage boy. It eats him up every day, wondering if there was something he could have done to change the outcome.” He slips off his beanie, runs a hand through his sandy hair before tugging on his ear. I can practically hear the words running through his head, the ones he won’t say out loud, even to me: Just like I do.

  Words I consider every single day myself.

  I lean into him, tugging my own beanie down around my ears. The silence that surrounds us at nearly four o’clock in the morning is dense and sleepy. “For what it’s worth,” I murmur, “I think you’re doing the best you can for yourself.”

  Like me, though, he’s not able to talk about his choices easily. His arms circle me for a brief moment in a hug that leaves my heart hurting for him. “We should help Dad get those last two boxes down before he kicks both our arses.”

  Because I love him, I do not push any further. Not this morning, at least.

  The first time I ate at the Moose on the Loose, I was reminded of the diner I used to frequent with my friends back in high school. Called The Hollow Deer, there were dusty stuffed animal heads on the wall. It used to turn me off of meat when I was there, simply because those poor animals would stare at me balefully, like they were saying, “Et tu, Chloe?” Well, the Moose is similar in that there are animals everywhere—moose, obviously—but rather than stuffed heads, it’s more in décor: moose curtains, moose statues, moose pictures on the walls, and moose etchings on the tables. If you like moose, this is definitely the place for you. If you don’t, well, you’re definitely in the wrong diner.

  I like it here, though. Kitschy as it is, it’s also very welcoming, and locals flock to this place for comfort food and easy camaraderie. Well, mostly easy. There’s still Frieda to contend with, especially when she’s in a gloat-y mood like right now. “Imagine my surprise when I saw a change of address form in Paul’s office.”

  The yin to Frieda’s yang, Ginny bumps hips with me. “I can’t believe you and Will are living together!”

  I roll my eyes. “Roommates,” I stress. “We’re roommates.”

  “Riiiggghhhht,” Frieda drawls. She scoots until her hip is also against mine; I’m trapped in a gossip sandwich. One of the locals who comes on a daily basis chuckles from his spot at the counter. I try not to glare at him. “Like anyone could be just roommates with someone as tasty as Will.”

  Ginny giggles. Frieda chortles. The words are on the tip of my tongue, but I never can get them out, no matter how much I wish I could unburden myself, even to friends. Because if I were to let it out, it’d break me even more than it already has. And I’m a Class A, prime example of a broken girl. You’re wrong, I want to tell them. Will is nothing more than my best friend. He will never be anything more than my best friend, because I already am in love with somebody else. Two somebody elses, actually. And that will never change, no matter how much I wished differently.

  I tell them instead, “You realize my bedroom is next to his dad’s, right?”

  “I bet old Cameron snores,” Frieda says. “And sleeps like the dead.”

  I wrap another set of silverware with a napkin. “He’s forty-five, Frieda. That’s hardly old.”

  “I think it’s great!” Gum snaps between Ginny’s super white teeth. “You’re the best thing to happen to Will in ages.”

  I scratch the back my neck, uncomfortable with this turn in the conversation. I ho
pe Will doesn’t come out of the kitchen. He’s incredibly uneasy about anybody discussing what he considers to be no one’s business but his.

  “Right?” Frieda puts a new liner in the coffee pot. “We thought he’d given monkhood a go until you entered his orbit, thanks to some bitch he couldn’t seem to get over.”

  I don’t have the heart to tell them that Will isn’t entirely over that bitch just yet; just this morning, there was another traumatizing phone call that had Will in nearly a zombie state for the better part of an hour. I don’t know what’s worse—the lingering tie he and Becca, his ex-girlfriend, can’t seem to unknot, despite the vast physical distance and history between them, or the forced separation and radio silence I’ve enforced between me and my fiancé. And his twin.

  But I can’t let myself think about them right now. I grab my pad and pen, ready to let myself fall into my work routine.

  Frieda’s not done with me, though. “You cannot honestly tell me that you haven’t hit that yet.” She purses her red lips together.

  I look her straight in the eyes and say slowly, but clearly, “I haven’t hit that.”

  “Are you asexual?”

  I level a long look at her. She’s only asked me this about, oh, a hundred times since we’ve met.

  “Because, honey, Will is what we call USDA Prime beef.”

  “Well, thank you. Nothing makes a man feel manlier than being compared to actual cow flesh. Shall I lift my shirt so you can check my marbling as well?”

  Ginny gasps, fire engine red, as Will sets a rag down on the counter next to us. Several customers nearby laugh loudly. Another smile curves my lips. It’s an epidemic.

  But Frieda is not shamed in the least. She pats Will’s rock hard abs, still hidden behind his shirt and apron, before sauntering away. Ginny flees shortly afterwards.

  “You’re evil,” I tell him, but he knows I’m joking.

  “Bullocks. I am the epitome of angelic fortitude. Besides, they clearly don’t know Dad. He wakes at the drop of a pin. Any shagging we’d ever do would have to be out of the house. I’m extremely loud when aroused, and I have a feeling you are, too. Some things just cannot be helped. Dad could never sleep through us.”