Page 24 of The Story Between Us

Her books on the side table, dog-eared and annotated. Her handwriting on a notepad. Her presence soaked into every surface, preserved like a museum exhibit, like a shrine, like a wound that refused to close.

Livvie had thought she’d come to help him finish a book.

She’d gotten it wrong.

She’d walked into a house where time had stopped three years ago, where a man had frozen himself in the moment of his greatest loss, where grief didn’t work through him but wrapped around him like a second skin.

The manuscript wasn’t late because he’d hit a block.

It was late because finishing it meant admitting Emma was gone.

Nate moved toward the kitchen, oblivious to her realization. Or maybe just pretending. “Milk? Sugar? Fair warning, I think the milk might be questionable.”

“Black is fine.”

Her voice sounded strange. Thin.

She stood in the middle of his living room, surrounded by ghosts, and understood with sudden, terrible clarity: She hadn’t come to save a book deal.

She’d come to help a man who hadn’t even begun to grieve.

And she had two weeks to do it.

The dogs had seen her before Nate had, which told him his fortress had already fallen.

Even now, the betrayers sat at her feet, their tails whisking the floor.

While he, frankly, had to remind himself how to breathe.

Seven years. Seven years since that night on the dock, since the…the moment…well, since he’d let himself really look at her. At the funeral, she’d blurred into black fabric and red-rimmed eyes, and he hadn’t managed to look at anyone that day, least of all her.

But now—she’d grown into herself. The only way to describe it. The girl he remembered had carried all sharp edges and nervous energy, hair that wouldn’t behave, opinions too big for her frame. The woman sipping his wretched coffee (brave) had become something else entirely. Same warm brown waves, but softer now, with hints of auburn that caught the afternoon light, skimming her jaw in a way that made him want to brush them back. Same freckles scattered across her nose and cheeks, sun-warmed and close enough to count, and the same hazel eyes that had always seen too much.

But something new lived in the way she held herself. A steadiness. A quiet confidence that the twenty-year-old version of her had still been growing into.

She’d always looked beautiful, but he’d been too young and too stupid and too scared to let himself think it. Now the thought crashed through his defenses like it had every right to be there.

You two are ridiculous. Just kiss already.

Shut up, Emma.

Now, Livvie held his burnt coffee and walked through his house like she was cataloging a crime scene.

He watched her take it in—the couch with the blanket bunched at one end, the coffee table cemetery of mugs, the general air of a man who’d stopped trying. Her eyes moved over everything, careful and quiet, and he could practically see her filing away each piece of evidence.

Exhibit A: He’s been sleeping on the couch.

Exhibit B: He hasn’t done dishes in a week.

Exhibit C: He’s wearing the same sweatshirt from yesterday. And the day before. And probably the day before that.

Okay, she couldn’t know that last one without an interrogation. Still, the shame crawled up his spine like something with legs.

The contrast between them did not escape him.

“So, you’re with Pemberton,” he said. “When did that happen?”

Livvie set her messenger bag on the floor. “Six years ago. Started as an intern, took the job after I got my master’s degree in literature.”