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“That’s insane,” Bree said when I told her as much.
I grabbed our coffees and mumbled athank youto the barista before turning toward her, my voice hushed as we walked to the front doors of our favorite shop. “Bree, there’s something you don’t know.”
Her steps faltered as she looked at me, and after a delay, she took her drink from my hand. “Okay, let me take a sip before you tell me whatever this is because, clearly, it’s heavy.”
A weighted breath tumbled from my lips, my eyebrows lifting in agreement.
“Judgment-free zone,” she said once she’d taken a long drink of her iced coffee.
I gave her an affectionate look, then pushed on the door so we could slip outside. “I was with someone when I met your brother. Chase knew,” I hurried to add.
Her eyes widened, but she lifted her cup. “Still a judgment-free zone,” she said quickly before taking another drink.
“You’re such a dork,” I said as a soft laugh eased from me, but I didn’t feel any lighter.
If anything, that weight on my chest and in my stomach felt heavier.
“I should’ve broken up with him immediately because Chase was...well, I fell for him that first night,” I finally went on. “But I didn’t, and I know that’s terrible. But I’d been with my boyfriend for years, and I tried telling myself Chase was just an intriguing stranger. Then I got trapped until I was hurting them both.”
“And Chase knew the entire time?” Bree asked from where we stood outside my car.
My head moved in a jerky nod. “He was never okay with it, and Ireallyhurt him by taking so long to decide, but we couldn’t stay away from each other.”
“How long did this go on?”
“About two months,” I said regretfully.
“Okay, well, I thought that was going to be more dramatic, like a year, or something,” she said, then slanted her head. “Still bad—no judgment!”
“I should’ve broken up with my boyfriend the night I met Chase,” I said unquestionably as I reached for the handle of my door and slipped into the driver’s seat.
“But you didn’t,” Bree said once she was sliding into the passenger seat of the car, “and that was years ago. So, what does this have to do with Chase’s weird memories of Harper?”
My tongue darted out to wet my lips as those suspicions wound deeper and deeper until I felt sick with them. “He thought Harper had been with Brandon,” I informed her softly as if someone might be listening. “That they’d gotten togetherwhenshe was still with Brandon before she finally left Brandon for Chase.”
Bree’s expression fell. “Oh.”
“And he told Brandon they physically fought over Harper.”
“Okay!” Bree said as if that were a piece in the Chase Mind Puzzle in my favor. “Chase probably never even met your ex, right?”
I made a contradictory sound as I reversed out of the parking spot. “My ex had had his suspicions for a few weeks, but when I broke up with him and told him everything, he went to the tattoo shop. Chase let him get a hit in before Brian and another artist had to pull them off each other.”
“Shit.”
A laugh left me that held no humor because there was nothing funny about this. “And with everything else?” My shoulders lifted before heavily falling. “It’s us. These memories have been us, just twisted so he thinks it’s Harper.”
“But maybe not everything,” Bree argued gently. “He’s so in love with you, Scarlet. He wouldn’t hurt you.”
I focused only on driving for a while before murmuring, “That’s what I’d thought. That’s what Iwantto believe.”
“Maybe you have it wrong,” she said a few minutes later, sounding hopeful as she turned in her seat to face me. “Instead of being your relationship twisted around, maybe the memories really are just randomly created events with little added twists of the two of you.”
“Maybe,” I muttered, but doubt fueled the word and filled the car as we fell into silence.
And I knew from the way Bree sat there the rest of the way, just holding her drink, that all my suspicions were no longer ‘insane’ theories.
There were too many similarities for them to be.
