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When we pulled up to the house, Bree rested her hand on my arm to keep me from leaving the car. “I know you’ve heard stories about him, but you didn’t know how Chase was in college. He was...well, honestly, I’m surprised he doesn’t have dozens of kids or a disease.”
“Thanks, Breanna,” I mumbled dryly.
“Sorry.” She scrunched her face apologetically before leaning closer, her blue eyes clashing with worry and resolve. “That stopped when he met you. Immediately. He wouldn’t cheat on you.”
“Yeah,” I breathed. “Yeah, you’re right.” I tried to force a smile and rambled, “It’s just this week. The exhaustion and fear and heartache from it. I’m letting it get to me and trying to create solutions that only cause more pain.”
“It’s going to be okay,” she said confidently. “I can’t imagine how difficult this is for you, but he will come back to you.”
Before I could respond, my attention caught on the car slowing down on the street and turning into the driveway.
Claire’s car.
“They’re here,” I said quickly.
“What—already?” Bree asked, looking over her shoulder as I reached for my coffee and the door handle at the same time. Forgetting completely about my seatbelt until I tried to get out of the car and got caught on it.
I needed to slow down.
I needed to breathe.
But I was trembling when, just seconds ago, I’d been fine.
The doctor had said going about his normal life might help with the retrieval of those lost memories. But this was Chase’s first look at our life together, and I felt anxious over it. Because what if he hated our life and broke my heart even more? What if this didn’t work?
But what if itdid?
I drew in a shuddering breath as I finally managed to step out of the car and tried desperately to cling to that hope as I watched their doors open. My feet automatically taking me to the man my heart called for as he stiffly and awkwardly got out of the car, only to falter at the warning look he sent my way.
“What are you doing here?” he asked as he adjusted the sling his arm was in.
I looked to the house as if I somehow might’ve driven to the wrong one, then gave his parents a hesitant look. “I live here too.”
“With Bree?” he asked doubtingly, then looked to his sister and back to me just as Bree came bouncing to my side and announced, “Konrad will be here in a minute.”
My stare swept to his parents again before locking on Chase. “With you.”
His eyebrows shot up as he looked at the house.
“We said we were taking you home,” Claire said as she came up beside him.
“Yeah, I—” He dragged his free hand through his hair, his head subtly shaking. “I thought this must be Bree’s new place when we pulled up. What happened to my house?” When his mom started gesturing to the house just past us, he said, “No,myhouse. The one on—”
“Where you lived with Brandon and all the guys?” Bree asked, then hurried to explain, “You stopped renting it after you graduated.”
Chase nodded slowly as he took in the house. “So, this is where I live.” He didn’t phrase it as a question, so I didn’t bother answering. I wasn’t sure I could without correcting the ‘I’ to ‘we.’
“Well, let’s get inside,” Robert suggested when a heavy awkwardness fell over us.
“Right,” I said, hurrying away from Chase and everyone else so they wouldn’t see how I was struggling to hold on to my waning composure.
Once I had the door unlocked, I burst inside, my gaze touching on everything as if the house might have fallen into chaos in the time it’d taken Bree and me to run and grab coffee.
But it was how we’d left it.
It was how it usually looked.
And suddenly, it didn’t seem like enough.
