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As I climb the stairs and enter my room, I’m no closer to an answer, but my emotions seem to have calmed slightly. I know in my heart that I’m in love with Connor and that I need to find some way to make things right between us. But I also can’t seem to silence the voice inthe back of my head, whispering about all my insecurities and how one false move can ruin everything. Is it possible to make things any worse than they are right now? I don’t think so. I can’t go back to just being Connor’s friend, someone he chats with when we happen to see each other.
To make matters worse, I’ve been using Love as my excuse. Love has always and will always be my number one priority, but my fear has cast a shadow over the life we are building here. Connor loves my daughter just as much as I love Jade. The four of us have slowly been growing closer to each other, but after what I said to him at the studio, I wouldn’t be surprised if I ruined everything we were building. I was naïve to believe that I could stick my head in the sand and pretend none of this happened. I’ve been using my fear as an excuse to keep him at bay, but in the end, I ended up hurting all of us.
“Maybe a shower will help clear my head,” I mumble as I walk into the bedroom. I gasp in surprise as my eyes lock on the tarot card sitting on my dresser. Every muscle in my body freezes as I lean forward, my eyes squinting slightly as I glance at the card, wanting to make sure I’m seeing it correctly.
“It’s inverted.” I gasp, covering my mouth with both hands, swinging my head back and forth as I try to process what I’m seeing.
If I were paying more attention to what the cards were saying earlier, I would have noticed that I had the meaning all wrong. The Devil card is a tricky one. Whena tarot card is inverted, the meaning changes completely. My mom always said that when an inverted card shows up in your tarot reading, you have to listen to your gut to understand what it is telling you. It may be positive, negative, or neither—I just need to leave myself open to hear the lesson or message they are trying to tell me.
Bristol was right. I saw what I wanted to see. I was so focused on what could go wrong with our relationship that I closed myself off to the possibility that everything would work out in the end. By closing myself off to those possibilities, I was unable to see the message that the cards were trying to share with me. When I asked the cards if I was meant to be Lydia’s replacement, pulling the Devil card would show that I was being trapped by her memory, leading me to believe that Connor never loved me. That I was only a placeholder for his dead wife until he tired of me or found someone better. So, I shut down, closing myself off from any other possibility.
But now, having had time to process and clear my mind, I get an entirely different reading of the card. With it being inverted, the Devil card means something entirely different. Connor isn’t trying to replace his dead wife; he’s finally ready to move on with me by his side.
“How could I have been so stupid?” I drop onto my bed, placing my head in my hands.
I try to run every scenario through my head, wanting to know exactly what I have to do to get Connor to forgive me, but I can’t settle on the right one. My skin itches to grab my deck of cards and ask them what to do,but for the first time since I had Love, I want to make this decision myself. I don’t want to base all my decisions on a deck of cards any longer. I could be way off base, crashing and burning epically, but at least I’ll know I tried. Connor has done everything he can to break down the walls around my heart, drawing me gently out of my shell. I owe it to him—I owe it to us, to give a relationship a try. Giving my heart to Connor won’t ruin our chances of finding a place to call home, but by opening my heart to him, it’s possible for us to gain so much more.
My heart pounds in my chest, blood rushing through my ears. My vision blurs, as if I’m viewing the world through another lens. I’m panicking. I know it, and I’m powerless to stop my mind from running through all the ways things could go wrong if I don’t get to Connor as quickly as possible.
“I have to go,” I whisper into the room before running back down the stairs and out the front door.
The drive seems as if it takes forever, but it probably doesn’t take longer than a few minutes before I see Connor’s two-story Tudor home come into view. My hands are shaking as I turn off the car and climb out, racing toward the house.
Tears blur my vision as I rush toward the front door, wanting nothing more than to see Connor again and tell him how much I love him.
I come to a dead stop a few feet from the front door to catch my breath, my hands shaking as I reach for the door. Suddenly, it swings open, and I see Connor. Abright smile spreads across my face, eyes locked on him and taking in his every feature.
“I was wrong,” I whisper before wrapping my arms around his neck, pulling him closer, and brushing my lips against his. “I love you.”
Chapter 18
Audrey
Afeeling of home settles into my soul as I pour all my feelings into this kiss, hoping he will understand what he means to me. We break apart, gasping for air as Connor lifts me into his arms. “I thought I had lost you.”
“Not lost, just took a small detour along the way.” A mixture of fear and joy fills me as I worry I’m too late. His eyes snap to mine, scanning down my body before a blinding smile spreads across his face as he pulls me into his chest.
“I’m sorry, Connor.”
“There’s nothing for you to apologize for, beautiful.” His arm snakes around my waist as he pulls me into the house, kicking the door shut.
I bury my nose in the side of his neck and inhale deeply, tears trickling down my face.
“What about the cards?”
“The cards had it right this time, not me. I was so terrified of getting my heart broken again thatI let a silly deck of cards determine the outcome of my life. It was stupid.”
“Audrey.” Connor clenches his eyes shut tightly, pulling me closer to his chest.
I want to surrender to all the emotions inside me, but I need to make sure he understands why I did what I did. It was dumb, and it will never happen again, but I owe him an explanation.
“No. Don’t talk. Just let me get all of this out.” I take a deep breath, pulling back slightly so I can look into his eyes. “When my parents died, I was lost. I had just had a baby, not a full year beforehand, and had no other family to turn to. Thankfully, I had Bristol and her parents, but it wasn’t the same. My mom had given me an old deck of tarot cards, and they became my guide. I asked them everything I could think of, feeling as if it was my mom guiding my life in the right direction.”
A gut-wrenching sob escapes me as I bury my face in his neck. Snot and tears collect on his skin as I try to regain control of my emotions.
“At some point, instead of them being my guide, they became gospel. If the cards said something was a bad idea, then I didn’t do it. I began to not trust myself to decide alone, having almost paralyzing anxiety about deciding anything without them.”
Connor doesn’t say a word as he rubs tiny circles on the bottom of my back, giving me the courage to continue.
