Page 4 of A Memory Not Mine (Sanguis Amantium #1)

Chapter four

Mira

My circle of friends was small—by design. I liked to joke that I hate people, and while that wasn’t entirely true, it was close enough. Most people drained me. But Anne and Dillon? They were the exception. I loved them, even when I couldn’t quite explain what was happening inside me.

Group hug complete, I dropped into a chair beside the low patio table, the fireplace already roaring against the late fall chill, eager to tell them what had happened.

When my parents were killed in a car accident this past summer, Anne and Dillon had wrapped themselves around me like insulation, trying to shield me from a grief that sometimes felt too heavy for an only child to carry.

But as the months passed, I’d started to find a way forward.

The pain was still sharp some days—grief came in waves—but I was beginning to feel like myself again.

Not exactly the same, and maybe I never would be, but close enough to recognize the outline of who I’d been before I lost them.

“Well…what’s the latest? Tell us about the thing you found in the safe deposit box,” Anne asked as she poured a glass from the pitcher.

I shrugged, trying to downplay the chokehold yesterday’s vision still had on me.

“I thought I was done playing executor,” I said. “But a bank statement showed up last week—turns out Dad had a safe deposit box I didn’t know about. I found the key buried in his desk.”

I hesitated, then pushed on. “Inside was a small portrait of a woman. Some distant Scottish relative I’d never heard of. And when I touched it…” I shook my head. “It was the most intense vision I’ve ever had. If Dad were still alive, I’d ask him about her. But that’s not an option anymore.”

I’d wanted today to be fun—something normal after months of anything but—and here I was again, teetering on the edge.

“Are you sure it was a good idea to move back into the house?” Dillon asked, concern marking his brow. “Honestly, I thought you’d put it up for sale immediately.”

I suspected the last part of that comment was more wishful thinking since I was now almost an hour away from where these two lived near downtown. “Nah…you know I have a soft spot for old things. The creaky wood floors and wavy glass windows that don’t want to go up—they make me weirdly happy.”

I’d broken my lease, hired movers, and returned to the yellow Colonial on Washington Street in Marblehead, the house I grew up in.

The main structure dated back over two hundred years, expanded over time with two wings and a detached garage before my parents bought it.

It needed a coat of paint, but the roof was new, the furnace solid. It stood the test of time.

Like many of the homes on the street, it sat just ten feet from the sidewalk, most of that narrow setback swallowed by a tangle of overgrown hydrangeas.

By late October, their woody stems were exposed, green leaves mostly faded or fallen.

In winter, the house looked tired, worn by years and seasons.

But in spring, when those same bushes exploded with rich blue mopheads, it became one of the most beautiful homes on the block.

This was the house that made me. And in some strange way, I saw myself in it—sometimes bright and full of promise, sometimes broken-down, sad, and in need of improvement.

“How’s the love life?” Anne asked, pivoting the conversation like a seasoned pro, clearly hoping I’d moved on from the on-again, off-again architect I’d been seeing for two years before my parents died.

“Nonexistent, but thanks for the reminder,” I said, with just enough sarcasm to smother the sting.

Right on cue, the voice of my therapist, Dr. Elizabeth Patrick, echoed in my head like a judgmental fairy godmother.

She was always reminding me that I wasn’t listening to my intuition when it came to dating.

Apparently, my pattern was: ignore the red flags, jump into bed with the nearest handsome disaster, then act shocked when it all imploded.

According to her, I didn’t have commitment issues—I had a radar for emotionally unavailable men and a black belt in self-sabotage. She said I should be looking for someone who gave me energy—not someone who drained it out of me like an emotional vampire.

Great in theory.

In practice? A lot harder when the sucker in question has six-pack abs.

“Maybe the wide path of destruction— also known as my dating history —just means I’m not cut out for a long-term relationship,” I said with a theatrical shrug, the kind that practically begged for a sitcom laugh track to drown out the quiet desperation behind it.

“I don’t believe that,” Anne said, tossing back her long blond hair like a rom-com heroine delivering a plot twist. “He’s out there—you just haven’t crossed paths yet.”

That was the thing about Anne. She never let cynicism win. I could be knee-deep in the rubble of another romantic implosion, and she’d still be out here planting hope like wildflowers—reckless, bright, and utterly convinced something beautiful would grow.

Then, just as I was preparing a monologue about my lifelong attraction to men with red flags and gym memberships, she switched gears.

“Did you ever tell Dillon about that woman who called you?”

I blinked, caught off guard. With everything that happened after my parents died, that bizarre call had completely slipped my mind.

Michael, the architect, was my big gamble. Eighteen months of trying to make something last. He was tall, dark, and charming, a divorced dad who knew exactly what to say and when to say it. Looking back, I was almost certain it was love-bombing.

And I fell for it—hard.

Pretty quickly, though, he seemed to lose interest in sex, which completely baffled me.

I enjoy sex, and most men do too, so this was unfamiliar territory.

Then came the excuses—he was too busy to drive the twenty miles to my apartment, had sudden business trips, followed by long stretches where he was unreachable by phone or text.

Looking back, it was all painfully obvious.

But at the time, with barely any real relationship experience, I assumed this kind of friction was just part of the deal.

So the relationship dragged on for nearly two years, me voicing frustration about the lack of intimacy, him apologizing and promising to try harder, the emotional seesaw slowly beating me into submission.

One day, only half-joking, I said, “If I could just fuck someone on the side, maybe this relationship would actually work.”

He turned on me instantly, called me a slut, a nymphomaniac. And in that moment, I saw it for what it was, a form of abuse. I stayed calm and asked him to leave.

I hadn’t thought much about it since, until that call, out of the blue, about eight weeks ago.

“I told you, he was either gay or fucking someone else!” Dillon proclaimed, eyes gleaming with I told you so energy when I explained how this woman called to say she’d been dating Michael for the last three years and had found text messages between us on his phone.

“At first, I thought this woman was calling to blame me, so I quickly told her I had no idea what was going on,” I said, filling Dillon in to bring him up to speed.

“She told me she’d confronted Michael with the texts, and he confessed.

Not only had he been dating both of us, but those so-called business trips?

They were just excuses to meet up with other women from dating apps.

And to top it all off, he’d never even finalized his divorce—he was still legally married. ”

I paused, then added with a dry smile, “You’re the only gay boyfriend I’ve ever had…or at least, the only one I know about.”

Dillon and I had dated briefly, and one night—after pizza and a couple bottles of wine—he had confessed something he’d never told anyone else: he was attracted to men. I had held him tightly, moved that he trusted me with such a vulnerable truth.

We broke up soon after, but our friendship endured. Still did, to this day .

“You know,” I said, half-laughing, “her call was almost like a public service announcement…woman to woman.”

I laughed, but underneath, I felt a wave of disgust with myself for not walking away when the cracks first appeared.

My therapist was right, I poured so much energy into trying to get Michael to spend time with me, only to find myself watching the clock, waiting for him to leave the moment he arrived.

Cheater or not, I was never meant to be with that man.

What I really needed was someone I couldn’t stand to be away from. But honestly? I was starting to wonder if that kind of guy even existed.

“Okay, you two—enough with the emotional spiral,” I said, slicing through the heaviness like a knife through stale birthday cake. “I have an announcement to make… I’m going to Scotland.”

They both blinked at me, mouths open, like I’d just announced I was joining a cult or getting married in space.

“I think it’s time I track down some of these famously clairvoyant Garvies and figure out, once and for all, why I have this ‘curse.’” I added air quotes for dramatic effect, because if I didn’t laugh about it, I might actually scream.