Page 24 of All’s Well that Friends Well (Lucky in Love #2)

I’m giving myself a headache. So I kill the engine, climb out of the car, and slam the door with too much force.

Then I round to the other side, grab the flowers, and head to the front door.

With every step I take, I fortify myself; I put up all the walls I can so I’ll be ready for the emotions that lie ahead of me.

I met Maura Delaney when I was in college. I was just starting to get my life back together after the death of my parents a few years earlier. Rod had reentered the picture, and I was working with him, completing my studies, trying to figure out what I wanted to do.

Maura’s appearance was something I hadn’t planned on, but I went to her immediately. She was beautiful, with dark hair and dark eyes and an infectious smile. She laughed too loudly and too much. When I was with her, the rest of the world faded away, and I loved every second.

Because while the rest of the world was starting to come together for me, it still hurt. She took me away from all of that pain and confusion. She was an escape, a coping mechanism.

Maura was always amused by my natural frown; she laughed at me with ease, made it her mission to make me laugh too.

She didn’t conform to anyone or anything, but those qualities looked darker on her than they do on Juliet.

She was defiant, unyielding, unwilling to compromise, even when the two of us needed to meet in the middle to make things work.

Still, we got engaged, and then we moved in together, and that was when things started to go downhill.

I like to think Maura loved me—and in her own way, I know she did—but I’m not sure she ever could have married me.

Not really. Maura didn’t like anyone in her space; she didn’t like being accountable to anyone but herself.

She wanted to do what she wanted to do, and she didn’t want to be tied down.

These were things I’d known about her, to some degree, but it wasn’t until we moved in together—and until we started planning the wedding—that they became apparent.

Then she got sick. She got sick in a way I’d never been prepared for, and everything fell apart.

Mr. and Mrs. Delaney both come to the door when I knock, and I know they’ve been waiting because it’s not even a second before they appear in front of me. It’s starting to rain, too, cool gusts of wind pushing this way and that.

So I put my best smile on the way a southern grandmother dons her best dress for church. Then I pass Mrs. Delaney the bouquet—yellow daisies, her favorite—as she pulls me into a bone-crushing hug.

No one turns down a hug from Mrs. Delaney. It’s not even worth the effort to try. So I return her hug with one uncomfortable hand, patting her back awkwardly until she lets me go.

She’s as unlike her daughter as it’s possible to be, and sometimes I wonder what it says about me that I find relief in this knowledge.

“Come in, sweetheart,” she says, finally releasing me. Her dimpled smile beams up at me, her dark hair graying, eyes magnified behind spectacles attached to a beaded necklace.

“Good to see you, son,” Mr. Delaney says, clapping me on the shoulder. I nod at him and shake his hand, and then the three of us head to the dining room. It smells like they’ve made beef stew, and despite my reluctance, my stomach rumbles.

I’ve been hungry since Juliet mentioned her peach breakfast bars.

“It smells delicious,” I say. My voice is gruff, but the words are genuine, and I think they know that.

“We know you like stew,” Mrs. Delaney says, and I nod, giving her another smile. “Sit, sit—here.” She pulls out the chair at the head of the table for me, and I swallow thickly.

The head of the table. The place of honor. The seat I take every time, not because I ask but because they insist. I sink heavily into the wooden chair without argument.

Mrs. Delaney doesn’t even let me help with the cooking. Sometimes she lets me do the dishes—I always try—but even then, it’s rare. They treat me like a king in their home.

I thank Mr. Delaney as he hands me a steaming bowl of stew with a hunk of what I know to be sourdough wedged on the side, already soaking up broth. I keep my eyes on that bread, because it stops them from wandering elsewhere, all the places my gaze tries to go.

But I’m an onlooker to a car crash, not wanting to look yet unable to stop. And sure enough, three bites into my meal, I find my eyes being pulled to the portrait on the wall opposite me all the way in the living room.

The engagement picture Maura and I took.

She’s in a carefree orange dress and I’m in a shirt she made me wear—dark blue except for a few peeks of orange at the cuffs and neck.

Although I’m not sure anyone else would notice, I can tell how different I looked back then; my smile was easier, more free, and I clung to Maura with a longing I’m not sure was good.

We’re looking at each other in that photo, mid-laugh, the happiest we ever thought we would be.

Because we didn’t know. We didn’t know then what I know now, and what I suspect she knew at the end.

That sometimes love is not enough. Feeling love for someone is not the same as choosing them every day. And not all relationships are good, no matter how wonderful they feel.

The way I clung to Maura was not healthy. The way she treated me at the end was not healthy—when her wild laughter and infectious smiles had turned to wild anger and infectious paranoia, desperate manipulation to keep me close while simultaneously trying to push me away.

We weren’t good for each other; neither of us had any business being in a relationship with anyone. We had moments of passion and nothing else.

But you can’t build a functional life on moments of passion. The help Maura needed wasn’t something I could give her; nor could she give me the security I relied on.

We were toxic, all the way to the end.

“So tell us,” Mrs. Delaney says, and I startle out of my thoughts. “How are you liking your job?”

I take a big bite and chew slowly so I can think about what to say.

I don’t love my job. But I’ve never loved my job. It’s a means to an end, something I’m adequate at that will allow me to earn money and survive.

“It’s fine,” I settle on, swallowing my bite of stew and trying not to grimace at how piping hot it still is. “About the same, really.”

Well—the same except for Juliet Marigold, who’s still trying to bring me cookies and handing out blinding smiles to anyone who so much as makes eye contact.

I’m about to go on, about to push Juliet out of my mind. But before I get that far, my phone buzzes from where it’s resting in my lap.

And I swear, it’s like she knows. Like she can tell I was thinking about her. Because it’s Juliet’s name that pops up on my phone screen, and I’m so taken aback that I almost drop my spoon halfway between my bowl and my mouth.

“Sorry,” I say gruffly when I look up to see both Mr. and Mrs. Delaney looking at me, their faces curious. “Sorry. Just a—work.”

Apparently I have resorted to sentences that do not make grammatical sense.

“Anyway,” I go on, clearing my throat as my phone buzzes another time, then another, and another—that’s four texts in a row, is she insane?—“yes. Work is fine. It’s tiring, but I don’t mind.”

“I hope you take time to rest,” Mrs. Delaney says, her brow puckering into a frown, and Mr. Delaney nods.

My mind flits to the fluffy comforter in Juliet’s old room, to the soft, soothing atmosphere, but I redirect myself quickly.

“I rest plenty,” I lie. “Don’t worry about me.” I pause and then change the subject. “How have you been?”

The tension drains out of me when they answer, accepting the shift in topic.

It’s better when I don’t have to talk about myself; I barrel through the rest of my beef stew, listening as they update me on their lives recently.

Mr. Delaney is retired, but he’s been having a hard time adjusting to life without his job as a school teacher; still, the warm look he shares with his wife tells me they enjoy the extra time together.

There’s something sad there, though, too, and I know it comes from the lingering pain of losing Maura.

When there’s a break in the conversation, Mrs. Delaney jumps in to ask if I’d like another bowl of stew. Mr. Delaney is on his third, and yet he remains as tall and thin as ever. But I shake my head.

“I’m good, thank you. I’m going to use the restroom, though?—”

I break off as she points down the hallway, even though I’ve been here enough that I have the layout of this house memorized.

I don’t know why I’m going to the bathroom; I don’t need to. I guess it would just be nice to splash some water on my face and take a few deep breaths.

So I hurry down the hall and to the little bathroom, pristine and clean in a way the bathrooms at work never will be, no matter how much Juliet scrubs. Then, before I even realize I’m doing it, I’ve pulled out my phone, opening the four texts from the woman who makes me want to pull my hair out.

The first one is normal enough.

Juliet Marigold

These peach bars smell really good!! Are you sure I can’t drop them off at your door even if you’re not home? You could sneak one tonight!

I roll my eyes. Is she still going on about the peach bars? I keep scrolling, checking what she said next.

Juliet Marigold

Otherwise I’m going to eat them all before they get wet. Allowing my baking to be ruined is nothing short of a travesty!!

Secretly I agree. Granted, I haven’t tried her breakfast bars, but if it’s anything like her peach crumble, they’re delicious?—

But my thoughts halt in place as I reread her text.

She’s going to eat the food before it gets wet? Why would it get wet? Surely…

My eyes dart to the little window on the bathroom wall, frosted window pane being pelted by rain.

Surely she hasn’t been outside . Right? She wouldn’t do that. She’s not dumb.

I swallow as something strange rises in me, something tangled and complex. It’s irritation, but also concern, and exasperation, and even amusement. I tamp those feelings down, swallow them whole, and scroll more quickly now to keep reading her last two texts.

Juliet Marigold

I’m actually just going to wait on your porch for a minute, if that’s all right.

If it’s not all right, I will wait here anyway, because you’re not home, and it’s raining really hard

This last text doesn’t even have a period at the end, much less her usual string of three exclamation points or question marks.

A strange twinge of anxiousness tugs at my chest, and I add it to the growing list of feelings I don’t understand; then, before I can think things through, I open the bathroom door and stride back down the hall.

“I’m so sorry,” I say to Mr. and Mrs. Delaney, who look surprised. “Something has come up that I need to go take care of.”

Mrs. Delaney blinks, her eyes wide, but she nods quickly. “Of course,” she says, shooing me toward the front door. “Of course, sweetie. Thank you so much for coming by to see us.”

“Any time,” I say, and I give her the usual one-armed hug. I clasp hands with Mr. Delaney and then head to the front door, doing my best to keep my stride normal, unhurried.

I keep my speed normal and unhurried all the way from Boulder back to Lucky, too, but my hands could probably put a dent in the steering wheel with how tightly I’m holding on. All I can see in my mind’s eye is an image of Juliet, huddled up on my front porch, looking like a drowned rat.

It’s a ridiculous worry. She’s not waiting on my front porch in the rain. She wouldn’t do that.

Still, I find myself picking up speed when I’m back in city limits—just a little bit, enough to get me home faster but not enough to be dangerous on the back roads so prevalent in Lucky.

By the time I turn into my neighborhood—Juliet’s old neighborhood—I’m actively working to take slow, even breaths.

My eyes scan the front porch through the rain as I pull into the driveway, but no one is there; then I look at the rest of the front of the house. She’s not there either, and no car is parked here. My shoulders slump as relief floods through me.

Good. I knew she wouldn’t just sit in the rain.

So I get out of the car and hurry inside, loosening my tie the second I step through the garage entrance.

I unbutton my shirt with rapid fingers, tugging the wet button-up off as quickly as possible, because wet shirts are the least-comfortable thing of all time.

I don’t notice anything until I’ve crossed the kitchen and emerged into the living room, shirt draped over my arm, eyes on the hallway that leads to the stairs. But then I hear a sound—a tiny little sound, like the tapping of a finger on glass.

Tap, tap, tap, tap.

I startle so violently that my shirt almost falls to the floor. Then I whirl toward the living room window?—

Where, sure enough, I see Juliet Marigold outside, huddled up and looking every bit the drowned rat I had imagined.