Page 40

Past: Four Years After the Accident—Twenty-Eight Years Old

A hushed murmur rises from the crowd as I stride to the front row of Conference Room A inside the Kensington Hotel next to The Orchid.

I know what they’re whispering about.

The youngest Anderson son was just promoted to CFO of Fleur Entertainment Holdings.

And he’s interrupting the Sotheby’s auction that has been going on for the past hour and a half.

Ignoring the camera flashes and the subtle pointing of fingers, I unbutton my black suit jacket and smooth my fingers over my tie before taking a seat in the spot saved for me and carefully placing Lexy’s journal on my lap.

The auctioneer, a tall man with white hair and horn-rimmed glasses, clears his throat and slams the gavel.

“Quiet, please! For the next item on the list, a rare and exciting find aboard the famous Spanish sunken ship, La Reina Estrellada , otherwise known as The Starlit Queen. The ship disappeared into the frigid depths of the Atlantic near the Bermuda Coast in 1770. For over two hundred years, explorers around the world have tried, to no avail, to uncover the resting place of the vessel.”

He clicks a button and a spotlight shines on a glass box to the left of the podium, the image of the contents also projecting on the large screen behind him.

I rake in a sharp inhale as the crowd gasps .

This is the moment we’ve all been waiting for.

A single glittering gold coin is carefully displayed atop black velvet, the spotlight highlighting the weathered edges and Spanish words inscribed on the surface.

“Once considered an impossible treasure—the crème de la crème for all treasure hunters—The Starlit Queen has recently been recovered, and with her are twenty-five cases of Spanish gold, coins, and jewels, all of which have been claimed by the Spanish government. However, the government has graciously allowed for one rare Royal 8 Escudos coin to be sold to the highest bidder—a collector who wants to own a piece of haunting history.”

Impossible treasure.

The words ricochet in my mind.

Fragments of the January morning five years ago fill my consciousness.

My lips twitch when I remember Lexy’s teasing grin as we huddled in front of the crackling fireplace after our impromptu snowball fight outside my apartment.

How she bit her lip when she scribbled the fifth item on her bucket list.

Item 5: Get a piece of treasure from a sunken ship.

Dreamer: You’re laughing at me, Ethan, but this stuff is out there, waiting for us to find it.

Do I need to remind you of my motto again?

Keeper: Good luck going against professional treasure hunters, Nova.

Need I say it again?

Professional. As in, they’ve spent years looking for sunken treasure, and you want to somehow come across it?

Dreamer: Looks like you need a reminder: If I believe it, who’s to say it isn’t true?

My heart twists, the sharp pain my constant companion.

Five years later, my darling Nova is still in a coma .

The agony has never faded—the gash in my heart only widened.

When my assistant, Debbie, told me the sunken treasure was found a month ago, I called in various favors to have Sotheby’s host their auction here at The Kensington.

My home turf.

Because this treasure is mine.

It belongs to a kindhearted girl with flaming hair and sky-blue eyes, a girl who lights up every room and my cavernous heart with her mere presence.

“This rare coin is one of a kind because of a misprint in the name. The starting bid is five-hundred thousand. Do I have any bidders?”

“Five-hundred.”

“Six-hundred from number fifty-nine.”

The numbers rise at a breakneck speed, and the blood boils in my veins.

I tug my cuff link and breathe in deeply, letting the vultures fight each other before I go in for the kill.

This treasure is mine.

Her impossible bucket list item—the one thing I thought was unachievable on that list.

No one stands in my way of making her dream come true.

“One million. Do we have any more bidders?”

“One point five.”

The bids slow to a crawl and I flinch when I hear the auctioneer slam the gavel down because this is the moment of the kill.

I raise my hand. “Five million.”

A collective gasp echoes in the room and my eyes nearly go blind from the incessant camera flashes on my face.

I ignore them and focus on the auctioneer instead.

He nods. “Five million to Mr. Anderson. Going once?”

I hold my breath.

“Twice.”

My fingers curl around Nova’s cuff link.

“And sold! ”

The air rushes out from my lungs and I look down, sliding open the cuff link, revealing the beautiful hummingbird with the red chest.

My eyes burn and nose prickle.

A lump forms rapidly in my throat.

People congratulate me for winning such a rare treasure, but I can barely hear them.

I’m underwater. Drowning in front of them.

I’d give away my entire fortune to have her back.

Because there’s no greater treasure to me than the woman lying in the hospital.

Wordlessly, I stand, holding the journal close to my chest, and a Sotheby’s assistant rushes up to greet me.

It’s something I arranged in advance—not part of their normal process, but then again, the Anderson name lets me get away with many things.

I click a few buttons on my phone, transferring the money into their account, and show him the screen.

The assistant murmurs a few words and listens to his earpiece, no doubt confirming the receipt of funds.

“Congratulations, Mr. Anderson.”

He unlocks the case and hands me the coin.

I hold it up and he stands in front of me, ready to take the photo I requested.

“Do you want to stand in the middle, sir?”

I shake my head.

“No. Leave this space next to me.”

Closing my eyes, I imagine her scent of sweet lavender, the softness of her hair.

How her head reaches my shoulders.

My hands twitch and I stretch out my arm, imagining an alternate reality.

She’d smile at me, triumph glinting in her eyes.

She’d whisper, “I told you so, Keeper. Because if you believe it…”

“Who’s to say it isn’t true?” I whisper to no one.

This. This is how I’d hold her if she were here with me.

But all I can feel is air.

The burn intensifies behind my eyes, and I blink a few times before letting my arm drop to my side.

I strain a smile, and the assistant snaps a picture.

He’ll have someone deliver it to my office later .

This way, my Nova is always with me.

Standing next to me as I complete each bucket list item on her behalf.

A tear escapes my eye and I quickly wipe it away as I make my way out of the hotel.

Twenty minutes later, I’m walking down the halls of Manhattan Memorial.

The nurses smile—sympathy in their gazes.

They know who I’m here for.

They know the statistics and the odds.

They probably think I’m insane for coming here week after week, wishing for a different outcome.

An impossible outcome.

The same steady beeping of machines greets me when I enter her room.

The same sterile smells and unsettling humming of the air conditioning.

There she is, my sleeping beauty.

My lungs constrict as I set the journal on her nightstand and take a seat at her bedside.

I smooth out her sunset hair, which used to be thick and luscious, but is now dull—a jewel that has lost its luster.

She’s still the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen.

I lace my fingers with hers.

Lifting them up, I press a kiss on the back of her hand.

“I once told you it was impossible to find sunken treasure, and you told me I had no faith,” I murmur, my voice thick.

“But look,” I pull out the coin from my pocket and press it into her palm, “you were right. Nothing is impossible, Nova.”

Tears slide down my face, and this time, I don’t stop them.

“Didn’t you used to tell me, ‘if I believe it, who’s to say it isn’t true?’”

I let out a ragged breath and press my forehead against her chest, listening to the steady beats of her heart.

“The impossible is possible, Nova. We found a piece of sunken treasure. C-Can you please wake up? Please?”

A fresh wave of grief stabs my heart—an organ that has never stopped bleeding ever since that rainy night four years ago .

It’s a miracle I’m still alive.

It’s not fair.

It’s not fair.

It’s not fair.

“Life isn’t fair,” imaginary Lexy whispers.

“But we make the best of it, right? We don’t wait to live, because the clock keeps ticking.”

Ba-dum.

Ba-dum. Ba-dum.

Her steady heart.

She’s alive, but she isn’t alive.

It’s not fair.

A surge of anger rushes through me as I fist her blankets.

Helpless. I’m fucking helpless.

“I wish I could move on.” The corrosive poison pours out of me in a hushed whisper.

I wish it didn’t hurt so much.

I bite my lip hard and taste metallic.

A punishment for the lie.

Opening my eyes, my vision blurry, I press another kiss on her hand.

A smidgen of blood stains her fair skin and I quickly wipe it away.

I can’t dirty my hummingbird.

“No. That’d be a lie, Nova.” I swallow.

“I’d give anything to continue loving you.”

Sliding my hand into my pocket again, I pull out the one thing I bring with me every time I visit her.

Snapping open the box, I show her the sparkling engagement ring.

I take her hand in mine again and whisper, “You never gave me your answer, Lexy. I have the ring now. The only ring I’ll ever buy for the only woman I’ll ever love. Will you marry me?”

I hold my breath—the way I do every time I ask her when I visit—and wait for the impossible miracle.

A twitch of her fingers.

A spasm of her eyelids.

A faint whisper from her lips.

But only the beeping of the machines echo in the room.

Blowing out a heavy breath, I open her beside drawer and tuck the gold coin away with the rest of the treasures I gathered for her.

Mementos from her bucket list. Symbols of hope, waiting for her when she wakes up .

If she wakes up.

Five items down, two more to go.

I told myself I have to let her go when the list runs out.

My Nova would want me to because she’s selfless that way.

It’d hurt her to see me in pain.

The Anderson men aren’t lucky in love.

The words Dad said a long time ago haunt me as I stand and tuck the blankets carefully around her.

The Anderson men aren’t lucky in love.

I’d take all the bad luck in the world if it meant she could wake up.

Even if she forgets me.