Think Twice Read online

  “He did seem in a much better mood when we left.” I sighed and crossed my arms before shifting toward the window.

  “Your father is right. Jack will be fine, baby girl. He’ll be too tired to be in a bad mood.” Mom squeezed my leg and turned back around. “So, you can go and celebrate your eighteenth birthday without any worries. Your brother would be mad at you if you spent tomorrow night moping around worried about him.”

  “But don’t celebrate too much.” Dad swiveled his head to me when traffic slowed. “Jack wouldn’t like that, either.”

  I held in a giggle when Mom elbowed his ribs. Tomorrow, at eight thirty-seven a.m., I would turn eighteen. The most emotion I could muster for the occasion was a shrug. My friends insisted we all go to this trendy club in Westchester County a few miles outside the city, whereas I would have been happy with somewhere low key and local. My friends insisted on a big night out to celebrate not only my birthday, but the start of my new life.

  I planned to spend the summer immersed in art, the one thing that made me forget all of my troubles. My mother ran a summer program at the school where she taught kindergarten, and for a few hours each day, I would teach art to the younger kids. I’d also signed up to work two nights per week at the paint studio where I’d been working part time since junior year. My goal was to be so busy I wouldn’t have even a moment to stop and think, and I prayed both jobs would make the summer fly by.

  My plan was to leave New York and head to the University of San Diego. I had a full scholarship and should have been bursting at the seams: perfect weather, a free ride, and a chance to reinvent myself. Not that life was so bad here. I had a ton of friends, awesome parents, a brother who, despite all the grief he’d caused me as of late, loved me as much as I loved him.

  But none of that mattered. Because someone else didn’t love me. At least, not the way I loved him. Each day, the despair choked me a little more than the day before, and I couldn’t let it. I needed to get as far away from him as possible. Eventually, I’d forget him—but I anticipated “eventually” to be at least a decade. Maybe putting most of the country between us would help.

  I had no choice but to try. I acted as thrilled and excited about it as I could without busting open a vein. Doubt about my decision plagued me on the daily. San Diego felt like running away rather than running toward something, and while looking ahead to school and my supposedly awesome new life, the rush of homesickness nauseated me. Every time I opened my mouth, I made sure to gush about leaving for the West Coast, but the forms for admission had laid on my desk for weeks. Why couldn’t I just fill out the forms and send them back?

  Dad pulled into the driveway, nodding hello to the figure by our front door. It was funny how actively avoiding someone almost seemed to conjure them up. Moving far away had to at least fix that.

  “Hey, Dylan.” My mom walked over to where he stood and gave him a hello kiss on the cheek. He’d been my brother’s best friend since … forever. Even before I was born. And although they were in their mid-twenties, Dylan and Jack still did everything together. Whether it was a family party or a quick stop by on a holiday, he was everywhere. He’d lived with his mother and stepdad across the street until they’d moved to a smaller apartment. He stayed in the house and watched over their downstairs tenant. So even when he wasn’t around, he still was.

  It was why falling in love with him was the single dumbest thing I’d ever done in my entire life.

  Dylan gave Mom an easy smile, his full lips spreading and showing a sliver of perfect white teeth. When he turned to shake Dad’s hand, my eyes fell on the corded muscle of Dylan’s forearm and lingered there when he sifted his fingers through his short, but perfectly tousled black hair.

  Beautiful. He was so fucking beautiful that gazing at him caused me visceral pain. It was moments like this when I wanted to pack my bags and race to LaGuardia Airport.

  “Well, that’s a relief,” Dylan said after my parents told him about giving Jack a come-to-Jesus before we left him at the rehab center. “He’s strong; I have no doubt he’ll be back on that truck within the year.”

  “We’ll see,” Dad said. “Right now, I hope he’s focused on getting up and moving. The rest’s all details.” He jerked his head at me. “Now, all I need to worry about is this one turning eighteen tomorrow.”

  I rolled my eyes and headed for the door. My father liked to kid, but there was a lot of truth in those types of comments. No matter what my age would be tomorrow, my father would never see me as an adult.

  My height and freckles came from my mother, but you could pick me out as Nick Garcia’s daughter from a mile away. We shared the same Puerto Rican olive skin and big dark eyes, although his eyelashes were much longer. Mom always cursed him for that.

  I was close with both of my parents, but my best memories of growing up were always of my father. When I was little, I loved climbing onto his lap while we watched the Yankees or Giants together, not caring about the game or who won, just content having my favorite person in the entire world all to myself. Sometimes, we’d sneak off for pizza and ice cream only the two of us and we’d come home with a dozen drawings I’d scribbled on napkins.

  I was high on his adoration for every silly creation I’d show him, and that carried into my teenage years. Mom and Jack would always tease how we were two peas in a pod, and they were right. My father was my best friend—my best friend who still thought of me as the tiny little girl I wasn’t anymore.

  I’d never brought a boy over since I knew full well it would be my father’s every intention to run him off as I would forever be his “Peanut.” To him, I was seventeen going on ten.

  Not that I was serious about anyone. I’d fooled around here and there, but there had never been anyone I was dying for my parents to meet.

  Loving Dylan Matthews was a black cloud of sorrow that followed me all over the damn place.

  “That’s right.” Dylan turned to me, his gorgeous mouth now stretched into a mega-watt smile as he beamed at me. “Tomorrow is the twenty-second.”

  My insides melted when his hazel eyes met mine. Sometimes, I could almost swear his gaze lingered when our eyes locked. But that was ridiculous, right? He knew I loved him. I’d made the unfortunate mistake of confessing a few months ago, fully aware my feelings were the embodiment of the word “unrequited,” but I couldn’t hold it in anymore.

  “So,” Dylan sat next to me on our couch, his beautiful arms resting on his knees as his puzzled eyes met mine. I invited him over under the ruse of “asking him something.” The truth was that I loved him so much it was clouding my vision and making me dizzy. I refused to believe it was a clichéd crush on my brother’s best friend. This was too all consuming to be childish and fleeting.

  “What did you want to ask me?” He scooted closer, and I swallowed the boulder-sized lump in my throat. This had to be said in person, not over text. Although it would’ve been a whole lot easier. It was go big or go home. Get this out once and for all, and deal with it.

  “Well,” I breathed before my eyes fell to my jean-covered thighs as I wiped my damp palms back and forth in a furious motion. “I wanted to tell you something.”

  Dylan’s dark brow furrowed as he inched closer to me. “What’s wrong? You can tell me, Patricia,” he rasped and reached over, draping his strong hand over my tiny one. My fingers dug into my knee so hard I almost punctured a hole in the frayed fabric. I loved when he called me Patricia. By using my first name instead of the baby name everyone else called me—when he said Patricia it was … intimate … special … ours.

  Oh God, this was killing me.

  “You can tell me anything, I promise.”

  Well, we’d see about that.

  “Dylan … I… I love you,” I blurted out in one breath.

  At that, he’d taken his hands from mine and backed away. His face fell, his jaw clenching before he exhaled a long breath. The minutes it took for his eyes to come back to mine seemed like hours. I expected
a rejection, and I expected it to hurt, but preparing for it didn’t impede the crushing blow.

  “PJ, I …” He covered his mouth with his hand and shook his head. “I’m … flattered … but—”

  “Flattered?” I scoffed. “Okay, I get it. You don’t have to say any more.” I pushed off the couch, biting the inside of my cheek so I could sob behind the privacy of my bedroom door when he grabbed my wrist and pulled me back.

  “Patricia, you are a beautiful, amazing girl.” Girl. He’d meant “little girl” and my stomach lurched as if I was about to vomit. Dylan needed to make the brush-off quick before I made a horrendous mess of myself and upped the humiliation even more.

  He let out an audible sigh, wincing as if it was painful and uncomfortable to be in my presence. The friendship we had died before my eyes, along with any silly aspirations of being more.

  “But you’re Jack’s little sister. I … can’t …” His eyes raised to the ceiling, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down as he swallowed. “I can’t think of you any other way.”

  He’d let me down easy and kept a comfortable, but polite distance. My subconscious had been cruel and wanted to read into the stares and shoulder squeezes that were brotherly, not affectionate.

  “Big plans?” Dylan asked, stuffing his hands into his pockets before making his way over. That insignificant move made his biceps appear even bigger. Every inch of him was gorgeous, and I needed to somehow escape this crippling infatuation. Until then, I covered it up with a combination of indifference and snark. I hoped it hid the pathetic pining I didn’t know how to stop.

  “My friends are dragging me to some club. Nothing big.” My gaze dropped to the ground as I inched toward my door. “I bet Jack wouldn’t mind a phone call. Especially now that he doesn’t spit out his words; at least, for the time being.”

  Despite myself, we shared a laugh. I missed talking to Dylan. I missed our easy friendship, the one that had nothing to do with my brother, before I opened my mouth and ruined it.

  “I’ll do that. Have a very happy birthday if I don’t see you tomorrow, PJ.”

  Maybe the universe would be benevolent and spare me from my plight for just one day. I highly doubted it, Dylan always showed up anywhere I happened to be. The street, the store—he lived so close that running into him was a daily given, but I could hope.

  My phone buzzed in my purse after I muttered a thank you and ran inside.

  RILEY: Hey, almost birthday girl. It’s SO on tomorrow night. There are about eight of us … including Liam.

  Liam was a nice guy and had been hinting at a date every time we were all together. He was cute and funny, but I shied away every time. He was sweet, but he wasn’t Dylan.

  Tomorrow was my cutoff point. No more yearning for a man who would pat me on top of the head like a child instead of kiss the ever-loving shit out of me. I deserved heart-stopping passion from a man who loved me, and depriving myself for what could never be was stopping right the fuck now.

  ME: Sounds fabulous. I need to figure out what to wear.

  I smiled as I punched out the text. Fake it until you make it, right?

  RILEY: That off-the-shoulder blouse, the skinny jeans with the holes at the knees, and those killer black heels I wish I could walk in. You know who can eat his heart out. It’s time to move on, and as your bestie, I promise to give you a nice big push.

  I expelled a long breath from my lungs, and I felt lighter. For the first time in my life, when it came to Dylan, I felt—done.

  Happy birthday to me.

  3

  Jack

  I laid back on the therapy table, awaiting the appearance of my assigned therapist. The muscles and skin under my arms ached from the crutches, but still, I insisted on using them. As ridiculous as it was, I’d rather exhaust myself on crutches than spend one second more in a wheelchair or on a stretcher. The helplessness drove me batty, and I prayed this place was as brutal as my orthopedic surgeon promised. I wanted my body pushed to every limit, limp with sweat and exhaustion so I could get it back to the shape it had been. Getting back on my feet, both of them, was my number one goal, and I didn’t give a shit how much I had to battle to get there.

  I squirmed on the table, the paper lining crinkling under me with every move I made. Thanks to my bum leg, I couldn’t even pull off restless. Each toss and turn had to be careful and deliberate. My nostrils flared as the rage inside grew. Nothing was worse than being trapped inside your own body.

  “Where is she?” I huffed to no one but myself. Granted, it had only been five minutes since I arrived in the room, but irritation and impatience simmered in my gut. I counted the grooves in the stucco ceiling in an effort to calm myself. My eyes clenched shut, already sick of the endless sea of white and black dots. I pictured my dad’s disapproving scowl and the shake of his head at my piss-poor attitude. I took a long breath, slowly exhaling some of the tension. If there was one thing I had in overabundance, it was time.

  “Sorry to keep you waiting,” a sweet voice apologized before bursting through the door. She flashed a sweet smile, and for a moment, I forgot to be a whiny asshole and let my own lips curve up.

  This past month, I hadn’t seen anyone or anything through the bitterness filtering my vision. Early spring blurred into almost summer, but I was too busy resenting the world for what happened to me. After two weeks in the hospital, and a stay at my parents’ house until insurance cleared me for in patient rehab, the only way I knew how to deal was to become a pissy introvert. I’d lost the use of my leg; I’d lost my girlfriend; I’d lost almost everything I’d come to count on. The last thing I wanted was to interact with anyone, but that wouldn’t help me. I was putting in more effort, but my almost friendly reaction to my therapist still shocked me a little.

  My sole focus was getting my battered limb to work again, so everyone around me faded into the background. I’d been climbing the walls, although only in my head as I was short a leg for climbing, waiting for my therapist to start the process. When my eyes locked with her chocolate brown ones, even if for only a minute, something registered beyond the dark cloud over my head. She was that beautiful, or I was that lonely and morose. Either way, her presence caused me to jackknife from lying down to sitting, sending a shooting pain down my leg—a humiliating reminder of the reason I was here.

  “Ooh, easy there.” She drifted her hand down my leg. “Are you all right, Jack?”

  “Yeah,” I grumbled, waving my hand. It was silly to pretend I wasn’t a mess. If she was my therapist, she was supposed to discern my weaknesses so she could make me strong again, but I hated it all the same. Being in another beautiful woman’s presence and feeling less than poured a fresh stream of salt on my open wound.

  I opened my eyes, but the effort it took to widen them exhausted me. My vision focused on my girlfriend sniffling next to the bed.

  “Hey,” my groggy voice croaked out. “What’s wrong, baby?” I knew seeing me like this was tough. My mother and sister hadn’t stopped the waterworks since I’d been admitted, although PJ would run out of the room before she really let the sobs go.

  “I can’t do this, Jack. I’m sorry.”

  “Can’t do what?” I blinked my heavy eyelids and did my best to lift my gaze to hers. Marina was dramatic, but the quivering of her chin gutted me. I knew even before she said it.

  “This isn’t the life I thought we’d have.”

  “No shit!” I spat back. “You think I wanted to fall through the floor? It’s a long recovery, but nothing is definite. You can’t just—”

  “I’m sorry.” She stood and pressed a kiss to my cheek before walking out of the room.

  “I guess I’m just eager to get started …” Our gazes locked, and an odd recognition came over me. “You look really familiar. Do I know you from somewhere?”

  She guided me back to lying flat on the table, cradling my leg before she set it down.

  “I suppose I look different since you last saw me. It’s been a wh
ile since we moved. Can you push your leg into my hand?” My gaze drifted to her shiny chestnut hair cinched into a ponytail at the nape of her graceful neck. The loose wisps of hair around her delicate cheekbones only accentuated her beauty. I peered lower at her snug polo shirt and black pants—the standard therapist uniform from what I’d seen. Still, the lean curves of her hips pouring into long legs that went on for days. This woman was anything but forgettable, yet I couldn’t place her. Where the hell did I know her from?

  Her hand hovered over my ankle as she awaited my response.

  I grimaced as I fought to lift my leg a half inch off the table. Even that tiny movement caused beads of sweat to break out along my temples. This road ahead everyone kept referring to seemed like climbing a goddamn mountain.

  “Moved?” I repeated, still trying to figure out who she was.

  “I’m Kyle’s sister, Danielle.” She laughed as she gingerly lifted my leg. “Does this hurt?”

  I winced at the stiffness, bracing myself for blinding pain, but she was gentle enough to know when to stop.

  My eyes widened as they stayed glued to her face, a face I now remembered covered in thick glasses with hair pulled back into a tight braid.

  “Dani?” I breathed out. “I mean, Danielle Marsh. Damn,” I gasped at the realization. My old friend Kyle’s sweet and shy little sister was my physical therapist—a therapist I spent the last ten minutes lusting over like a horny twelve-year-old. Talk about a small world.

  “Yeah, I had Lasik surgery and stopped with the braids. I can see how you wouldn’t recognize me.” She grabbed the clipboard holding my chart and scribbled some notes. After she set it down on the counter, she hovered over me, raising a brow as she cocked her head to the side. “You should know, I’m one of the toughest therapists here.”

  “Is that right?” I couldn’t help the tug of a smile on my lips. Dani had always been shy and adorable in a puppy sort of way. It irritated the shit out of Kyle that he couldn’t shake his little sister, to which I’d been nothing but sympathetic, but even he couldn’t find it in him to be mean to her when she loitered near us in his basement. It was difficult to imagine that sweet little thing as a tough-as-nails therapist.