Hitched (31 page)

Allie narrowed her eyes. “Yeah, heard you were gone too.”

“And you wouldn’t think of being pissed about that, everything considered, right?” he said, eyebrows up as if daring her.

Allie blew out a breath and crossed her arms. She’d love to be self-righteous here and yell at Josh for letting all of this happen. But, of course, she couldn’t. It was her fault.

All of it.

Losing what little energy she’d pulled together with adrenaline and ire, Allie let her shoulders slump. “Sorry about the wedding.”

That was a really stupid way to apologize, of course, but she didn’t know what else to say.

“Me too.”

She looked up. “
You’re
sorry? You didn’t run out on me.”

“No, but,” Josh glanced at Devon again, “I never should have proposed in the first place.”

Allie looked at her ex-best friend too. Then she nodded. It was true. “Okay.”

“Okay,” Josh repeated. “Now why is Gavin texting me about you?”

Allie felt her heart cramp. She lifted a shoulder. “He’s worried about me.”

“But he’s not here with you?”

“He’s here. He’s just not
here
.”

“Why not?”

“Because I thought it might make you uncomfortable.”

“Oh. Right.” Josh looked a little uncomfortable that he clearly wasn’t all that uncomfortable seeing his ex-fiancée for the first time since she’d left him at the altar.

Suddenly, the whole thing hit Allie as really funny.

Allie started laughing. And couldn’t stop.

She was here with her ex-fiancé and her ex-best friend, who were obviously now a couple—again—talking about her father and her ex-almost-mother-in-law, who may or may not be a couple, and telling them that she was now home with the guy who’d stolen her away from the wedding that neither her nor her ex-fiancé were upset hadn’t happened.

She had no idea what was going on with anyone—including herself.

And that was actually…okay.

Not knowing what was going on was
never
okay with her. Except that now, suddenly, for some reason, it was.

She laughed until her eyes watered and she had to sit down on the steps again.

“Oh god,” she finally gasped. “This is the craziest situation.”

Josh was looking at her like he was afraid she might actually be crazy, but Devon was smiling.

“Okay.” Composed again, Allie stretched to her feet. “I’m going…home. I guess.”

Her mind flickered briefly to a house with a huge back window that looked out on the highest mountain peak in North America. Home.

Yeah. She was going to her dad’s house.

“Call if you need anything,” Josh said.

Allie paused halfway down the sidewalk and gave her friend and almost-husband a smile. “Sure. Thanks.” But Josh couldn’t give her what she needed anymore.

A few minutes later, Allie let herself into her dad’s house.

It was quiet. But that wasn’t what she noticed first.

It smelled good.

And it was tidy. Clean even.

She dropped her bags by the door, staring at the living room she hadn’t been in for over a week. How was it possible that there weren’t dishes and mail everywhere?

She turned on two lamps and looked around. The only good explanation was that her dad had forgotten to get the mail. Or eat. For over a week.

She frowned. No way had her brothers gone without eating for that long. There should at least be empty chip bags and soda cans sitting around. She swore they acted more like they were thirteen than twenty-five and twenty-four.

Dreading what she’d find, she headed for the kitchen.

But it too was clean and neat.

If her wedding invitation hadn’t been hanging on the fridge door next to the white dry-erase board where she left her dad reminders, she would have gone back outside and checked the house number. But this was the right house.

Kind of.

Allie turned in a full circle. Everything was put away, the sink was clean and, sure enough, there was a pile of mail on the table. But it was neatly stacked and she could see that it had been opened. Flipping through it quickly showed that none of it was bills to be paid. So someone had paid the bills or tossed them. And even Danny wouldn’t toss the bills.

Mostly because Danny didn’t ever throw anything away.

Huh.

She checked the fridge, but there was no expired or rotten food and there were even a couple of containers of leftovers that were new. So someone had cooked? Sophie? Maybe.

There was only one last place she needed to check in this
Twilight Zone
house.

Taking the steps two at a time, she went to her brothers’ rooms.

They were messier than the rest of the house but they weren’t disasters. There were clean clothes in their drawers and no dirty dishes that she could find. And she tried.

Feeling very confused, she pulled her cell phone out and called Charlie.

“Hey, Al,” he greeted. “What’s up?”

“Where’d the leftovers come from?” she asked without preamble.

“What leftovers?”

“The ones in the fridge.”

“The fri… You’re at home?”

She frowned as she headed back for the kitchen. “Yes, I’m home. You told me Dad was gone. So I came home.”

“Jesus.”

She heard some bangs and rustling on Charlie’s end of the phone.

Then he said, “He’s not
gone
. He’s on a trip.”

“Yeah. He’s not here.”

“And hopefully he’s having a great time.”

“Charlie, you don’t understand…”

“I do, Allie,” he interrupted. “I do understand. You’re usually in charge. But when you left, we made do. And that might surprise you. It might even piss you off. But we’re okay.”

She narrowed her eyes. “Why would that piss me off?” Surprise her? Definitely. But was she mad? She didn’t think so.

“You like being in charge. It was the way you bonded with Mom, and now that she’s gone it’s your way of staying close to her. But our world didn’t fall apart without you.”

She opened her mouth to respond and then closed it again. The world didn’t fall apart without her? Huh.

“Where’d you get that insight?” she asked.

Charlie sighed. “I always knew that you were trying to be like Mom.”

“And who pointed out that it was my way of staying close to her?” Because Allie hadn’t actually realized that herself. At least not in so many words. She’d felt the need to fill her mom’s shoes, to pick up where Lily left off, but she hadn’t realized that she was actually comforted by it. She was, though. It was the routine, the familiarity, looking through her mom’s files, reading notes in her mom’s handwriting—it had all kept Lily close.

“Lydia,” Charlie finally said.

Ah. Of course. “And she talked you through making dinner a couple of nights,” Allie guessed. “That’s where the leftovers came from.”

“Yeah,” Charlie muttered.

Allie took a deep breath. A million things were flying through her mind, but one thought seemed to sum it all up—
Holy crap
.

Her world really had changed in just over a week.

“Did the dinners turn out well?” Charlie didn’t have a lot of kitchen experience, so even with a live chat with a fantastic cook, they might have been less than perfect.

“Edible,” he said. Then he chuckled.

Allie couldn’t help but smile. He sounded…good.

“And how’s Danny?”

“Fine. He got an apartment with some guys he met in class.”

Well, at least he was in class.

“And Dad’s with Sophie.”

“Yeah.”

“Are they…”

“Hell, Allie, I don’t know,” Charlie said quickly. “I’ve decided it doesn’t matter.”

“It doesn’t matter?” But in the next moment, Allie couldn’t really come up with a reason why it
did
matter.

“Sophie’s fantastic. She and Dad get along. Let’s just leave it at that.”

Sophie was definitely fantastic. Okay. Allie was going to take some advice from her brother for a change. “Okay, we’ll just leave it at that.”

“Okay. Now I have to get back to work.”

“Work?”

“Yes. It’s how I spend some of my time now.” Charlie paused, then said, “And it’s not so bad.”

They disconnected and Allie stood staring at the phone. Her dad was okay, Charlie was okay, Danny was okay. What the
hell
was going on?

A knock at the kitchen door made Allie jump, then her heart pounded as she thought it might be Gavin. She quickly crossed the room and pulled the door open.

The person on the other side hadn’t even made the list of the top ten possibilities in her mind.

“
Devon
?
”

The other woman wet her lips and gave Allie a smile that seemed nervous. “Hi.”

“Wh…what are you doing here?”

“I…um…think we should talk.”

Well, sure why not? Everything else was crazy. Allie propped her shoulder against the doorjamb and crossed her arms. “Okay, go ahead.”

The familiar fatigue was starting to settle in. She hated that Promise Harbor did that to her, but it did. She felt heavier here.

“Are you okay?” Devon asked.

“Well, my mom’s still dead, my dad’s missing, and half—or more—of my hometown hates me. I’ve been better.”

“You’re the one that left.”

Allie blinked at her. Okay. Wow. “That’s true.”

“Are you sorry you left with Gavin?”

That was easy. “No.”

“I hope you’re not upset that Josh and I are together. Because…we are, Allie. We’re together. And that’s just the way it is.”

“I’m not upset about Josh at all.” That too was an easy answer.

Devon didn’t say anything for a few seconds. Then she said, “I was really pissed at you for a long time.”

Allie lifted an eyebrow. “Pissed at me?”

“For dating Josh. For
marrying
Josh.”

Allie straightened from the doorframe. “If you recall, I didn’t marry Josh.”

“You said yes to his proposal. Then you left him at the altar. In front of everyone.”

“Which should make
you
happy.” Crap. She really couldn’t handle this too.

“It does. It just…” Devon sighed. “I don’t know. It hurt me to see him embarrassed and confused and hurt like that.”

“Seems like he got over it pretty well,” Allie said dryly.

Devon’s gaze flew back to her face. She even blushed a little. “Nothing happened between us until we were both sure he was over you.”

Allie’s shoulders slumped. “I’m sure that didn’t take long. It’s not like he was head over heels, Devon.”

Devon nodded. “Yeah. I know that now. He never
really
loved you.”

Right. Totally true. Still not exactly something she needed rubbed in her face at the moment.

“Okay.” Allie clapped her hands together. “So, if this pep talk is over…”

Devon reached out and clasped Allie’s hand, seeming as surprised as Allie was at the gesture. She looked from their hands to Allie’s face. “I got so wrapped up in how I was feeling about Josh and losing him and him being here with you…I didn’t think about how hard the past year must have been for you.”

Allie didn’t pull away. She swallowed hard.

She and Devon had been close. She knew this woman, and right in that moment she could look into her eyes and see that, deep down, they were still the same people they’d been when they stayed up late eating raw cookie dough and talking about their plans and dreams…and, of course, guys. That had been before Josh and Gavin, but she could see the funny, sweet, intelligent woman she’d loved like a sister.

“Yeah. The past year has sucked.”

“I wish…I wish I hadn’t pulled away. I should have been there to help you through it.”

“Devon,” Allie said, feeling exhausted at the idea of there being one more thing that had gone terribly wrong, “you said you were over Josh. You said it was okay with you that we dated.”

“I know.” Devon’s eyes glistened. “But I didn’t mean it. It tore me up. I love him so much, Allie.”

Allie pulled in a long breath. Should she have known that? Should she have somehow sensed that her best friend was hurting? “I couldn’t see or feel anything past what I was going through,” she finally admitted. “I just took you at your word.”

“I know.” Devon let go of Allie and wiped at her eyes. “And it’s all okay now.”

Allie thought about that. Then she felt a smile threaten and she didn’t try to fight it or hide it.

“I guess that makes you one of Gavin’s biggest fans.”

Devon frowned, then slowly smiled. “I guess it does.”

“I thought of you while I was in Alaska,” Allie told her.