Chapters (52)
- COVER PAGE
- DEDICATION
- PART ONE
- ONE
- TWO
- THREE
- FOUR
- FIVE
- SIX
- SEVEN
- EIGHT
- NINE
- TEN
- ELEVEN
- TWELVE
- THIRTEEN
- FOURTEEN
- FIFTEEN
- SIXTEEN
- SEVENTEEN
- EIGHTEEN
- PART TWO
- NINETEEN
- TWENTY
- TWENTY-ONE
- TWENTY-TWO
- TWENTY-THREE
- TWENTY-FOUR
- TWENTY-FIVE
- TWENTY-SIX
- TWENTY-SEVEN
- TWENTY-EIGHT
- TWENTY-NINE
- THIRTY
- THIRTY-ONE
- THIRTY-TWO
- THIRTY-THREE
- THIRTY-FOUR
- THIRTY-FIVE
- THIRTY-SIX
- THIRTY-SEVEN
- THIRTY-EIGHT
- THIRTY-NINE
- FORTY
- FORTY-ONE
- FORTY-TWO
- FORTY-THREE
- FORTY-FOUR
- FORTY-FIVE
- FORTY-SIX
- ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
- ABOUT THE AUTHORS
‘And I promise not to keep you out of the loop anymore. I’m sorry. Can you forgive me?’ Hugo asked quietly, and Evie nodded hesitantly into his palms.
THIRTY-ONE
Thirty-one
Evie woke up alone on the couch at the crack of dawn. The night after their double date with Ben and Sami, she and Hugo had decided to have a quiet night in, ordering takeaway pizza and watching Friends reruns. While Hugo had gone to bed at ten, wearily citing his early flight back to LA the next morning, Evie had stayed up late to watch one of her favourite comfort movies, Love & Basketball, and must have fallen asleep mid-film. She slowly stretched, her body stiff and contorted from sleeping on the fashionably narrow couch all night. Not to mention from the effort of holding it together in front of Hugo since their fight about Chloe.
She lay there for a while, thinking about the last couple of days with Hugo. Despite his justification, the fact that he had kept Chloe’s insistence to get back into his life a secret didn’t sit right with Evie. She felt a lump of doubt sitting in her throat, and she couldn’t swallow it away.
She dragged herself off the couch and crept upstairs with her arms wrapped across her chest, not wanting to wake Hugo. Gently opening the bedroom door, she was surprised to see the room was empty. Hugo had left a note on her pillow.
I didn’t want to wake you, Evie. My flight time changed and I had to leave in a hurry—Hugo.
Something was really off. She couldn’t remember the last time she had received a letter from Hugo without his signature ‘xxx’ sign off. And for him to leave without even a goodbye was totally out of character. Had Evie’s confrontation pushed him too far? Or was he hiding something from her? Then again, she had been hiding something from him. She had the biggest secret of all. She had lived this past before. And she was playing it all to her advantage. She was a lying cheat. Was she getting all she deserved?
Not wanting to be alone with her guilt for a second longer, she called Ben.
‘Hello?’ he croaked.
Evie held the phone away from her ear, checking the time.
‘I’m so sorry, Ben, I didn’t realise how early it was.’
‘Is everything okay?’ Ben grumbled, sounding only fractionally more alert.
‘Yeah, yeah. Everything’s fine,’ lied Evie. She squeezed her eyes shut, tears pricking within them. ‘I just, well. I’m worried everything’s gone to shit.’
‘Evie,’ Ben said, making her suddenly feel a little lighter. ‘Evie, you’re my best mate, but I can’t do this anymore.’
Evie’s chest constricted. ‘What do you mean?’