“I’m sure you can guess, given what you heard in the lobby earlier. Now, I need a damn key so I can fix this before she disappears from my life for another ten years.”

Jackie shoves me out of the way. “I’ll do it. I guarantee I’m faster.”

Fifty

Whitney

I stare out at the darkness. The only thing I can hear from where I’m curled up on the terrace is the rushing water of the river below.

Tonight will be the last night I hear the river. Tomorrow, I’m gone.

I wrap the blanket tighter around my shoulders and think about how the hell I’m going to make this up to Cricket. She’ll be devastated. But in the end, I think she’ll understand.

I hope she understands.

From behind me comes a whooshing sound, and I jerk around to see a form step out into the darkness from my room. I open my mouth to scream, but he turns on the light.

Lincoln.

“How did you get in here?”

He holds up the plastic card. “Your aunt made me a key.”

The traitor. Although, she probably has no idea what happened tonight.

“She shouldn’t have. It’s not going to make this any easier.”

“Yeah, it is. Because you’re not going anywhere, Blue. Not this time.”

Tears burn in my eyes again. “You only get one mother, Lincoln. You can’t choose—”

He shakes his head and comes around to crouch in front of me. “There’s no choice to be made. That’s been done for years. I was too young and stupid to realize it before, but I’m not now. She told me what she said to you. How she tried to scare you, and then I fed into all of it that night at the cabin and pushed you away.” His hands cup the sides of my face, and he looks into my eyes. “I’m never pushing you away again.”

I know what Lincoln’s thinking right now. If he chooses me over his mother, we can live happily ever after, and I wish that were true. But there’s no way I can ever be happy knowing I caused that breach with his family. He may think his mother will get over it, but I know the truth. That woman will hate me until the day she dies, and I won’t be responsible for causing that break.

I wasn’t lying when I said that there’s nothing I wouldn’t do to see my mom again. To hear her voice. To smell her perfume. To listen to her hum as she cleaned the house.

Nothing.

“Please tell me you believe me, Blue.”

That’s the only easy part of this whole situation. “Of course I believe you,” I tell him.

“And you forgive me?”

This life has taught me more than anything that holding on to a grudge is the biggest mistake of all. I don’t know what he really thinks he needs forgiveness for, but I’m not holding on to any of it.