Page 65 of How We Loved

“She’s told me a few things that kind of felt like red flags.”

My heart starts to pound out of my chest as anger rises deep within me. “Red flags about what?”

She goes to sit on the couch, obviously thinking about what she should say. Dalton follows her, and I go back to where I was sitting as well.

“She really likes the guy, but just the fact that there’s been any …” She pauses like she’s trying to find the right words. “I don’t want to say issues, but weirdness … it kind of rubbed me wrong. I mean”—she looks at Dalton—“Dalton and I definitely had our issues.”

Dalton laughs. “Like when you pushed my truck into the marsh?”

“I pulled it. Get it right,” Natalie taunts.

I raise my eyebrows in surprise. “She did what to your truck?”

Natalie lets out a big laugh. “You never told him?”

He lowers his eyes at her. “No. It was bad enough that Trish saw it. I kept that shit to myself. You’re lucky you didn’t cause any damage. Thank God Trish knew to keep her mouth shut too. Last thing I needed was the world knowing what you did to my baby. I’d never hear the end of it.”

“You’re totally right!” I laugh as I shake my head at their antics.

They used to fuck with each other because they hated each other that much, yet here they are, in love with one another now. Blows my mind.

“But we had reasons to act like that. Trevor seems almost aggressive toward her and controlling too.”

I sit up, listening even more now. “How is he controlling?”

“So … he doesn’t want her hanging out with us. Like this. Anymore. At all.”

Rage instantly fills my veins. You can’t tell a girl she can’t hang out with her friends. That’s chickenshit.

“Seriously?” Dalton asks, just as surprised as I am.

“Yeah. Last night, she was asking me for advice about what she should do. I feel bad, telling you now, but I don’t really like hearing that he’s trying to take her from her friends. It’s come up a few times. Especially her relationship with you.” She points to me.

“So, where is she now? She’d better not be at home by herself just because she doesn’t have his permission to be here.” I’m barely able to contain my composure now.

Natalie reassures both of us, “No. She’s not home. She’s with him.”

I don’t like that she’s with him, but when I heard she couldn’t hang out with us anymore, all I could picture was her sitting at home, alone, so I guess that’s the better option in this particular situation.

Then, what else Natalie said hits me, and more anger rises because I know she’s there and he’s been aggressive toward her too.

“What about the aggressive part?” I ask as my jaw tics, not sure how much more I can handle hearing.

“She’s told me a few stories of them hanging out over the past few weeks, and … I don’t know. She brushes over what she was saying like it’s randomly part of their day and not the main part of what she’s saying, but hearing he’s gotten mad more than a few times caught my attention. He always apologizes, then acts all cool with her again. It’s just … I feel like every conversation has something like that in it.”

Worry wraps around my heart so tightly that I have to think about my breathing, wondering if I even can breathe at all. Knowing that anyone has gotten mad with her pushes me to a place I don’t want to be.

Maya is the sweetest, happiest person you’ll ever meet. No one should ever get angry at her for anything, especially a guy she calls her boyfriend.

“What were they going to do today?” I ask.

“Not sure. She just said she was going to his place.”

I pick up my phone to call her, and after two rings, it goes to voice mail. Closing my eyes, I rub my lips as I try to think about what I can do, knowing, right now, there’s nothing I can do. If she’s with him, she won’t answer my calls or texts.

Fucking great.

As the hours tick by, there’s this thing in the air that won’t go away, making the day almost unbearable. Though none of us are talking about it, we all know it’s different without Maya here, no matter how much we try to ignore it.

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