Page 11 of Wish Lists and Road Trips

I looked up to see him staring at me and my cheeks pinked. “What?”

“Do you really think that’s how it works?” The look on his face was haunted, like I’d carelessly brushed a wound.

I swallowed. “I don’t know,” I whispered truthfully.

The plane lurched and started to taxi. Nick turned forward again, his posture going stick-straight. “Look, Brit,” he said, “if this plane goes down, I promise not to hold you accountable, okay?”

I nodded, my throat tight. It wasn’t an absolution of my crime, just from the karmic consequences, but I’d take it. He didn’t even ask me why I did it. Which was fine because I’d never see him again after this day was over.

But it really would have been nice to tell one person the truth.

“How are you feeling? Sick? Nervous?” Brit smacked a piece of strawberry-scented gum, staring at the side of my face. She had her head resting on her hand, that peacefulness evident in her smile even though we still had hours of travel hassle before we got home.

“I’m fine,” I lied. She still thought I was afraid of flying, and I let her believe it. Mostly because I didn’t want to tell her I was edgy and sick because there was a high possibility I was going to fail at my brother’s dying wish.

I’d be back in New York by tonight, and then what the hell was I going to do? Bring the rest of the ashes back with me? Hand them to my mother in this stupid tin that we used to keep coins in when we were younger? Alex would rest for eternity collecting dust on her mantle instead of tossing around the ocean.

That would be the ultimate hell for him—sitting still. He told me as much the day he took over as president of the company and moved his stuff into my dad’s office. He’d flicked the sign on his door, his usualdon’t give a fucksmile on his face. “Where dreams go to die, right?” he said.

He was partially right, it was just that it was my dream that was dying.

Brit calling me the heir to the throne had pressed on a bruise I’d been nursing for years. My cousin Tom and I had been counting down the days until Callaway and Sons was ours since we were kids, but for some reason when Alex turned thirty, my father gave him the title like it was some sort of participation trophy.

Alex, who had a degree in graphic design and never gave a single fuck about the family business.

I have no idea if he knew how much of a gut punch that was, watching my father hand him everything I’d ever wanted just for him to treat it like a prison sentence, but it tainted everything that came after. Including the last moment I ever had with him. That was why I owed him this. Why I was going to do everything possible to finish this list.

I scrubbed a hand over my face, replaying that day again in my head for the thousandth time. Whatever Brit did to make her think the plane would fall out of the sky, she had no idea that, if anyone, it was me who deserved it.

“Is that your girlfriend?” Brit asked, pointing to the text I’d been typing out to Willow. I promised I’d send her daily updates, though I’d been dreading telling her about this setback before I figured out how to fix it. I still had two items left on the list and I had no idea how I was going to complete them now.

I hit send and put the phone away. “No.”

“Wife? You’re not wearing a ring.”

“Not my wife. Just . . . a friend.”

She scrunched her nose. “Hmm. What’s that?”

I’d pulled Alex’s letter from my bag when we took off and it was clutched in my fist.

“It’s a letter,” I said. I’d almost worn a hole through the corner of it from pinching it between my fingers, so I folded it in half and shoved it back into my pocket.

Her eyes somehow grew even bigger. “Love letter?” she asked. “Ohhh . . . prison pen pal?”

“No.” I tried to serve her a look, but the corner of my mouth tugged upward. She was cute.

“I have a secret document too,” she said. She reached into her tank top and produced a piece of paper folded into one of those little triangle footballs I used to make in school. She used her bright pink fingernail to tug at the folds until she got it open, smoothing it out in her lap. “You want to know what it is?”

I did but I wasn’t going to play “I’ll show you mine if you show me yours.”

“Don’t worry,” she said, reading my mind. “This can be my day for show and tell.”

She smoothed the paper out over her lap and read. “I promise to always listen to what my heart is trying to say even when the words are rough. I promise to put me first and work hard for my dreams. From this day forward, there will never be anything more important in my life than me.” She smiled. “They’re my wedding vows. I changed all theyous tomes. I wrote them to myself.”

I nodded.

Her smile flickered and I realized this was one of those moments when Alex would throw something at me and jokingly tell me to quit talking so much. “I mean, what made you want to address them to yourself?”

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