Page 56 of The Ripple Effect

“We can ring it when we’re ready. No point in rushing.”

Chapter Sixteen

For once, I don’t hurry along the path from the pavilion to the clearing. My head needs a minute to come down from the dopamine rush Lyle put into my blood; my heart needs to get a grip on reality.

Two fingertips trace my lower lip, where the memory of his mouth still presses against mine. The path his hand took under my shirt feels luminescent, like trails of glowing plankton on night paddles along the Pacific coast.

When I proposed the fake engagement, public displays of affection felt like far too much.

How is it possible that eight days later they don’t feel like enough?

Sloane thinks the kiss was fake, obviously; her reaction was as bland as if she’d found us scrubbing the floor.

It felt real to me, though. And if Lyle’s reaction was any indication, it was plenty real to him.

But it was also impulsive. We didn’t plan to kiss or make sure we’d get caught; we just did it. In the moment, I felt sure; now I’m second-guessing everything.

It makes me want that exit strategy Sloane mentioned, except I don’t want the roads that go to fake breakups or other disasters. I want an off-ramp from this gray area to somewhere solid. And I have no idea how to get there.

I wouldn’t even know who to ask for advice.

For a second, I feel so lonely I grip my chest, pulling the skin with my fingertips to ease the ache beneath. Sometimes you need help to work the problem, but there’s no one in camp I can pour my heart out to.

If Liz were here, and if she weren’t wrapped up in parenthood, I might tell her. It’s been a long time since I had good problems to share with her, instead of the lopsided parade of tragedy that’s my half of our friendship.

But Liz doesn’t know about the fake engagement. Sloane’s the one who sniffed that out, and she and I haven’t really talked since our conversation in the truck. I don’t see a chatty, intimate relationship in the cards for us, anyway. Gossip sessions are almost impossible when we’re surrounded by people twenty-four seven, and I’m working from before she gets up until after the guests go to bed.

On top of that, Sloane already has the advantage over me in the secrets department. She knows something that could bring down my business; I know a slice of her life storyPeoplemagazine could have told me for $7.99.

She’s growing on me, though. She’s too perfect for me to pour out my heart to her over Lyle, but we could aim for a clean slate, like Kat talked about. I’ll stop throwing out her Christmas cards unopened; this year, she’ll add a handwritten line of greeting and scrawl a big letterSover the preprinted signature.

As I cross the clearing, Dereck exits the path leading to the tents, his Louis Vuitton weekender bags slung over hisshoulders. He’s dressed in dark jeans cuffed at the ankle, a soft-looking camel cardigan over a white T-shirt, chunky-soled loafers, and expensive, sinkable sunglasses.

These aren’t paddling clothes.

And the low hum in my ears isn’t blood rushing underneath my skin, but the engine of the same black car that delivered Dereck and Sloane four days ago.

I blink. “Where are you going?”

“LA,” Dereck chirps, striding jauntily toward the parking lot. “Flight’s in three and a half hours. Oh my god, thank you,” he gushes, setting down a bag to accept a steaming, green-logoed go-cup from the driver. “You don’t know how I’ve missed these.” He sips it reverently, coming away with foamed milk on his sculpted upper lip.

“Is everything all right? Is it Sloane’s…” I glance around, not sure what I should say about her mom in public.

“It’s fine; nobody died. Sloane will explain,” he says, one foot already in the back seat.

I hate surprise goodbyes. If someone’s leaving, I like to know the details in advance: when they’re going; how long they’ll be gone. If someone doesn’t share their itinerary, that rarely means anything good.

If Sloane’s mom is fine, then she’s leaving because she wants to. She’s letting me go even though shepromised.

“Where is she?” I bark.

The front flaps of the Sunset Dome are tied open in defiance of my warnings about mosquitoes. Sloane’s suitcase is flung across one of the canvas chairs. The dresser drawers are all open, the contents jumbled like she’s so desperate to get gone she doesn’t care what gets left behind.

“Sloane. What the hell is going on?”

She picks up a pair of underwear, shakes it, then throws it onto the heap in her suitcase and reaches for another pair. “Dereck says he returned my AirPods, but I can’t find them. The car’s leaving in five minutes. Can you recheck the rest of the tent while I do the drawers?”

Is this how it ends between us? She casually asks me to find her missing stuff in the last seconds before she goes back where she came from, like I owe her my help but she doesn’t owe me an explanation?

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