Page 47 of Wreck Me

Her throat twisted so tight she had to yell to get words out at all. “Stop lying. Just stop. His texts only said ‘It’s done,’ because he knew you’d know exactly what he meant. And you said he’s inColorado. How would he have even known I left the house if you hadn’t told him?”

Nico shook his head as he gave a limp and unconvincing shrug. “I’ve no idea how he knew. It’s true we’d had a loose sort of a plan, but that was before. The plan changed when we both agreed on moving the house. I didn’t want this, I promise.”

She stood awkwardly, still holding onto the bits of her treasured home. “How about I make you a promise?” she spat as she glared down at him. “I promise to never believe your promises ever again.”

“Ginny, please, don’t.” He looked up at her, his mouth a slanted gash of pain and his eyes watering as if he were about to cry. The guy deserved an Oscar for this performance.

“No,” she said. “Youdon’t. You don’t call me, you don’t text me, you don’t think of me. People like me are beneath your thoughts.” She turned and started walking toward her car, her mind an orchestra of wrong notes.

I promised myself he wouldn’t win.I promised!

But in the end, he had, and she had lost everything. In a defeated tone she added over her shoulder, “Drop the dogs off to Monique. She’ll know how to find me.”

22

Nico wished the bulldozer had taken him down as he watched Ginny’s clunker of a car cough its way down Placard. Just minutes before, she’d pecked him on the cheek and held his hand. Not long before that, they kissed on a ridgetop overlooking the Pacific. He could still feel her slightness against him, still feel her nimble fingers in his hair. In his whole life, he’d never had a kiss like that—like cool, clear water hitting parched desert stone. Now he would never feel it again.

His foot brushed against a longish piece of house trim the exact periwinkle blue as a two-thousand-dollar suit on its way to a landfill somewhere. He pressed his boot onto the center of the board until he heard the crunch and felt it splinter.

Ginny wasn’t the type to forgive and forget. And after what had happened here, why should she? He had promised her up, down, and sideways that the house would be safe. He’d pledged his love for his mother that it would be safe!

The young man from the demolition company walked up to him. “Are you Nico?” Nico nodded. “Your brother said you’d be here soon.” He motioned toward the rubble. “She was stubbornat first. These old gals have good bones. Pity to see them go like this, but hey, progress, right?”

Nico envisioned hamsters running endlessly on wheels. “Right. Progress.” It was disconcerting how the man referred to the house as if it had been alive and female, especially since Ginny thought of the place the same way.

The man scratched at his ear. “The dump trucks will be here soon. We’ll start scooping and hauling, keep working till she’s cleared away.” At the mention of ‘clearing her away,’ Nico felt a tug at his heart. The man sent him a concerned, questioning look. “Was it your house then?”

“I grew up here, yeah.” The plume of demolition dust seemed as much inside of Nico’s head as outside of it.

“Ah. I thought it belonged to that girl. She seemed pretty upset.” He patted Nico once on the shoulder. “Nostalgia gets us all, but I'm sure you’ve got big plans for the place.” He turned and walked toward his machine.

Nostalgia?Nico wasn’t known for that. If anything, he was known for actively rejecting it. The past was the past. The future was all anyone need care about.

His future, any outsider could have told him, was now crystal clear. This pile of pastel-colored rubble was the endpoint of ten years of hushed deals, personal sacrifice, enormous financial risk, and sleepless nights. As of a few short minutes ago, he and his brother owned a veritable gold mine, with no squatter strings attached.

His muddled brain did a double take. The house’s destructionhadbeen a mistake, hadn’t it? He hadn’t secretly wanted his brother to call in the bulldozers, had he? Was that why he hadn’t told Vince about the new plan? Was that the real reason he’d switched his ringer off?

He searched his heart, and it soundly rejected the thought.No. He had wanted to visit Ginny in the sky above Malibu. Helonged to go for walks with the dogs and bring his mother to the house. He was curious to see where things might go between him and this mercurial woman who had somehow made an imprint on his heavily guarded heart.

The dogs were calmer now, and Nico figured they would be okay a few minutes longer. The side yard was intact, but he was nervous about them climbing the low fence and taking off. The very,verylast thing he needed was to lose one (or all) of Ginny’s dogs. He walked over and gave them each a treat from a bag in the back seat. Mick and Jack wagged their tails, but Annie spun in agitated circles.

“It’s okay, girl,” he said, patting her through the bars. He’d take them to Monique soon. First, he needed to know what had really happened here. Opening the driver’s side door, he retrieved his phone, then leaned against the truck’s hood. His brother’s text messages read like a diary of disaster.

11:15 am:“Looks like the house is empty – even the dogs are gone. Hey, Romeo, did you get her to leave with you? You sneak.”

11:19 am: “Can I go ahead or do you have demolition guys round the corner?”

11:29 am: “I don’t see any activity yet.”

11:40 am: “OK. They’re on their way. Don’t know where you went with her, but take your time, kay?”

12:17 pm: “The guy is there. Asking if we want to do any salvage first? I don't think there’s time for it, do you? IDK where you’re at.”

12:45 pm: “I told him to go ahead and start.”

12:50 pm: “Dammit. Front-end loader having engine trouble. They’re sending over a new one. I cursed them out, so now they’re sending an even bigger one. ;)”

2:25 pm: “New one finally arrived. It’s a frick’n monster! Will eat house for snack.”

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