Page 57 of Don't Regret Me
The door was locked, and Booker tried to pull her away. “I don’t think we’re supposed to go in there.”
She was done listening to people telling her what to do. Standing on her toes, she stretched up until she could barely reach the top of the door frame. It had to be there. If it wasn’t, it meant she’d made everything up. And that she couldn’t take.
When her fingers brushed cold metal, her entire body hummed with anticipation. The key was dusty when she brought it down, and she wondered how long it had been since it was used—except in coma land, at least.
“How did you know that was there?” Booker took a step back. “Liz, come on. Let’s go eat breakfast. You’re scaring me.”
She was scaring herself.
Pressing her lips together, she stuck the key in the lock, smiling when it clicked and allowed her to get the door open. Ignoring Booker’s presence behind her, she walked in slowly, reverently. It looked just as she remembered. A beautiful wooden desk sat covered in a thick layer of dust, illuminated by a beam of light coming in through the single window.
She rounded the desk, her eyes zeroing in on one drawer. It sat slightly open, but it was obvious no one had touched it in a while when it stuck. Gently, she wiggled it until it was far enough out she could reach in and thumb through the dividers.
When her fingers hit a thick stack of papers bound with simple metal clasps, she pulled it out.
“It was real,” she whispered, staring down at the top page.
Booker inched closer, gazing down at the script. “Don’t Forget Me?”
The title didn’t make sense until a person read the entire thing.
A tear dropped onto the page, and Liz wiped it away, but there was no erasing the faint memory of it.
“What does it mean?” he asked.
Finally, slowly, Liz tilted her head to look up at him, her eyes flooding. If it was real, that meant one thing. “He really forgot.”
27
NICK
“Do you know what you’re going to say to her?” Bentley asked for the third time.
Nick was starting to wonder why he’d let his new friend and his friend’s three kids tag along on this ill-fated venture. The moment he found out Liz had left for Virginia and the lake he once called home, he knew he had to go after her. He had to find her and tell her he’d been wrong.
“I honestly don’t know.” He turned to walk back into the house they were staying in.
It was a place Jasper found online for him. He’d almost forgotten he’d asked. This house was too big, too far from the one he needed to get to, and just not the right place.
But it was a roof. He didn’t care where he slept if it got him what he wanted.
Liz.
Always Liz.
His phone rang as he walked inside, across the dark wooden floors. “What?”
“Is that any way to talk to the last person on this planet who actually likes you right now?” Bea wasn’t really annoyed with him. She understood his moods like no one ever had.
“Sorry. I’m just…”
“I know, honey. It’s okay. As your agent, I should be telling you to finish your community service and get your butt to Hollywood without this diversion.”
“And as a human being?”
“I need to say you’re an idiot.”
“As if I didn’t know that already.” A kid ran by him, nearly knocking into him, and he jumped out of the way. He found them entertaining when he wasn’t in crisis mode. A second one yelled, chasing after the first.
