Count Your Lucky Stars (Written in the Stars, #3)(90)

Except she couldn’t get into the story no matter how hard she tried, couldn’t lose herself in the distraction the way she needed to. Her eyes kept flitting to the corner of her screen, desperate to see how much time had passed. She navigated over to her texts and reread the last message she’d sent to Olivia before hitting call.

Each ring ratcheted her nerves tighter, her heart rate higher, until she reached Olivia’s voicemail.

Hey, this is Olivia! I can’t come to the phone right now, but if you leave your name, number, and a brief message I’ll get back to you as soon as I can. Thanks!

The line beeped, but when Margot opened her mouth, nothing came out.

What was she supposed to say? Where are you? She’d already texted. Leaving a voicemail saying the same thing she’d already typed out was overkill. Needy. She ended the call, praying she hadn’t breathed too heavily during the brief three or four seconds before she’d hung up.

11:31. A pitiful little whimper escaped her lips as she let her head flop back against the couch. She couldn’t do this. Another hour of sitting around and doing nothing, waiting and worrying, was going to drive her up the wall.

She needed to do something. Go somewhere. She hit the power button on the remote and stood. Cat cracked open one eye.

“I’ll be back later, okay? Be good.”

Cat blinked at her and—she definitely needed to get out of here.

Hobbling down the hall, Margot snagged her purse off the bed and checked that she had her wallet and phone while she made her way to the door. She snagged her keys off the entry table and backtracked to the kitchen, stopping in front of the whiteboard on the fridge. Olivia had left a smiley face on the board days ago and Margot hadn’t erased it. She still couldn’t erase because—she didn’t even want to think that maybe this could be the last little message that Olivia left for her.

Rather than erase, she wrote beside it.

Went to Elle’s. Meet you at The Ruins at 1.

She clutched the dry-erase marker in her hand and added a heart beside her message. She cocked her head. It was a little lopsided, her hands unsteady, but it would do.

Seventeen minutes later, Margot knocked on Elle’s door. A shadow passed on the other side of the peephole right before the lock flipped and Elle opened the door. One eye was lined and the other wasn’t and she was wearing the polka-dotted silk robe Margot had given her for Christmas four years back.

“Hey, I thought we were meeting at . . .” Elle’s face fell. She reached out, dragging Margot inside. “What’s wrong?”

Nothing. Everything. Margot flicked her bangs out of her eyes. “I can’t get ahold of Liv. I called and texted and—nothing.” She cringed. “Sorry. I should’ve called before just showing up here and—”

Elle’s grip tightened around Margot’s wrist, cutting off her apology and her circulation. Damn.

“Don’t even, Mar. It’s fine.” Elle tugged her over to the couch. “Olivia’s probably just driving. Or maybe her phone died and she doesn’t have her charger?”

Olivia had Bluetooth in her car, and she was far too organized to lose her charger. Even as rattled as she was yesterday, there was no way she’d have left it behind. Besides, Margot had done a quick sweep of Olivia’s room this morning before checkout, just to make sure nothing got left behind. “Maybe.”

Margot’s chin wobbled and Elle frowned.

“Hey, no.” Elle reached out and grabbed her hand. “You’re not okay. What is it?”

Margot dragged in a breath, air stuttering between her lips. She held it until her lungs burned, then let it out slowly. “Liv and I, we had a fight last night. Before she left. Before I came down to dinner. It was . . .” She scoffed out a laugh, brows rising and falling. “Not fun.”

Elle squeezed her fingers and offered up a small, crooked smile. “Fighting with you never is. You always make good points, and it sucks when you’re right. And outside of the fight itself, the not-talking part is awful and—”

Margot threw herself across the cushion and flung her arms around Elle, burying her face against Elle’s shoulder, scrunching her eyes shut. Elle’s hair tickled her nose, adding to the burn inside her sinuses. She sniffed hard and tried to lean back, but Elle wouldn’t let her, only squeezing harder.

“How come you didn’t say anything?” Elle asked, leaning but not letting go, fingers wrapped around Margot’s upper arms. “Last night or this morning in the car? You just told us all Olivia had to leave. You didn’t say anything about a fight.”

She scratched the tip of her nose and shrugged. “I didn’t want to put a damper on the trip. Today. The weekend. I didn’t want to talk about it.”

Elle rubbed her arm. “Would it help to talk about it?”

Hell if she knew. She’d rather there not be something to talk about in the first place, something she felt like she needed to get off her chest, this weight, this—this fist wrapped around her heart.

“Come on,” Elle cajoled. “Talk to me.”

Margot took a deep breath. “Olivia, she’s generous, you know? She’s always putting everyone else first and—and I love that about her. But there has to be a point where she puts herself first, otherwise she’s going to give and give until she’s got nothing left. I basically told her that. Only, I also said she was overreacting. As soon as I said it, I realized it was a shitty thing to say, and now I’m worried that might’ve overshadowed my point. I don’t know. I just didn’t understand why she had to leave then, and she told me I have a fear of abandonment, which—”