Take a Chance on Me(75)

Mitch moved to take her in his arms, but she jerked back, shaking her head. “No.”

He lay back down and didn’t speak.

She drew in a shaky breath. “Sometimes I wake up with the sound of the dangling keys echoing in my ears. The memory of how I waved them in front of his face burned in my brain. I still can see his exact expression as he put down his pen, sighed, and got up from his desk. Do you have any idea how many times I’ve played that scene in my head? How many times I wished I’d taken no for an answer?”

Her shoulders shook as she began to cry in earnest. Mitch wanted desperately to comfort her, but he didn’t reach for her again.

She brushed away the tears with an angry swipe. “I wanted to go to the store to get lip gloss. It was the only makeup my mom let me wear. I had a date with Steve that night. I was driving and laughing. I didn’t like the song on the radio, and I went to change the station. He warned me to pay attention, but I kept flipping. He got mad and yelled at me, pushing my hand away. I looked down, only for a second, but it was too late. I ran a stop sign and a truck plowed into us. Next thing I knew, I was waking up in a hospital room and my whole life had changed.”

She sat up, her movements angry and jerky. “And you know what the worst part of it was?”

“What?” Mitch said, feeling sick to his stomach for what she’d suffered.


“Everyone felt sorry for me. So sorry. God, I hated it. Hated them. They looked at me with pity in their eyes and each time I died a bit more inside. I’d ruined their lives. I changed them forever. And they feel sorry for me.”

“Maddie,” Mitch said, putting his palm over her knee and rubbing.

She buried her head in her hands. “They never say it, never let on, but every time they look at me they have to think about what I did to them. They have to hate me.”

“No.” He’d never met her family, but of this he was sure. Their closeness and unity was clear in the way she talked about them. He knew estranged or strained families, and the Donovans weren’t like them. “They don’t, I promise you.”

She looked at him, her eyes watery and her nose red. “I hate me. Why wouldn’t they hate me too?”

Not caring if she protested, he picked her up and put her on his lap, wrapping his arms around her. He swayed back and forth, the gentle rocking motion meant to soothe away a pain that he couldn’t even begin to erase. “Maddie, you were a kid. Every teenager has worn their parent down. The only difference is that you had horrific, irreversible consequences. I’m sorry—I wish there was something I could do to change that for you—but since I can’t, I can only promise your dad would hate for you to blame yourself like this. For you to let it eat you up inside.”

“I know that here.” She pointed to her head before placing her hand over her heart. “But it’s hard to believe here.”

He lifted her chin and brushed a soft kiss against her lips. “What can I do to make you believe?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “But I’m working on it.”

“I’m sorry, Maddie.”

“I miss him.” She rested her cheek on his shoulder.

He rubbed slow circles over her back. “I know you do.”

She quieted, relaxing into his hold. “You help.”

“I’m glad,” he said. “What else can I do?”

She raised her watery gaze to meet his, and her eyes were so impossibly green, so full of something he didn’t want to name, that he sucked in a breath. “Fight.”





Chapter Twenty



In the dead of night, Mitch stared out the bedroom window. It had been a grueling day. He should be exhausted, but sleep eluded him. He dragged his fingers roughly through his hair and peered over his shoulder at the woman sleeping in his bed. The full moon streamed in, casting Maddie in its white, iridescent light. With her hair fanning out onto the pillow, she looked serene, so peaceful that it was hard to believe she’d cried in his arms until she’d had no more tears left.

Embracing the storm of her emotions that had been pent up since her father’s death had seemed to release something inside her. When she’d emerged on the other side, her expression had held a softness that hadn’t been there before. But her eyes held the biggest change: they’d been filled with a steely, determined certainty. Not only an elemental understanding of the path ahead of her, but a desire to walk it.

He’d known what needed to be done, what he could no longer ignore. He turned away from the image Maddie presented to stare once again out the window.

It was time to put hope away.





Chapter Twenty-One



The following morning, Maddie strolled into the kitchen feeling like a new woman. Something had happened last night, something years of therapy hadn’t been able to accomplish: She was finally free.

“Good morning, dear.” Charlotte’s cool voice sounded from behind her.

Maddie almost jumped out of her skin, then spun around. “Mrs. Riley.”

“Please, call me Charlotte.” The older woman was already dressed immaculately in a white linen, button-down top complete with pearls. “Mitchell left to do some errands. He’ll be back shortly.”

Maddie tucked a stray lock of hair behind her ear and straightened. There was something about Mitch’s mother that inspired good posture.