Wishing Well(91)

You gave us both back the sense of family. And while you became the light that shone in Maurice’s dark prison, you also became a sister figure to me. For all the money, for the lavish lifestyle I led, for all the comforts I had at my fingertips in life, you were more valuable than any of it. Those afternoons spent with you and my brother are what I take with me to my grave. I can promise you that while I waited on the gurney for the drugs to steal my breath, it was that yellow room I imagined last, it was your face looking at me with annoyed exasperation and Maurice’s beaming smile as he watched us talk back and forth.

He always had faith in you. He knew from the first second he saw you that night by the well, that you belonged to him, and he belonged to you.

I owe you everything for the role you played in our lives.

If this was our fairy tale, Penelope, than you were the hero that rode in on the white horse to rescue Maurice and I both. But even more than that, you were the beauty that soothed the violence of the beast, you were the sunrise and sunset in both of our lives.

I want you to continue being the hero, in every choice you make and in everything that you do. I truly believe you were put on the Earth to make it a better place, and I believe that whatever man ends up with you will be the luckiest man because of it.

Continue soothing the beast, Penelope. Even when he roars. Especially when he roars. And even when he tells you to play the maiden so he can be the hero, you continue simply being you.

My heart belongs with you, in this life and in whatever comes next.

I am forever in your debt,



Vincent Mercier



P.S. You must forgive me, Penelope. I am just a man...and a liar.



More tears. How my body was still able to produce them was a mystery to me. How I hadn’t gone blind from their heat was a mystery as well. I could drown in them, I thought, could fill the wishing well to the rim, until it, too, cried as those tears leaked over to slide down the stone and nourish the ground beneath it. Even now, it felt like I could barely hold my head above water.

The stain of my tears dabbled the note I held, the ink running along the edges where the tears had bled the words Vincent left for me knowing he would be gone. And in a bright spot where even the sunlight felt cold, I swiped them away wondering what I would do with my life now.

Being Meadow had been a disguise to hide from my past, but after learning the intricate details, after facing what had been done, I no longer felt the need to hide, no longer wanted to assume the life of my sister who was long gone.

My job didn’t make me happy. The country where I lived wasn’t my home. The name by which every person knew me was a lie I could no longer choke down.

I was as lost today as I had been the day Vincent found me in an alley beneath the freezing rain. Except he wasn’t here anymore. There was nobody who could pull me from the streets and lead me to my new home.

“Are you okay?” a deep voice asked

Wiping away another tear, I shook myself from the spectacle I was making, opening my mouth to answer, “Yes, I’m -“

My neck wrenched from how fast my head shot up in recognition of the familiar voice, my eyes locking to a memory, to a man that couldn’t be flesh and blood.

“You’re -“ my voice failed, the word cracked through as it crumbled apart. Swallowing to shove my heart back down to my chest from where it had lodged in my throat, I said, “You’re supposed to be dead.”

Arrogance was the arch of a single brow over his green eyes, the sunlight capturing the color and turning it into a glimmering, rare jewel.

“So are you,” he answered, his hands tucked in the pockets of his slacks, his suit jacket perfectly tailored to the breadth of his broad shoulders. With his dark hair a disheveled, wavy mess, his strong cheekbones cutting lines beneath those mesmerizing green eyes, and his mouth set in a cruel, yet compelling hint of amusement, he could have been Vincent on the night we met - a man of wealth, of power, of secrets and sound mind.

This wasn’t the Maurice I remembered from the basement where we’d spent so many hours. This was a man I didn’t recognize, except for how closely he resembled his older brother.

“How?” The single word slipped out from between my lips on a rush of exhaled breath. Before I understood I was moving, I’d stood from the bench and crossed the distance to approach him. Maurice didn’t move away or give ground, but he didn’t step toward me or give any indication that he was as surprised by my presence as I was by his.

“I now own the Wishing Well,” he explained, his voice absent of familiarity, of happiness to see me, of the love we once had shared. Also absent was the self-doubt, the self-loathing, the confusion and sorrow that had always been present seven years ago when I’d known him. “I’ve managed it for the past several years under a corporate name.”

“You-“

Fuck...how was this even possible?

Beyond the shock of seeing him standing here, beyond the shock of understanding what Vincent meant in the letter by calling himself a liar, beyond the shock of standing in a garden I’d swore to never see again, was the shock of seeing Maurice staring down at me with confidence in the set of his shoulders, arrogance in the glimmer of his eyes, anger in the thin line of his lips as if daring me to admit that what I’d done to him was wrong.

I’d blamed him for my sister’s death. I’d walked away and stayed hidden. I’d deserted him while still loving him for all these years.