Rory started to say something, then she clamped her mouth shut. She knew I was right. She threatened something along the lines of castration if Fisher so much as looked at me the wrong way.
“And Rose?”
“She was in the wrong place at the wrong time, depending on how you look at it. She walked in and saw Fisher and I close. Maybe kissing. I honestly don’t remember. She gave me a huge lecture and told me to end it. And we agreed it would be best not to tell you … especially if there was no longer anything to tell. Unfortunately, she’s been caught in the middle yet again. And for that, I truly am sorry. I don’t want what’s happened between Fisher and me to affect your relationship.”
Rory ran her hands through her hair and blew out a long breath. “Reese … Fisher fell back in love with Angie during those five years you were gone. And they got engaged. Yes, he had an accident and has temporarily lost his memories of her, but that doesn’t mean he won’t get them back. And when he remembers her, I don’t know what it will mean for you.”
It was like she hadn’t just heard Fisher profess his love for me.
I love her.
He didn’t say, “I love her too,” like he loved Angie and me equally. No, he loved me.
But he was going to Costa Rica with Angie.
“He does remember her. He remembers her twenty-first birthday party. He remembers her telling him she was pregnant.”
Rory’s head jerked backward.
“And he remembers buying a ring to propose to her two weeks later. But she miscarried the baby. And he didn’t propose because he didn’t really want to marry her.”
And he didn’t want to have a baby with me and marry me five years ago either.
My mind did a spectacular job of building my hopes up … Fisher Mann, King of my Heart. Then it just as quickly tossed a grenade of doubt on everything.
Poof! Gone.
And once again, I was left in a rubble of confusion.
“He told you that?”
I nodded.
“And Angie knows he remembered that?”
Another nod.
“That must have dug up some painful memories for her as well.”
Yes, Angie had been dealt a few bad hands in her life. She lost a baby and lost her parents. Her fiancé was in an accident and couldn’t remember her. Did that have to mean that she deserved Fisher more than I did?
“And the night he remembered that, Angie was having dinner with him, and he was going to tell her that the wedding’s off.”
Rory frowned. “He didn’t …”
I rolled my eyes. “No. He didn’t because she was too emotional. But he was going to, which means he will when the time is right.”
“Rose said Fisher and Angie are going to her cousin’s wedding in Costa Rica.”
Averting my gaze for a few seconds, I nodded. “He told me that too.”
“And you’re okay with the guy you supposedly love going to Costa Rica for a week with the woman he agreed to marry? You realize they’ll be staying at a hotel in the same room, probably with one bed, right?”
“I don’t know what the sleeping arrangements will be, but I trust Fisher.”
She didn’t have to tell me that. I hadn’t let my brain go there yet. Now it was there.
He could sleep in the same bed as her without having sex. They’d done it before, except for that one time they did have sex.
She bounced out the door that day, skipping on clouds and sliding down rainbows. And he kissed her back. It wasn’t a one-sided peck. He kissed her back.
Because he enjoyed the kiss.
Because he probably enjoyed the sex.
Of course he enjoyed the sex! It was sex!
My mind lurched into action, a malfunctioning amusement park ride, flinging riders into the air plummeting to their deaths.
“If you trust Fisher, why is he still engaged to Angie? Is he stringing her along? Stringing you along? Having his cake and eating it too?”
“I think if anyone is to blame for this situation, it’s me and Angie. We know the details, even if we’ve chosen to not share all of them with him. We know he essentially met us for—in his mind—the first time just months ago. So for either one of us to play the victim here, it’s laughable. You and I cringe at what I’m doing because we see the big picture. I’m involved with an engaged man who’s been ‘in love’ with his fiancée for nearly thirty years. That sounds terrible. And if or when Angie finds out, she’ll play the devastated fiancée role, and everyone will feel sorry for her.
“But in Fisher’s mind, it’s not like that. In his mind, he met us both a few months ago, and he fell in love with me. And everyone told him he was in love with Angie. It would be like me grabbing some stranger off the street, bringing them here, and telling you that you love them … now act accordingly. Is that all it takes? Would you just embrace that stranger? Love them? What if I said you love this person more than Rose? Would you fall in line? Would you trust me and just … love this stranger? Commit to forever with this stranger because I said, ‘Trust me. You love her.’ No. You wouldn’t because it sounds utterly preposterous because it is utterly preposterous! And the fact that Fisher has fallen in love with me twice, all on his own, without any recollection of our past or anyone telling him he should love me … that means something. No—” I shook my head. “That means everything.”