“Better see if your boyfriend is back.”
“Boyfriend? Oh, no. No, no, no.” She shook her head. “Luke is my brother. Seriously, we look identical, except I have long hair, boobs, and a prosthetic leg.” Closing her eyes, she bit her lips together. Someone needed to tape her mouth shut. “I’m sorry. We met like two seconds ago and I can’t stop reminding you that I have a fake leg, and to humiliate myself even more I actually mentioned my boobs. I’m just going to go. Even if he’s not here, I’ll just wait outside.”
Cage smirked. Hands crossed over his chest, he seemed to enjoy the Lake is an Idiot show. Her plans to ease him into talking about his father and Jillian derailed the second she stepped into the house. There wasn’t enough time to back up and steer the conversation in a different direction.
“You live around here?”
Lake shook her head. The less she said the better.
“Are you from New York too?”
Another place she’d never been.
“Yes. Have you been there?” Telepathically she willed him to say no. The last thing she needed was someone wanting to compare favorite places and things to do in New York.
“Yes, but only in transit with the team.”
“The team?”
“I play football.”
“Oh, that’s cool. Which team?”
“Cornhuskers.”
Lake nodded. “What position?”
“Quarterback.”
She tried not to react to the gorgeous guy confessing he played quarterback for a major college football team, but her eyes widened a bit anyway.
“Are you good?”
Cage shrugged. “I don’t know. Some people think so.”
“I ran cross country and played volleyball in high school. My mom thinks I should do something with the Paralympic Games.” She twisted her lips for a moment. “But I don’t know. It’s been a crazy year since the accident. Some days I still struggle to climb stairs.”
He gave her a slight nod.
“Well, I’d better see if Luke’s here and let you get back to … your stuff.”
He looked down, scratching the back of his head. “Yeah, my dad wasn’t a collector or any sort of packrat, but my parents were divorced. I’m his only child and my grandparents live in Portland, so I guess it’s my responsibility to decide what to do with everything. It’s all mine now, including the house. The funny part? I don’t want any of it.”
“My brother’s fiancée died a year ago. Her stuff still hangs in his closet. It’s just stuff, but there has to be a finality to get rid of it. I bet you’ll feel it when the last thing is removed from here and someone else buys the place. The ‘stuff’ is the epilogue. The story is over, but part of it lives on like a ghost for just a few more pages. What’s left at the end of the epilogue?”
“Nothing.”
Lake cocked her head to the side and narrowed her eyes. “Depends on how you look at it.”
“And how would you look at it?”
“I’m not sure yet. My boyfriend died in the accident that took my leg. When I came out of my coma the funeral was over, his parents had cleaned out his apartment, and some other person lived there. I turned the page after the final chapter only to find no epilogue. The author of my life sucker punched me.”
“Some would say the author of your life is God.”
“And I’d agree. But no amount of faith can truly comfort a grieving heart that can’t make sense of such tragedy. I didn’t lose my faith, but I did feel like God sucker punched me. No epilogue. But he’s God so I’ll probably forgive him some day.”
Cage chuckled. “I’m sure he’ll be grateful.”
She tore her eyes away from his smile and those dimples. “I’m sure he’s waiting.” She pulled on her boots. “Sorry to have disturbed you. We were just looking for Jillian. Her brother doesn’t know where she is and thought you might have heard from her. But we’ll find her.”
Lake opened the door.
“What’s your name?”
She turned. “Oh, sorry. I guess after fifteen minutes of talking about my disability, my boobs, and my anger at God, it might be nice to have a name to use when you tell your friends about the crazy chick that stopped to use your bathroom. It’s Lake.”
“Nice to meet you, Lake. I’m sorry. I have no idea where Jillian is or might be. And for the record, this has been the best fifteen minutes I’ve had in a long time, so I think when I tell my friends it will be about this hot girl that stopped by and how much I hated to see her walk out the door because really … the best fifteen minutes.”
Luke honked the horn. She cursed him behind her smile. Gorgeous quarterback guy just called her ‘hot girl.’ Her destiny stood before her and she had to leave. Maybe he would never forget their fifteen minutes together and come search for her in New York.