15. CARSON

Welcome to Patty’s ice cream and treats. Here’s your coffee. Would you like a side of teenaged heartache to go with that?

I came in here because I love their brownie sundaes, even though Matthias always makes me do a dozen extra burpees whenever he finds out where I’ve been. Plus, it’s on the list of places “the quarry” has been known to frequent on occasion, so I thought I’d scope it out and see if anyone set off any alarms in my brain. Like a dozen other places on the list, I planned to set up a baseline that I can compare against over the coming fortnight.

Now, out of nowhere, I’m staring into Cassie Vincent’s pale sapphire eyes.

I feel like I’ve been caught in the gravity well of a black hole – I can’t look away. I’m trapped. It’s a vision of the life I always wanted, but one I’d given up on.

Cassie has changed a bit since the last time I saw her. Her hair has gone a shade lighter, almost strawberry blonde but not quite, and straightened somewhat. The freckles that I used to count during our make-out sessions have faded a bit, but the skin is still the same milky pale it always was.

Her body, though. Wow.

She was always reedy, almost to the point of being gangly, back in high school – we both were. Not that I could have cared less. She was still a goddess in my eyes.

But now there are wicked curves under her yellow sundress. Shapely legs that have seen more than their share of exercise. And the cleavage peeking out to say hello to the world was definitely not there the last time we were together.

The last time we were together before she stood me up for the prom and disappeared from my life for a dozen years.

Her eyes are as wide as I imagine mine must be. We’ve been staring at each other for what seems like a week, but is probably only twenty seconds. In the real world. Which couldn’t be further from how I feel right now.

“Uh, do you guys know each other?” the blonde to Cassie’s left asks. I’ve seen her here before; she’s the owner, I think.

Cassie finally blinks and seems to come back to herself. Thank God. I don’t know if I would have been able to break the spell on my own.

“Yes,” she says with a smile that looks about as genuine as a $3 bill. “We, uh, we were … friends. In school.”

Friends. All right, then. I guess I know where I stand, at least now.

My charm autopilot kicks in and I stand up. The blonde gasps slightly as I do. I lean forward and extend my hand to her.

“Carson Drake,” I say. “Pleased to meet you.”

“I’m so sorry,” Cassie says, obviously flustered. “Carson, this is Tricia Clarke. She owns Patty’s.”

“Not for long,” Tricia says as she takes hold of my hand. She holds onto it for longer than most would consider polite, but eventually lets go. “Pretty soon Sandra and I are going to be partners. Why don’t you have a seat with us?”

Cassie flashes her a look as I sit.

“So,” I say. “Still going by Sandra?”

She looks like she swallowed a bug. “Yeah,” she says. “It’s, uh, it’s my name.”

This obviously confuses Tricia.

“What else would you call her?” she asks.

“She was always Cassie to me,” I say. “But her dad thought Sandra sounded more serious.”

“You were the only one who ever called me Cassie,” she says.

I knew that. How could I forget?

I’d whisper it in her ear during the nights we spent exploring each other’s mouths with our tongues. It made her feel special, something only the two of us shared. And that meant more to me than any night spent with a supermodel in the last few years.

Tricia looks Cassie up and down, appraising her like she’s a used car.

“You know what,” she says. “I think you look like a Cassie. It suits you. Suits your personality, too. I like it. I’m going to call you Cassie from now on, too.”

Cassie flushes. I shouldn’t be enjoying this, but I am. Sometimes I’m a real bastard.

“You have good taste in friends,” I say.

“Uh-huh,” she says.

Tricia looks back and forth between the two of us, obviously waiting for us to talk to each other. When we don’t, she takes it on herself to continue, papering over the tension.

“So,” she says. “How long has it been since you two saw each other?”

“Twelve years,” we say in unison.

Three months and five days, I don’t add.

Tricia cocks an eyebrow. “Ooo-kay. Good to see neither of your memories is failing. So not since high school?”

“Since prom night,” I say. It’s out of my mouth before I even realize it.

I worry that Cassie will clam up now, but she seems to have recovered her composure.

“What have you been up to since then?” she asks, propping her chin in her hand. Suddenly she’s as cool as an autumn breeze.

I can’t believe this. Every time I have the dream, the one where I show up at her empty house on prom night and everyone laughs at me, I fantasize about this moment when I wake up. The moment when I get to tell Cassie Vincent that I went on to fulfill every dream I ever had.

Well, all except one.

“I went on a full ride to Harvard,” I say. “But I dropped out in sophomore year when my dad passed away.”

Cassie’s eyes widen in shock. “Oh my God, Carson, I’m so sorry. What happened?”

“A training accident. He took a live round.” I keep my voice casual, but even now, a decade later, the memory hurts, an almost physical ache that fades but never fully disappears.

“That’s terrible! I loved your dad; he was so easygoing.”

I remember how well the two of them got along. Cassie’s dad was a bigwig colonel, always pushing her to use her intellect to its full capacity. He wouldn’t accept anything less than perfection from her.

And I was definitely not part of his plan for his daughter.

“My dad was too easygoing,” I say. “He spent his life being ordered around by other people. I decided then and there that I wasn’t going to let that happen to me. So I started a tech company and sold it a few years ago. Now I’m retired.”

Tricia is goggling at me now. I can practically see the drool pooling in her mouth.

Cassie gives me an earnest look and puts a hand on top of mine.

“That’s incredible,” she says. “Retirement obviously agrees with you. I mean, look at you.”

I manage to keep my grin polite instead of letting it spread from ear to ear. I’ve been waiting a decade to hear her say that. I realize now – maybe I always knew – that I would never, could never, have found satisfaction with any other woman.

“You’re very kind,” I say. “There are definitely some advantages to being able to spend as much time as you want in the gym.”

I lean in closer. The peppery fragrance of her perfume fills my nostrils and suddenly I can feel myself getting hard under my gym shorts. I lean back again; I don’t need that kind of embarrassment.

“Whatever you’ve been up to agrees with you, too,” I say. “You look incredible.”

“Well, thank you,” she says.

“So what have you been up to for the past twelve years?”

She fidgets in her seat, tugging at the hem of her sundress.

“Well,” she says, “that’s a long story.”