He'd gone beyond his player ways for her.
She'd grown beyond her traumatic past for him.
Together, their love was beyond.
Until one fatal accident.
__________
When she loses the love of her life in a car crash, Althea has nothing left in California...
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*ALTHEA'S POV*
October 11, 2023.
"You didn't tell me you were back in town?"
I blinked at the towel and cardigan Kylie was handing me, everything appearing too normal, from the cute dog licking my wet sneakers to Paxton walking in with a cup of tea, and from the faraway rumble of the storm outside to the photos on the chest of drawers beside me, where I could recognize some double dates and family dinners I'd partaken in.
Almost as if I'd just stopped by to say hello to old friends.
Well, it looked like it through the blur of my incessant tears, as the tsunami had reached my eyes on my way here, and I didn't have the strength to hold it back anymore as I accepted her towel.
"Why? So you could have warned him?" My gaze stopped on a picture, where I could glimpse Asher's profile as he played with Cucciolo, the same dog that cowered away at the sound of my words.
I hadn't expected that much bitterness seeping through the cracks of my voice. I hadn't expected it could hurt more.
Yet it did, the small dagger stabbed through my back pricking the gashed wound of my open chest as I looked at the girl who had been the closest thing I'd ever had to a sister, avoiding my gaze.
"Thea, I..."
"It's not her fault. I'm the one who lied to you that day." Paxton stepped by her side, his green eyes meeting mine for the first time since he'd opened the door, and there, I could take in the slight differences with his little brother: the specks of gold his irises didn't have, or the fact that he never abandoned his girlfriend. "She didn't know at first. This is only between you, me and—"
"Asher," I breathed out the two syllables that had been hovering in the silence because I knew it was him that was behind their fleeting glances. Just like they'd understood he was the one behind my tear-filled eyes the second they'd seen me.
"Why? Why did he do that?" The question must have sounded really pitiful because Cucciolo walked back to me, resting his muzzle on my foot as he gazed up at me with puppy eyes. A lot like Paxton as he rubbed the back of his neck and peered at me from under his brows.
"It's not my story to tell. You should talk to him."
"Really? I've come all the way here." Their house was farther from the cemetery than the clinic. "And it's all you're gonna say?"
