Letting Go (Thatch 1)

“I was only in the shop for maybe six minutes, seven tops. I hadn’t been looking outside while I was in there, so I don’t know who went past my car. But when I came out, this was tucked under my windshield wiper.” I held up the folded piece of paper, and both Jagger and Graham sent me looks of pain. They knew where my thoughts had gone when I saw the paper, but they had no idea how bad it was yet.

“It could’ve been a coin—” Graham started, but I kept talking.

“I opened it, and I thought I mus

t have been dreaming, or someone was playing a joke on me. There was no—” I cut off on a sob. “No way this could’ve been here. I got inside my car to call you,” I said, looking at Jagger. “But when I found my phone, there was a push notification on my lock screen, and that’s when . . . that’s when . . .” I shrugged helplessly, not knowing how to continue.

I clicked the lock button on my phone and a strangled cry bubbled past my lips when I saw that the message was still there. I hadn’t imagined it. It had been real. Just as the guys began asking what had been on my phone and the paper, I handed over both, and a weighted silence seemed to fill the space of my car for a few moments before Graham erupted in curses.

Jagger’s face went completely pale, his head shaking back and forth. “Who did this?” he asked himself before turning around to yell the same thing. Holding up the vows as he glared at the people still standing on the sidewalk. “Huh? Who the fuck pulled this shit?”

Graham was asking everyone who had been near my car, but the way he was asking was scaring people to the point where all they were able to do was shake their heads and back away from him.

The phone vibrated in my lap where Graham had dropped it, and I looked down to see a text from Janie, the notification from Ben sitting untouched below hers. My fingers felt like ice as I slid my thumb across the screen, opening up the Facebook messages. I looked at the small picture of Ben and me before glancing down at the message that had been sent to me almost thirty minutes ago, the ones before that from well over two years ago.

In my head, I knew he was gone. I knew this wasn’t him, and I couldn’t let myself believe he was sending me messages. He’s gone, Grey. He’s gone. With a steady breath out, I typed back a message and hit send.

Who is this, and why are you doing this to me?

Just before I closed out the app, a bubble popped up indicating Ben was responding—no, not Ben. Someone. I stared at the screen, holding my breath until it all came out in a hard rush when I saw the response. There was a picture of Jagger kissing my forehead from just a couple weeks ago. Below, the words:

Ben Craft: How could you do this to us? We were supposed to be forever, Grey.

“No, no, no, no,” I whimpered. “Ben, no.”

“I don’t know how—Grey, what is it?” Jagger asked in a rush, reaching for my phone. I tightened my grip, but he somehow swiftly and gently pulled it from my fingers. “It’ll be okay, we’ll find out who did . . . what the hell? You sick fuck!” he roared out toward the street, and people turned to look at him. “Stop hiding, you have something to say, come and say it!”

Graham walked quickly over to where Jagger was turning in circles, his eyes looking suspiciously at everyone. Wrapping his arms around Jagger’s chest, he started pulling him back toward the car. “Calm down, man.”

“I swear to God I will find out who you are!” Jagger yelled at everyone, and yet no one.

“Calm down, Jagger,” Graham grunted as he released him. “Calm down and get Grey out of here.”

“This piece of paper came from my place. It was in my fucking house!” Jagger hissed at Graham, shoving the vows in his face. “You know I wouldn’t do this shit to her, now tell me how this got here. Tell me who took this!” he yelled back toward the street. Jagger bent into my open car door and took my chin between his fingers, his eyes were wild and his voice was harsh. “That is not Ben, Grey. Whoever it is, is sick and twisted, but it’s not him. Okay?”

I exhaled roughly and nodded my head once.

Everything about him softened as he continued looking at me. “I need to hear you say it. I need to know you believe it,” he whispered, pressing his lips softly to mine. “It’s not him, baby.”

“It’s not Ben,” I finally choked out, and Jagger released a ragged breath as he moved his hands to cradle my face, holding me close to him. “You had the vows?” I asked shakily. “W-why . . . why would you?”

He moved back far enough to look at me better and shook his head slowly. “He’d been working on them at my mom’s place the week before the wedding. He kept them there because he knew you’d look for them at his parents’ house.”

A startled laugh escaped my lips, because I had looked so many times in the days leading up to the wedding.

“I didn’t know if you’d want to see them . . . after . . . but I knew you would hate me if I got rid of them. So I’ve just been holding on to them until you were ready. I knew one day you would ask about them. But they—I mean, they were hidden in my loft so you wouldn’t stumble upon them, Grey. I don’t understand. No one else goes in there . . .”

My eyes widened. “I’m not doing this!” I said quickly. “I’m not doing this to myself, I swear to God, Jag, I’m not!”

“No, baby, no. That’s not what I was saying, I know you wouldn’t. Someone cruel is doing this, and I promise you I’m going to find out who. Okay?”

I nodded and he pressed a firm kiss to my lips.

“I need to get you out of here. Where do you want to go? Do you still want to come to my place, or do you want to go to your parents’ house?”

My mouth opened to say my parents’, but I quickly shut it. Part of me screamed that I’d just seen the vows Ben had been preparing for our wedding, and now I was betraying him by being with his best friend. But I realized that is what the person who stole the copy of the vows was trying to do; they were trying to separate me from Jagger. They were trying to make me take ten steps back in my healing from Ben’s death.

“Yours,” I whispered.