Truly (New York 1)

Allie skipped over a small patch of lawn and burst into the store, ready to fling her arms around her sister and crazy-hug her. Or possibly shake her. She wasn’t even sure which, she just needed to touch her.

Born eighteen months apart, they’d spent their whole lives together, and it was bad enough that May had moved to New Jersey. Now she was involved in some kind of scandal, and Allie couldn’t stand being left outside of it. She needed May to tell her what was going on. She needed May to be here.

It was damned uncomfortable, being crippled by doubt a week before your wedding when you didn’t have your sister-confessor around to spill your guts to.

But when she scanned the entryway of the store, she didn’t find her sister. Just a long-haired man with a camera slung around his neck, chatting with the suspicious store owner.

Telephoto lens. Journalist? Photographer?

He couldn’t be here because of May. That would be too bizarre.

But then, so was the idea of May attacking Dan with a utensil, and Allie had seen that video footage with her own eyes.

She checked the bulletin board near the door. No new messages.

None yesterday, either. No calls. One piddly email that said nothing Allie could sink her teeth into.

The fist of anticipation in her stomach tightened, and she released a long exhale and headed toward the coffee. Coffee was the ostensible reason for this errand: Matt only drank decaf, and they’d run out. But honestly, Matt drank maybe three cups of coffee a week. Mom had sent them out because she was just as anxious for news as Allie was.

Allie had watched the YouTube video fifteen times at least, always wincing at the part where Dan—with his typical Labrador earnestness—basically called May ordinary and boring, when anybody with eyes in their head could see that she was made of awesome.

Or maybe they couldn’t see it. Allie had been forced to impose a news blackout Thursday in the aftermath of the luncheon when some dickweed sportscaster called May “plain” and Matt read a sports blog that called her a “Packers groupie” whom Dan had elevated to the good life. Allie had lobbed a slipper toward the computer—not hard enough to actually hit it—and took Roscoe and Keller for a long walk.

Then she’d come home and watched the video some more.

Every time, she felt a sympathetic, curling disappointment deep in her stomach. When Dan sank to his knee, May’s back was turned to the camera, so Allie couldn’t see her sister’s reaction as Dan said that the most important thing in his life was football. She couldn’t see what May had felt when she heard him say that she kept him grounded, helped him focus, made him a better player.

She could imagine it, though. May’s hurt. Her disappointment. Maybe even a fleeting anger, though anger and May weren’t well acquainted.

She just couldn’t imagine any expression on May’s face that would lead to her attacking Dan with a fork. It wasn’t May.

Dan’s proposal had sucked, but Dan was Dan. This was a guy who’d put green beans in his nose at the dinner table. True, Allie had egged him on, but even so. Green beans. In his nose. What had May expected, violins and roses?

Whatever she’d expected, she hadn’t gotten it, and Allie hated that. She hated that May almost never got what she hoped for, and she loved May for never letting it get her down. It was the most glorious thing about her sister—the way she always found some new source of hope.

Roscoe barked outside, a brief moment of disobedience as Matt left him at the curb, having clipped his leash to a signpost. Possibly-a-Reporter Guy sauntered into the coffee aisle and looked her over, then turned his attention to the herbal teas.

Allie scanned the coffee until she found the kind Matt liked. She heard him greet someone warmly near the front of the store.

Typical. They were hundreds of miles from home, but somehow Matt had found a friend.

She wandered back toward the meat counter to pick up cold cuts and cheese. Reporter Guy trailed behind her, feigning interest in the Entenmann’s coffee cakes.

Shit.

Allie kept her face turned away and tugged her hat down over her forehead. If he recognized her, would he follow her and

Matt back to the cabin? Did he know May was supposed to be here soon?

She ordered pimiento loaf, salami, and Muenster cheese. Snatches of Matt’s conversation floated to her, interspersed with the grating sounds of the slicer.

“—surprised me, dude, that’s all—”

“—not sure. Sometime today, but—”

“—disappeared on me, and I kind of lost it, to tell you the truth. I hopped in a cab—”

“—have practice? There’s a game in a few days, right?”