The Temptation of Lila and Ethan (The Secret 3)

I nod eagerly and clap my hands together. “Of course. I love wedding stuff. And the dress is the best part.”

“I know.” She frowns as she winds around the tiny island in the middle of the kitchen. “Which makes me reluctant to show you.”

“Why?” My face scrunches up. “Ella, what did you do?”

“I didn’t do anything.” She sighs. “Which is why you’re not going to like it.”

I stare blankly at her, confused, and she sighs and motions for me to follow her as she walks toward the hallway. She takes me back to a small bedroom. The blue walls are covered with artwork and there’s a wrought-iron bed piled with sheets of paper that are smudged with penned lyrics.

I pick up one of the sheets of paper from the foot of the bed. “What? Do you guys just sit around and write and draw together all day?”

“Kind of,” she says, opening the closet door. “I mean, I’m not in school right now and I only work part time down at this art gallery, so I have to fill up my day somehow.”

I nod and set the drawing down on the dresser. “I’m trying to find a job,” I admit. “But I’m having no luck.”

She’s searching through the clothes hanging up, but pauses, glancing at me from over her shoulder with her eyebrows elevated. “Really?”

“Yes, really.” I sit on the edge of the bed and cross my legs, but then pull a face and put my hands on my lap. “Wait, is this safe to sit on?”

She sifts through the small amount of clothes in the closet. “My bed? Why wouldn’t it be?”

“Because God knows what you two do on it.”

She rolls her eyes. “It’s fine, just keep your hands on your lap.”

Laughing, I lean over and examine the sheet of lyrics on the bed. “So, does Micha work every day?”

“Sometimes,” she replies. “Sometimes he gets a week off at a time. Sometimes he’s on the road all week. Right now, he’s recording at a studio in town.”

“And it’s not hard for you?” I ask. “To be away from him like that, because I remember how hard it was for you two the first time around.”

“I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t, but I go with him to every performance I can and we spend every waking hour together when we’re not working.”

I sit up straight, leaning back on my hands. “I’m not really surprised that you guys are doing well.”

She removes a hanger from the rod and turns around. “You aren’t? Really? Because I kind of am.”

“I already told you that you guys have the most beautiful relationship that’s ever existed and although you’re kind of crazy, you’re not stupid and I knew you’d eventually get it all right.” I make a swoony face, tipping my head to the side as I drape my hand over my forehead. “You guys are so dreamy together.”

She rolls her eyes. “Whatever, Miss Smarty Pants. Maybe I should be giving you a hard time.”

I lower my hand. “About what?”

“About whether or not you’re in love with Ethan.” She arches her eyebrows, waiting for my response.

I am! I want to scream, but I haven’t told Ethan yet, so telling her first seems wrong. “So how about that dress?” I say, trying for a subject change and reaching out for her to hand it over. “Let me see it.”

She lets my abrupt subject change go and slowly pulls out a plain black tank dress. “I hate white,” she says, holding the fabric up to her body, “so I thought this could work.”

It goes to her knees and has no detail at all. Plus, it has a really high neckline and the straps look really worn out.

“Are you going to a funeral?” I ask, pulling a face at the hideous dress. “Or a wedding?”

She sighs, defeated, lowering the dress to her side. “I don’t like fancy stuff, okay. And besides, fancy dresses are expensive.”

“It doesn’t have to be fancy.” I get to my feet. “But this…” I touch the fabric and then cringe at the roughness of it, like it’s been washed a thousand times. “Ella, you seriously can’t get married in this. It’s hideous.”

“Well, what do you suggest I wear?” she asks. “I don’t have a lot of money and I don’t have anyone to help me besides you.”

I mull it over for a minute, wondering if I really want to go to where my brain’s heading. How much do I care for Ella? A lot obviously, since I’m even considering what I’m considering right now. I mean, she’s my best friend, and she deserves a really pretty dress. “I have an idea, but you’ll have to trust me. And I mean really, really trust me.”

“Why?” She’s wary. “What are you up to?”

“I’m not up to anything,” I tell her, heading for the door. “I just don’t want you to be shocked.”

Her mouth turns downward as she trails after me. “Okay, I’ll trust you, but I have a few rules.” She counts down on her fingers. “Like no ruffles, no pure white, no poofiness.”

I laugh as we head out the door.

Ethan

It’s Thursday morning, only about twelve hours since I left Las Vegas and Lila behind. I find that I’m missing her a lot more than I’d expected. She’s texted me a couple of times and I want to call and talk to her, but I promised myself I wouldn’t until after I talked to London. That way I could have a clear head. Maybe. Hopefully.

I’m at London’s aunt’s house, where London lives most of the time because it’s closer to her doctor’s office. I’ve been sitting in a living room that smells like cat food for about an hour, counting the tics of the grandfather clock while drinking iced tea and listening to Rae talk about hope while we wait for London to come back from her doctor’s appointment. I’m getting a little restless waiting, wondering what she’ll look like and the stupid part of me believes there’s a small possibility that she’ll walk into the room and recognize me. It’s making me regret coming here and making me really want to hop onto a plane and go back to Lila, just so I can hold her.

I’m just about to tell Rae that I can’t do this when the front door swings open and London walks inside. It’s mind-blowingly strange, seeing her again. She looks older, yet the same. Her black hair is still resting at her chin and streaked with purple, and she still has a scar on her lip and her nose is pierced. She also has a faint scar on her head where she hit it on the rock when she fell out the window, the thing that caused the brain damage. I swear, if I didn’t know any better, I’d guess that I’d somehow stepped back in time four years.

There’s this fleeting moment when I swear her eyes light up like they used to whenever she looked at me, but it vanishes so quickly I wonder if I was imagining it. She glances at her mother, who she does recognize, but not from her childhood. She can’t remember anything from the past, except the basic functions of walking, talking, and breathing.

“Who’s he?” she asks her mom in a robotic kind of voice.

Rae looks just how I remember her the last time I saw her right after London’s accident. She’s still the spitting image of London, only twenty-years older. She gets to her feet. “This is an old friend of yours.”

London’s eyes lock on me and I remember how she sometimes used to just stare at me with this thoughtful look on her face, like she was memorizing what I looked like. But now, well, she just looks lost, like someone who wandered off into the forest and can’t find her way back.

“I don’t remember him,” she says, stepping back toward the door. “Why is he here?”

Rae quickly winds around the sofa and grabs London’s arm, stopping her from bolting. “He came here to talk to you. A long way actually, so the least you could do is sit down and listen to what he has to say.”

London glances at me and I force a smile. It’s too weird. I just keep thinking about all the time we spent together and how I can remember it but she can’t. I’m a stranger to her, but I realize now she was kind of like a stranger to me the entire time we were dating.

“What’s your name?” she finally asks me.

“Ethan,” I get up from the sofa and walk toward her with my hands tucked into the pockets of my jeans. “Ethan Gregory.”

She considers this for a moment. “I have no idea who you are,” she says and then shrugs like she’s at a loss for words. “Sorry.”

“I’m sorry, too,” I reply, but I’m not quite sure what I’m sorry for. Whether it’s for leaving the house that day, not ripping the needle out of her hand when she was about to shoot up, or for the plain and simple fact that I can’t make her remember me. Or maybe it’s because even though I’m standing here with her, I can’t stop thinking about Lila, her smile, her sadness, and the fact that at the moment I really just want to be with her, not here.

“Why don’t you two sit down?” Rae gestures at the sofas. “And I’ll go get you some iced tea.” She smiles at me with hope in her eyes as she walks past me, heading to the kitchen and leaving me alone with London.

London shakes her head and then sighs and sits down on the sofa. “I don’t know why she tries so hard.” She tucks her hands underneath her legs. “I can barely remember her and she’s my mother.”

“She just cares about you.” I take a seat in the recliner across from her. “It’s a good thing.”

“Or a stupid thing, depending on how you look at it.” She eyes me over as she leans back in the sofa. “What’s your name again?”

“Ethan,” I say, picking up the glass of iced tea Rea has placed beside me. She’s disappeared back into the kitchen, and I can’t help but wish I was back there with her. “Ethan Gregory.”

“And we dated?”

“Yeah, pretty much?”

“And we had sex.”

I’m in the middle of a sip and nearly spit the iced tea all over the floor. “Yeah, I guess you could say that,” I say, setting the glass down.

“Was I any good?” she asks curiously as she leans forward. “I mean I had to be if you’re here to visit me.” Her feistiness resembles the London I remember so much it’s kind of hard to take in.

“You were,” I admit, wiping my lips with the back of my hand.

She arches her eyebrow. “The best you ever had.”

I open my mouth to answer, but then clamp my jaw shut because the answer is no. The best I’ve ever had is back in San Diego doing who knows what, hopefully smiling and being happy.

“Aw,” she states, her eyebrows arching as she relaxes back in the chair. “There’s someone else.”

I nod slowly, sadly. “Kind of.”

She seems amused by this, the corners of her lips quirking. “Are you in love with her?”

I lean forward, overlapping my hands on my knees. “You know, you ask a lot of questions.”