Celia is dead.
I lost my chance to tell her how much she means to me.
I had to come here, to prove to myself she was really gone, and to admit out loud, even if to only her tombstone, that I loved her.
I crouch down and place a bouquet of violets at the base of her tombstone, my mind reeling with all I should’ve said.
I’ve attended burials for more people than I can count and always felt cheated. Life taken too soon has become an ongoing theme, but the one woman I loved, the one woman I could’ve spent the rest of my life with is gone and I never got to say goodbye.
“Aw, freckles . . .” I bite back the pain that claws at my throat at the thought of her beautiful skin six feet below me in a dark coffin. With a heavy heart I drop back to my ass and stare at the fresh grass. “I should’ve told you before, but I’m a coward. I love you. I know, it sounds crazy, but I do. I wish I’d known how sick you were, I would’ve been able to tell you . . .” I drop my head forward feeling the rush of emotion that I’m so used to being able to drown out with liquor. I haven’t touched a drop in weeks, forcing myself to feel for the first time in a long time. “I should’ve been there for you.”
I sit in the quiet cemetery hearing nothing but the wind through the trees and the cars passing by on the nearby street. It’s in that stillness that I sense movement at my back.
Paranoia pricks at my nerves and I jerk my head around to see—I go light-headed as the blood drains from my face.
“Celia?” I hop to my feet so fast she squeaks in surprise. My mouth opens and closes, but no words come out because—I’ll be damned—but Celia, the woman I’ve fallen in love with, the woman whose grave I’m currently standing on, is staring at me with eyes so wide I’d swear she’s just as shocked to see me as I am to see her, which is saying something since she’s supposed to be dead!
“You’re here.” Two words spoken so softly as if they were whispered into the breeze.
“I don’t . . .” My eyes skate between her and the gravestone. “What is this?”
Her eyes dart to the bouquet of flowers and I’d swear the corner of her mouth tilts up a little. “Violets.”
I swallow and take a step closer, half thinking she’ll disappear into thin air. “They were her favorite.”
She licks her lips, those perfect thick lips, and I rub the center of my chest as something works fiercely behind my ribs.
With our eyes locked she steps closer and holds out her hand. “You must be Aden.”
“Yes. And . . .” I blink and fight the faintness in my head. “You’re Celia.”
“No.” Her smile falls. “I’m her sister, Sawyer.”
“Sawyer.” Of course. Her sister, but they’re identical. I had no idea Celia’s sister was her twin. “You . . . wow.”
I shove my hands in my pockets to keep from reaching out to her and study the gorgeous woman before me. Dress slacks that hug every curve of her legs, white button-up shirt ironed to perfection, her clothes a complete contradiction to her hair that falls around her face and dances in the wind.
“You look just like her.”
“We were identical twins.”
I look down at the headstone hoping to sever the connection I feel to the stranger in front of me. “She never told me she had a twin.”
“I know.”
My gaze darts to hers only to find her eyes are firmly fixed on the tombstone. “How do you know that?”
She squares her shoulders and looks up at me with all the assurance of a woman who won’t be intimidated. “Because I never told you, Aden.”
“I’m sorry?” It’s as if her words knocked the wind from my lungs. “When would you—”
“I lied to you.” She takes a step closer and I’m too frozen to back away, because what she’s saying can’t possibly be true. “My name is Sawyer Forrester. I came to San Diego to pack up my twin sister Celia’s house and . . .” She pauses. “I pretended to be her.”
I take a step back, my stomach curling with revulsion. Could it be that she lied to me this entire time making me believe she’s someone she’s not? Who does that? “You’re . . . Celia?”
She nods. “I’m Celia to you. But no, I’m Sawyer.”
She’s Celia, my Celia. And she’s a fucking liar. “How . . . why would you do that?”
Her face grows serious. “Because she asked me to, and when you love someone and they have a dying wish you do whatever it takes to make it come true even if it breaks your own heart in the process.”
I stare up at the sky and try to make sense of what I’m hearing. “I don’t believe you. The woman I knew would never do something like that, the woman I loved was loyal and—”
“Loved?”
For a moment I wish I could draw back the words, but then realize that yeah, this is what I wanted, to tell Celia I love her so I nod. “Yes. I loved her. But you are not her.”
She advances. “Aden, it’s me—”
“Prove it.”
Her big green eyes fix on mine. “You drink too much.”
“It doesn’t take a genius to figure that—”
“You have nightmares.”
I freeze.
She takes a step closer. “You eat raw fish straight off the line. You named a sea lion Morpheus.” Another step closer. “You don’t like crowds,” she whispers.
I open my mouth to defend myself, but she cuts me off.
“You blame yourself for the deaths of your men who died so you could live. You try to hide the fact that you’re hurting.”
She closes the last foot between us and it hits me. Her scent. The sweet smell of her hair mixed with the natural scent of her skin that I’ve dreamt about since the last time I held her. “Cece . . .”
“Sawyer.” Her eyes brim with tears.
I cup her jaw and watch a single tear trace down her cheek. “It’s you.”
“Yes.”
“You’re alive?”
“I am.”
Before I can barely think it, my lips find hers and her hands are wrapped around my neck and slipping into my hair. I nip at her mouth and when she opens to me I slide my tongue against hers. Her sweet flavor combined with her body pressed against mine is all the confirmation I need.
This is her.
The woman I fell in love with.
God, but having her back in my arms, it’s like she never left. Everything about her feels like coming home.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Our foreheads pressed together, we breathe each other in.
“At first I didn’t think it was a big deal, but then you told me about your past and after that . . .” She closes her eyes. “I knew telling you would hurt you, and I couldn’t bring myself to do that.”
“So you left thinking I’d forget you and move on.”
“Yes. Then I’d always be the girl you had fun with one summer.”
I tuck a lock of her shining hair behind her ear. “Only one problem with that, freckles.”
She blinks up at me.
“I could never forget you.”
Her lips quiver with emotion so I kiss her until I feel her fall limp into my arms.
Looking back, I should’ve known, if I’d paid more attention to the differences between how she acted and those photos of her . . . and the photo of her and Cal. I think on some level I knew something didn’t add up but didn’t want to accept it.