THE CRAZY GOOD SERIES - Rachel Robinson Page 0,3

She looks like a zombie, albeit a pretty one, from a bad horror flick. I kiss his cheek and whisper the words I promised him I would never say.

“I’m out, Maverick. I’m leaving.”

Knowing I can’t look at him again I speak to a now tearful Monica.

“Good luck, Mrs. Hart. You need it more than I do,” I say. With that I turn and walk out of his room. As the door clicks behind me, I hear his monitors beeping wildly. A second later Monica screams for a doctor. I walk past the bustle of nurses flying to room 143. Burly Wart Nurse meets my eyes and offers a weak, apologetic smile. I mouth the words thank you.

As I exit the hospital darkness greets me. Darkness of all sorts. I will give up anything if he’ll survive.

Guess ole’ Mom had the right idea.

CHAPTER TWO

Windsor

The Past. One year, eight months, twenty-one days, and eighteen hours ago

I SLICK THE second coat of nail polish over my toes slowly, making precise strokes. I blow on them even though I know it doesn’t speed the drying process; it just gives me something to do while I wait. “Spontaneous,” I say out loud, reading the name of the shade I selected. The second I say it I immediately regret it.

“Even your damn nail polish is trying to tell you something,” Gretchen snaps from the other side of the room before she turns on the blow dryer. She has one foot propped on the kitchen counter while she dries her self-tanning spray. She glances up from her furious work and widens her eyes to make sure I’ve heard her, urging me to acknowledge her.

I roll my eyes. “Yes, yes,” I scream over the hair dryer’s dull roar. She smiles, switches legs, and returns to her Friday night ritual. I’m just glad she finally found something that makes her look island tropical instead of Oompa Loompa orange. That was a bad few weekends. I shake my head at the memory as I swipe a cotton ball with nail polish remover around my cuticles. Perfect, I think, standing from the old, leather couch. I hear the dryer shut off and know I’m about to be privy to an official Gretchen-knows-best-rant. I tighten my thigh length robe and heave a sigh as I watch her walk toward me, clad in her black lacy underwear and matching demi-cup bra.

“Seriously. You need to have fun tonight,” she says, fanning her six-pack abdominals, even through the spray is already past the tacky stage of drying. “You are in desperate need of just letting loose, Win. The type of fun that you let happen during a night out—the kind that you don’t worry about what will come next month, next week, or even tomorrow morning.” She’s right. She’s unfortunately, perfectly right. I sigh, clutching the belt of my robe, twisting it half to death.

“It’s just hard. You know I was with Nash for four years. We were planning our wedding, Gretchen. I can’t just pretend that didn’t happen. I can’t act like I wasn’t ready to settle down. I’m over the bar scene,” I tell her, hoping playing the sympathy card will make her shut up. Even the Gretchen machine has boundaries when it comes to my botched engagement and the downward spiral that almost landed me in the looney bin. “I’m over the hapless fun and, frankly, men are just skeevy these days.” I look down at my toes, making sure they aren’t touching. “They only want sex.”

Gretchen leans in and hugs me, her lean arms wrapping around my shoulders, and light brown hair sticking to my glossed lips. “They aren’t all skeevy, honey. Some are good and you will find a good one because you are good,” she whispers.

“You smell like a baked potato, Gretch,” I counter, trying to figure out the exact scent of her spray tan. I already know for a fact all men are skeevy, and all the good ones get snapped up quickly. She giggles, then pulls back and plays at mock outrage, one hand splayed across her chest.

She sniffs a forearm. “It’s vanilla passion,” she says, lacing her words with a slight French accent. It sounds more like a Crocodile Hunter accent, but I don’t say so. I know she is trying to lighten the mood, to force my focus to the present. “How do you expect to get Johnny Nash out of your head if you don’t fuck him out of it?” Gretchen smarts.

Her question is