medical insurance company. As with all emergencies, I’d been treated in the free public system, so I must’ve asked them for information just in case I needed to consult a specialist outside the system. There was the usual intro and legal stuff about preapproval, blah blah, and then: . . . comprehensive policy offers full cover for both you and your passenger.
Ice in my brain, freezing neurons into place.
I scrolled down the letter to see if I could find a name.
Shit, had I hurt Paige? Was that why she hadn’t called me even after such a bad accident?
My eyes hitched on a name: Daisy Pearse.
Who was Daisy Pearse?
I searched my emails for her name, found nothing. A hit of the Coke jolted those frozen neurons into life. Taking out my phone, I searched the contacts. There was one entry for “Daisy—Marco’s.” But it didn’t look like we’d exchanged any messages. Or I’d deleted them.
Marco’s was a high-end restaurant. And I had a habit of tagging the contact numbers of women with information about where I’d picked them up.
Marco’s had also been the site of the publishing party.
It was a good bet I’d picked her up in the hours before the accident, then forgotten all about her in the aftermath.
Dr. Binchy had made it clear that some memory loss wasn’t unusual when it came to the time immediately preceding or following a traumatic incident. That didn’t explain how I’d completely forgotten that I’d driven the Porsche to the party.
Or that it was undergoing major repairs.
These emails were in my inbox. I’d either made the insurance claims or given someone else the information to do so.
Staring at my phone, I touched the icon that would connect me to Daisy Pearse.
“Aarav! Hi!” A bouncy female voice. “I thought you’d blown me off!”
“Broken bones,” I managed to get out. “Still on crutches.”
“Oh, poor you. But I’m so glad you’re okay otherwise. They wouldn’t let me see you in the hospital. Said I wasn’t family.”
“Thanks for trying.”
“I’m super, super happy you’re okay!”
“Daisy, can you confirm what happened that night?” I asked, keeping my tone easy and laid-back. “All those drugs they gave me at the hospital—I want to make sure I’m not fuzzy on anything. Don’t want my car insurance company to screw me by coming up with some random reason to decline cover.”
“Oh, sure!” Daisy all but bubbled over. “Well, we met in Marco’s. I went with a friend of mine who works at your publishing house. I was wearing the cutest silver dress, and you came over and complimented me, and you’d asked the mixologist to make me a cocktail, and—”
I zoned out as she went on and on about the party, only zoning back in when she got to the part about getting in my car. “I was taking you for a ride?”
“Sure! Like, to see the ocean at night. Super romantic.” She giggled and it made me want to smile despite my shitty mood; no wonder I’d hit on her. I had a thing for happy, giggly girls. I was a bastard to them, but I was a generous bastard and always broke up with diamonds or rubies.
Except with Paige.
She was the one who’d made the choice to leave.
She was the one who couldn’t stand me anymore.
She was the one who’d lied.
18
What about the accident?”
“It was a total freak thing. It was freezing that time of night—three in the morning—and rain had started coming down without warning, and there was this car ahead of us that suddenly stepped hard on its brakes.
“You reacted fast, but there was something slick on the road. Later the cops said a truck had flipped and spilled oil and it hadn’t been properly cleaned up. You skidded into a spin and hit the tree.”
I fisted, then flexed my hand. “You’re okay?”
“Just got punched in the face and in the side by the air bags. Two black eyes, some other bruising, but nothing broken.” No lack of cheer in her voice even now. “It totally wasn’t your fault. You weren’t even speeding since we were doing the romantic drive thing.”
“Thanks.” I meant it.
“You’ve been in an accident before though, right? I hope this didn’t bring up too many bad memories.”
The Coke residue was suddenly sickeningly sweet on my tongue. “Why do you say that?”
“Oh, after the accident, while I was trying to keep you conscious, you kept saying the taillights were round last time. Over and over. Then one time you mumbled that your leg had hurt