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  TRUE NORTH

  Copyright © 2020 by Robin Huber

  Cover Design by ebooklaunch.com.

  All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the author.

  All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Also by Robin Huber

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Also by Robin Huber

  A Love Like Yours (Book 1 in Love Story Duet)

  A Story Like Ours (Book 2 in Love Story Duet)

  For Kevin

  Chapter 1

  Liv

  I lie in my bed, clinging to a heavy blanket of sleep, but the morning sun casts its soft glow against my cheek, calling me to get up and face the man in my kitchen who asked me to be his wife last night. To whom, I politely said yes.

  A loud bang forces my eyes open. The crescendo of pots and pans clattering across my kitchen floor is an ironic accompaniment to the mess I’ve gotten myself into.

  I groan quietly and pull my duvet over my head, but even then, I can’t escape the morning light pouring mercilessly through my bedroom window, or the glaring fact that I have no intention of marrying Travis Beauclair.

  Considering that I failed miserably in my attempt to end our casual dating relationship last night, it should be fascinating to see how breaking off our budding engagement goes.

  I throw the duvet off and press my fingers to my tight chest, mindlessly rubbing the spot that’s been quietly aching since I was twenty-two, but it doesn’t help.

  It never helps.

  I smell coffee, the only thing that will help me feel better about breaking Travis’s heart, and...bacon. Bacon will give me strength.

  I stare at a crack in my ceiling, listening to Travis for a few more minutes, until I hear the quiet thuds of his bare feet crossing my old—but charmingly historic—apartment. One could argue that old and charming aren’t synonymous, but I try to look on the bright side of things. It’s a necessary coping mechanism in my life.

  Travis carefully nudges my bedroom door open with a tray of food, wearing a pair of joggers, a six-pack, and a smile. As charming and handsome as he is, I’ve been looking for the bright side of our relationship for a while now—but the inevitable truth is, I don’t love him.

  He tries to blow one of his messy, dark locks out of his blue eyes. “Hello, fiancée.” He smiles wide, and my heart takes a diving leap into my stomach. I can’t look at his scruffy just-woke-up-and-made-you-breakfast-in-bed face.

  I’m a terrible person.

  I should have ended things with him months ago. Now I’ve gone and agreed to marry the man.

  What was I thinking?

  I wasn’t thinking. I was so caught up in my plan to break up with him last night, I was completely caught off guard when he dropped to one knee in the middle of my favorite restaurant. The word yes just fell right out of my mouth, even though every single part of me was screaming no.

  I blame shock and peer-pressure for my automatic answer. All the in-the-know waiters and other diners were staring at us, waiting for me to accept his very public proposal. I didn’t want to disappoint them. But the second I said yes, I heard a familiar voice fill my head, echoing my own ambivalent thoughts. Liv, what are you doing?

  I pulled in a hushed breath when I heard my twin brother’s voice, and blinked back the unexpected tears that rushed to my eyes. I hadn’t heard Brandon’s voice in so long, and although it was disapproving, I was wrapped in warmth. I closed my eyes for just a moment, just long enough to see his face preserved forever at twenty-one, before someone else filled my mind. Someone I’ve tried to forget for seven long years. Someone I’m now certain will never leave my heart no matter how much time passes. Gabriel North.

  Assuming my tears were for his proposal, Travis pulled me into his arms and slid the engagement ring onto my finger. I was too busy clinging to the sound of my brother’s voice and trying to hold onto Gabe’s beautiful face in my mind to stop him. It wasn’t until the people around us started clapping and congratulating us on our engagement that I finally came to my senses and surveyed the damage.

  In just a few foggy minutes I managed to acquire a sparkly new diamond ring and a beaming fiancé.

  “Coffee?” Travis asks with a smile, and I nod my head tentatively.

  “Yes, please.”

  He carefully sets the tray of food down on my nightstand and hands me a cup he already made. I take it from him, sipping it eagerly, but it does little to comfort me. It’s too strong, too sweet, and in need of cream. Lots of cream. But I drink it anyway, hoping it will take the edge off my champagne-induced headache—a consequence of accidently agreeing to marry him last night.

  I swallow down the bitter coffee and place the mug on my nightstand next to the sparkly diamond ring that’s resting dreamily in a ray of sunlight, reflecting a million tiny white sparkles on my wall.

  Travis immediately picks it up and slides it back onto my finger, and a jolt of guilt shoots across my chest and wraps tightly around my heart.

  I rub the spot mindlessly. “Travis—”

  “Move to Dallas with me,” he interrupts, blissfully unaware of the storm brewing inside me.

  “What?” I ask, shocked. As if getting married wasn’t enough, he wants me to move to a new city? A new state?

  I’ve spent seven years trying to make a life here in Raleigh, but most days I still feel like a misshapen puzzle piece that will never fit in. I tried to root myself with work, with friends...even with him. But all of that has only ever provided temporary relief from the longing I feel to be somewhere else—the place that still echoes deep in my bones. The place where, I know in my heart, I’m supposed to be. The thought of starting over again somewhere else is disconcerting, to say the least.

  “I know we’re not married yet, but I don’t want to go without you.” Excitement flashes in his eyes.

  “Travis”—I shake my head and spin the ring on my finger—“I can’t move to Dallas with you.”

  “Why? You knew Raleigh was only temporary for me. Graduate from Duke, pass the bar, then go home to Dallas and join my parents’ law firm. I might be a few years late, but that was always the plan.” He laughs softly. “Guess I just needed to sow some wild oats first.” He puts his hand on my thigh and grins. “But now that I’ve gotten that out of my system...”

  “That was always your plan, Travis. Not mine.”

  He pushes his lips together and flashes his piercing blue eyes at
me. “Liv, you can get another job in Dallas if that’s what you’re worried about. I know it’s a big city, but my family has connections. I’m sure they’ll pull some strings for you.”

  I feel my face screw up. “Thanks, but I don’t want another job.” Not in Dallas, anyway.

  His face is a mix of disappointment and confusion. “Okay...for now, I guess. But once we’re married...” He shrugs his shoulders and says firmly, “The firm is in Dallas, Liv. My family is in Dallas.”

  “I know...but I won’t be.”

  “What do you mean, you won’t be?” He sounds nervously perplexed.

  I decide to rip the band aid off. “I mean I can’t marry you, Travis.”

  He studies me for several seconds, blinking occasionally, and then he stands up and runs his hand through his dark hair. “But last night...you said yes.”

  “I know I did. I’m sorry.”

  “You’re sorry? For what? For changing your mind?”

  “I haven’t changed my mind, Travis.”

  He folds his arms over his bare chest. “Then why the hell did you say yes?” Why would you do that?”

  “I was just...overwhelmed. It all happened so quickly and everyone was watching us.” I drop my chin and say honestly, “I didn’t want to hurt you.”

  “How’s that working out?” he snaps.

  I close my eyes and whisper, “I’m sorry.”

  After a few silent seconds, he sits back down on the bed and reaches for my hand. “You’re just scared,” he says softly. “It’s a big deal to get married. I know that. We’re young and we still have our whole lives ahead of us.”

  “I’ll be thirty next year,” I say quietly, wondering where the hell the last seven years of my life went, and feeling agitated with myself for letting them slip by so carelessly.

  I’ll be thirty.

  I should want to get married. I should want a big city job, certainly one that’s less stifling than the one I have here—editing marketing materials for restaurant chains isn’t exactly my dream. But I don’t, I don’t want any of it. I don’t want it in Dallas and I don’t want it here.

  “There’s nothing to be afraid of, Olivia. I can give you a good life in Dallas. I want to give you a good life. Will you just let me do that? Please?”

  I give him a tight smile and nod over the emotion that’s suddenly strangling me. “I know you can...but it’s not the life I want.”

  “Why?” he groans, and it pierces my heart.

  I look up at him with watery eyes and admit, “I don’t love you, Travis.” I feel both relieved and stricken at once, finally saying those words out loud—words I planned on saying last night, before he got down on one knee. The anxiety that clung to them in my head before we got to the restaurant is only exacerbated by the look on his face now.

  After a few shocked seconds, the corners of his mouth turn down and he nods his head slowly. “I guess that’s a pretty good reason.”

  “I’m so sorry.”

  He lets go of my hand, stands up, and gazes at the massive green-leafed sugar maple outside my second-story window.

  I’m going to miss that tree.

  “Travis, I have to go home.” The ache in my bones turns into a quiet buzzing that makes my heart thump anxiously.

  “Home?” He turns around and gives me a curious look. “To Georgia?”

  “Yeah.” I nod softly.

  St. Simons Island is the second greatest love of my life—the place I called home for twenty-two years. The place that still beckons my soul like a lighthouse signaling a ship adrift at sea. I haven’t been back since I left for my final year of college at North Carolina State seven years ago—a year later than originally planned. But after what happened the summer before, the last thing on my mind was hurrying back here to finish school.

  I had planned to return to St. Simons after I graduated, but when the time came, I couldn’t do it. As difficult as it has been to stay away, the fear of facing who I left behind was easier to deal with—or not deal with—from four hundred miles away.

  “Why?” Travis asks, pulling me from my thoughts.

  I inhale a deep breath and hug my knees to my chest. “I miss the ocean.”

  “The ocean?”

  More specifically, the tiny section of the Atlantic that surrounds the Island. I miss the way it rushes up on the sandy shores and fills the sounds and rivers that snake through salty marshes. I miss the smell of it, I miss the sound of it, I miss the feel of it on my sun-soaked skin in the summer.

  “Yeah,” I say softly, “I miss the ocean.”

  He sits down on the edge of the bed and folds his hands in his lap. “So, I guess that’s it then,” he says, uncharacteristically throwing in the towel. “I’ll go my way and you’ll go yours, and we won’t get married.”

  I nod softly. “I guess so.”

  He gauges me for a few seconds, and then shakes his head and lets out a bemused breath. “Really?” He stands up and starts pacing around the room with a determined look on his face.

  After a few unnerving seconds, he stops suddenly and gives me an accusatory look. “This is about that guy you used to date, isn’t it? The one who was in the accident with you and your brother.”

  “What?” I whisper, because a sudden flash of heat is coursing through me, burning up all my oxygen. “You don’t know anything about him, or my brother.”

  “Well, maybe if you opened up to me once in a while, I might. What I do know is that he got some sort of brain damage in the accident and now you’re getting all nostalgic about him because I want to give you a life that he’ll never be able to give you. Damn, Liv! When are you going to let him go?”

  “Stop it,” I say through clenched teeth. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “For Christ’s sake, he killed your brother.”

  I bolt up from the bed and slap him hard across the face, making my palm scream. “I said stop!” I yank the ring off my finger and shove it in his hand. “I think you should go.”

  He holds his red cheek, looking dumbfounded. “Liv, you’re being irrational.”

  I glare at him, hoping to convey the thoughts I’m holding back, which I’d likely regret saying later.

  He looks down at the ring in his hand and then at me with disappointment in his eyes. “You’re really doing this?”

  I nod at him, unable to find words to express the flood of emotions surging through me.

  “Liv, please—”

  I close my eyes and warm tears spill down my cheeks. “It’s over, Travis.” I exhale a shaky breath that’s laced with relief, sorrow, guilt, and fear, because I know now, the only way I can move on with my life is by going home and facing my past.

  Chapter 2

  Liv, Eight Years Ago, August 15th

  “Momma? Where are my jeans?” I call down the stairs, hanging the top half of my body over the banister.

  “Which ones?”

  “You know, the ones that are faded and ripped a little at the knees?”

  She holds up the pair I was looking for. “These?”

  “Yes!”

  “Still warm from the dryer,” she says, tossing them up to me.

  I catch them midair and wink at her. “Best mom ever.”

  “Love you too,” she laughs.

  One of the best things about being home for summer break is that my mom offers to do my laundry. And I’m more than happy to let her. Beats waiting around the laundromat in the windowless basement of my dorm.

  “You’re still not ready?” my twin brother, Brandon, says, combing his sandy blond hair in the hall mirror. “Gabe’s on his way. He’ll be here any minute.”

  “I know his whereabouts, Brandon. He’s my boyfriend.”

  “Yeah, well, he was my best friend first,” he calls down the hall as I make my way to my room.

  I turn around and make pouty lips at him. “Aw, I remember those days. Sorry they had to end, but he’d rather make out with me now.”

  He m
akes a gagging sound as I disappear behind my bedroom door and it makes me laugh. Poor Brandon. He’s been putting up with me and Gabe since the tenth grade. But he has no one to blame but himself. He’s the one who said it was okay for his best friend to start dating his sister. I think he might have underestimated Gabe’s affection for me.

  I tuck my white tank top into my snug fitting jeans, step into a pair of sandals, and inspect my sun-kissed face in the mirror. By sun-kissed, I mean I forgot to reapply sunscreen while watching Gabe surf for several hours this morning. And by watching Gabe surf, I mean I was gazing at him unabashedly and daydreaming about our future. One more year until we graduate from North Carolina State and then the world is ours. According to Gabe. I giggle with wonder and excitement at the thought.

  I still remember the thrill I felt when we both got accepted, and the subsequent relief that followed, knowing that we could stay together in college. Gabe never doubted that we could maintain a long-distance relationship if we had to, but I’m slightly more practical than he is. I brush on some powder to help camouflage my pink cheeks and add some mascara to highlight my green eyes. Just a dab of my favorite tinted lip gloss—I smack my lips together and make a soft popping sound—and I’m almost ready to go.

  “You ready?” Brandon calls from the other side of the door? “I’m heading downstairs.”

  “Yep, I’ll be down in two minutes,” I call back. Or five.

  I run my fingers through my long brown hair to separate the loose waves I curled into it. It’s usually the color of milk chocolate, but the sun has really lightened it up this summer.

  Okay. Ready to go. I grab my phone and look at the delicate gold ring on my right hand—a small compass is engraved on the surface around a little diamond. It was a gift for my eighteenth birthday from Gabe. My true north. I spin it around on my finger and smile, thinking of the sweet words he wrote in the letter that went with it.

  My phone buzzes on my dresser and I see a text message from Brandon.

  Brandon: Gabe’s here

  I knew he was here. I could hear his Camaro coming up the street.