Maeve. Maeve. Maeve.

That voice in my chest cried out as I drove away from the house, without throwing another glance back.

I had kept my word. I had led Andrew to Maeve. And as much as it should have felt like the last responsibility being delivered from my side, it did nothing to make me feel relieved.

The ache that began at my chest was slowly spreading throughout my body. Burning me. Consuming me.

On my way back home, I settled my elbow against the window sill, and curled my fingers before my mouth, letting my mind to wander off.

Andrew might have already begun talking to her about her father, and I could imagine a little line ceasing between her brows. Maybe she’d cross her arms against her chests to look unintimidated, or stand at the doorway, not even letting him in.

A small smile on my face made me aware of the direction of my thoughts. I was still thinking about her. And there was no fucking way to stop it.

Turned out that my first ever called-in-sick day was worse than having to go to the clinic. Because there was nothing at home I could do, other than sit and overthink about everything that was wrong in my life at present.

Two hours straight, I had sat at the couch and pondered over her. Of course.

But amidst daydreaming about her smiles and beautiful brown eyes, my perspective had—unknowingly— shifted from Ian, to Dr Cole. And I only realized it until I was deep into this strange theory I weaved. Truly strange.

The way Maeve had made no attempts to explain herself or give any excuses when I confronted her. How she had instantly broken off the conversation when I had tried to reconcile. How her reaction looked immediate and…and almost practiced?

If the word I used was right, then there could be two possibilities.

Either she had already predicted my reaction over this topic leading to our breakup (and the asshole in me had waved a green flag to it). Or she had experienced this before. Maybe she had come across this same situation in her past sometime, that led her to believe it was the only way anyone would react.

But how?

Before Mrs. Kennedy had called to inform me that Andrew had dropped by at the clinic, I was in my study, going through Maeve’s report file.

I had scanned every page, word by word, in hopes of finding something that could put my anxiousness to rest.

There were the same old details like any other case report. Nothing new.

But something had clicked in my brain when my fingers brushed over a name. A name I had somehow overlooked before.

Mary Frank Adams.

I stepped inside my apartment and was welcomed my two pairs of eyes staring directly toward the doorway from the couch. At me.

Niall looked deep in thought, almost zoned out. Whereas Chloe…looked like she could bite off someone’s head.

When did she drop by?

“Hey,” I greeted them without an ounce of excitement in my voice. Ignoring their scrutinizing eyes, I made my way past the couch, rolling my shirt sleeve on the way. But before I could make it out of the room, Chloe’s voice stopped me in tracks.

“What happened?”

Amidst the silence blanketing the room, her voice boomed louder.

I turned around. She was standing at the edge of the couch, Niall still seated but side-eyeing me.

“What?” I frowned.

Chloe’s eyes narrowed, studying my face quietly, before she threw her hands in the air with an exasperated sigh.

“You tell me what. Did you break up with Maeve?” I switched glances between her and Niall, my throat suddenly too dry to voice out words.

How did she know? Was my heartbreak so obvious on my face?

When I failed to respond, her shoulders slumped. “You did, didn’t you? That’s why she sent it back, and did not even reply to my texts.”

My heart sank. “Sent what back?”

Chloe rubbed a hand against her forehead, then plopped back down on the couch. She did not answer me.

My heart picked up a pace faster than my legs as I walked back to the both of them and stood before the couch. My sister looked like she was on the edge of exploding, so I shifted my attention to my brother.

“Niall?”

He looked up at once, then leaned back on the couch with tired huff. “The party gown. Michael was at the Villa to deliver it back to Chloe.”

My lips parted into an inaudible, “Oh.”

Of course, she did.

My eyes looked around the room and successfully spotted a white paper bag which was torn at one end. The red fabric of the dress spilling out through the crack. Against my will, memories of the night I'd peeled that dress off Maeve and when she'd laid herself bare before me, flooded into my mind. The trust she'd put in me, the vulnerability she'd displayed. All gone.

“What happened, Ian?” Niall asked, looking at me with somewhat of a sorry expression.

Before I could open my mouth, Chloe said, “He fucked up, what else?” She looked up at me and I saw the same sorry in her eyes. Only, that sorry was not for me.

She wasn’t wrong though. I had fucked up. Big time. And now, I was going to rectify my mistake.

Or at least try to.

Without uttering another word to them, I left for my bedroom. Once inside, I took out a brown leather duffle bag and threw in two pairs of casuals and one formal attire, just in case. I picked up Maeve’s file and stuffed it in, aimlessly wondering whether I was going to do the right thing.

You are. A voice resounded from withing me.

Right. I was not going to dig up history of my girlfrie– uh, of my ex girlf–

Damn it.

I was not going to dig up history of Maeve Adams. I was just going to delve deeper into my client’s case and do my best I can for her. As I always did. And I knew where I would find a clue or two to help me into the right direction.

Just as I was packing my toiletries, Chloe appeared at the bedroom door, still looking pretty pissed, but lazily made her way in and plopped down on my bed.

“Going somewhere?” She eyed the duffle bag.

“Yes.”

“Where?”

“Seattle.”

Chloe’s eyebrows furrowed in irritation, and looked like she would say something really hurtful. And she did.

“Seriously? You get your heart broken and the first thing you do is run away?”

Okay. That hurt.

I stopped packing and straightened to fix her with a look. “Run away?”

“Yes,”

“From what?”

Her lips thinned, as if holding back her words, eyes boring into mine with a silent request.

I couldn’t tell her I was not running away, but running toward something. Giving her false hopes and getting mine up along the way was the last thing I wanted to do right now. No one was knowing anything about anything until I was sure of this weird theory I had made up in my mind.

Breaking my eyes away from her, I resumed my packing. “I am not running away, Chloe. I’m trying to... figure out something.” That was the most I could give away.

“Does that something concern Maeve?”

I paused, looked up. “Yes.”

A line furrowed between her eyebrows, but she didn’t question me about that something, then said, “Maeve told me once, that she wasn’t sure whether you are serious about her.” She looked down at her fingers, and I swore I heard her sniffle. “I had seen the look on her face, Ian. She was as much into you as you are into her. She just needs your reassurance.”

“I know,” sitting down beside her, I took Chloe’s hands in mine. I couldn’t point out who she was concerned about more, me or Maeve. But I was glad she had a better opinion about Maeve. So much better than what she had about Olivia.

“Don’t let her go, Ian.” Chloe squeezed my hand, looking up at me with gloomy blue eyes.

Although something in my head told me that I had already let go, that little voice in my chest suggested otherwise. I wrapped an arm around her shoulder and offered a genuine smile.

“I won’t. I promise.”

The next day, at sharp ten o’clock in the morning I set my foot in Seattle. The chill of November air cocooned me, making me stuff my hands inside my coat pockets, as I called for a cab.

“Where to, sir?” The driver, an old fellow, who looked exhausted although it was hardly noon, asked.

“We Care Shelter Home, please.” I told him and he raised his brows, glancing at me through the rear-view mirror. I thought he’d make some sort of comment, but he just shook his head and pulled away from the airport.

He was probably thinking I had abandoned my family there and was paying an annual visit. I would make the same face if I met someone who had actually done it.

I could understand people wanting to live alone, but for that, kicking out their parents or children from their house was too cruel.

From what I could remember of the conversation I had with Andrew, and some of which Devin had exaggerated over the call, Maeve and her mother were kicked out of the house when she was a kid. But the two men had way different saying about the same topic.

According to Andrew (and what I was able to pry out of him in exchange for Maeve’s address), her father had an affair outside marriage and had abandoned Maeve and her mother for the sake of his new, unethical relationship.

But Devin differed that when Mary Adams had found out about her husband’s affairs, she had readily walked out of his life with their little daughter. And that she wasn't in her right mind when she did it.

Either way, I could understand why Maeve did not fancy her father.

“Not used to being around a family” Maeve’s words crawled unbidden, into my ears, making my heart clench.

I could know, but could never relate to the struggles she might have gone through her entire life. Ever since being away from home, to having limited access to education, working in a strip club, not finding love in a husband she hoped she did, then facing all of her insecurities in one single night, alone in a park.

Even thinking about that night filled me with never ending guilt.

It should have been her talking and me listening, not the other way around. And now I could probably not have a peaceful, direct conversation with her. The answers I’d hoped to learn from her, I would never have now.

Well, at least not from Maeve.

I knew most of what I needed to know about Maeve’s life, from when we had first met at the club till now. But there was only one person, other than Maeve herself, who could let me in on the things that happened before we met.

And now I made my way to that one person, hoping I was not too late already.