I Stand Before You (Judge Me Not #2)(99)

Mom asks me to hold on while she goes to get Will. In no time the kid is on the phone. He tries to play it cool, but I can tell he’s excited to visit. While we talk about shit we can do when he gets here, Mom checks flights. She finds one from Vegas to Pittsburgh (the closest major airport) for this Friday.

“Book it,” both Will and I say together as he puts me on speaker.

We hang up, and I am elated. Two more days and I will see my baby brother again. Kay will get to meet him too.

I put together a quick plan, one that will require me to leave work early on Friday to get to Pittsburgh in time to pick Will up. His flight comes in at seven, and I need time to drive to the airport and park. Unfortunately, if I leave early, Kay won’t be able to come with me. But maybe it’s better if I spend the ride back alone with my brother. It will give us time to discuss him scamming me for money, and then using what I gave him to buy drugs. Art supplies, yeah right, I knew that sounded suspect. But I am not going to worry about any of that bullshit until I have Will face-to-face.

I run my hands through my hair and scan the living room. There’s so much I have to do, like get one of the upstairs bedrooms ready for my brother. But first things first, I want to tell my girl about my brother’s impending visit. I can’t wait to hear her reaction, so, without further ado, I head next door.

As I’m walking up the steps to the apartment above the garage, I think about how I thought things were good earlier. Well, shit just got a whole lot better.

My brother, my girl—the two most important people in my life—will be here with me, all three of us together, in just two more days.

Could life get any f*cking better?





Chapter Eighteen


Kay


I go into work a little later than usual on Friday morning. Truth be told, I am still catching up on much-needed extra rest. See, Chase came over Wednesday evening to tell me about his brother coming into town. My boy was so happy he couldn’t quit hugging me, even while I was fixing dinner. All that hugging led to kissing, and kissing led to touching, and since it seems we can never get enough of one another, dinner went onto the back burner, literally. We didn’t get to my homemade chili till hours later. And then yesterday evening I was over at Chase’s. We never even got to dinner. We spent the entire evening in bed.

Love, it sure makes you silly…and kind of horny, I think as I settle in at my desk, yawning.

I suppress an out and out laugh, but my lips remain curved up in a ridiculous grin as Father Maridale walks in. When I see his serious expression though, my smile falters.

“What’s wrong?” I ask.

“Kay, I don’t know if anyone has told you yet, but Mrs. Wilson was in a fairly serious car accident yesterday evening.”

“Oh, no! Doug’s mother?” I am not sure I heard correctly, but Father nods in confirmation.

I may not like my ex-boyfriend all that much—in fact, I kind of despise him—but I wish no harm to his mother. She may have been a bit meddling in the past, but she was always kind to me.

“That’s terrible,” I say. “Will she be all right? Is there anything we can do?”

“I don’t know if she’ll be okay,” Father answers sadly, “but I know she could use our prayers.”

“Of course.”

The Wilsons aren’t part of the Holy Trinity congregation—they belong to another parish—but that doesn’t mean Doug’s mother won’t be in all of our prayers these next several days. My heart goes out to their family, and I feel bad for all of them, even Doug to a degree. But I still send up a selfish prayer that I don’t run into my ex-boyfriend. Surely, he’s in town, probably over at the hospital right now with his mother.

My stomach twists at the thought of coming face-to-face with Doug Wilson. He’s a walking reminder of the poor choices I made the night Sarah died. Not to mention he’s the entire reason why I even found myself in that position to begin with. Worst of all, I’ll never forget that he left, he ran off as Sarah lay lifeless in my arms.

Father Maridale gets a call and leaves, which is just as well since my hands have begun shaking. I squeeze them together. There, that’s better…for now.

It’s no mystery why all of this is hitting me so hard. It’s because of what day it is. Today is an anniversary of sorts, but not the happy kind. Quite the contrary—Sarah’s horrible accident occurred four years ago today.

I think most people have forgotten the exact date, no one has said a word as of yet. But I will never forget—July nineteenth is burned in my brain, seared into my soul. I know Chase would want to know the significance of today—and I should have told him—but I couldn’t bring myself to burden him with the information that the day his brother is coming into town is the four-year anniversary of Sarah’s death. So, while Chase is picking his brother up at the airport this evening, I’ll be at the cemetery, spending time with Sarah. And my guy has no idea.

I had originally planned to ask Chase to come with me tonight, especially since he’s the one who’s been helping me come to terms with the fact that not everything that happened the night Sarah died was in my control. But when Chase came over the other night, so hyped up about his brother’s impending visit, I couldn’t ruin his happiness.

I try to work on a few things to get my mind off of today’s significance—like getting started on organizing next month’s activities calendar—but I can’t concentrate at all. I can only think of Sarah.