Lies(62)

Don’t get me wrong, I couldn’t care less that we’re not legally bound or that the party got interrupted. I don’t even care that we never got to use the flower cannon or eat the cake. I just want to see him. To know that he’s okay. Then I’ll be able to breathe properly again.

“Try not to worry, honey,” Dad joins in. “He’s being given the best care possible. Are you sure you don’t want anything to eat?”

“No. Thanks.” They mean well. But five hours. Five fucking hours. Why would it take this long? Bear said he would be fine. He said so.

Finally, a doctor walks in wearing blue scrubs. “Elizabeth?”

“Yes?” I’m already on my feet and moving toward her. “Where is Thom? Can I see him?”

Only her face remains carefully blank, her gaze full of a gentle kind of sorrow. Professional through and through. She’s done this many times before. “I’m so sorry.”

“No.”

“There were complications—”

And suddenly Crow’s holding me up, his arms wrapped tight around me. He’s the only thing keeping me off the ground, in fact. “Thom isn’t dead. He can’t be. We’re getting married.”

“I’m so sorry,” the doctor repeats. Like it makes a difference.

Everything I love is dead.




“Open up,” yells Jen from the other side of the bathroom door. “I know you’re in there.”

With a groan I get to my feet and flip the lock. “Is something wrong downstairs?”

“No. Your mom’s got everything under control.” She wanders on in with a bottle of scotch and two glasses in hand. This is why she’s my best friend forever and ever. “But if you’re going to hide at your own fiancé’s wake then I’m not letting you do it on your own.”

“I just couldn’t handle it anymore. All those useless platitudes from people who didn’t even know him. Not the real him.”

She pours out two hefty shots, passing one to me with a sad smile. “Get this into you. You got through the service. Some days are better if you don’t try to handle the whole twenty-four hours sober. Today definitely falls under that category, I think.”

“Thanks.” I try to smile and fail miserably.” I can honestly say, the absence of him is the worst fucking thing I’ve ever felt.”

“Oh, B.”

I sit with my back against the tub, smoothing out the wrinkles in my fashionable black suit. My heels sit discarded on the other side of the room where I’d thrown them earlier. A shattered heart and sore feet were too fucking much to deal with in one day. I down a good half of the scotch, lighting my throat on fire. Not that it isn’t great scotch, Thom had excellent taste in these things. It’s just a lot of scotch at one time.

“Shit,” I wheeze. A peaty smoky taste lingers in my mouth.

Jen joins me on the floor and we both drink more. This time, I take it easy. On an empty stomach, the alcohol’s going to work fast. Ever since the hospital, not quite a week ago, I’ve been lost. Depressed as all hell and going through the motions, eating when Mom or Dad puts something in front of me, going to bed when they do. At night in bed alone I cry, my face buried in his pillow. But the rest of the time…I don’t know. The thought of eating breakfast this morning was a big no. Couldn’t do it.

Mostly these days I just stare at the walls. Nice, blank, and boring. Nothing there to remind me of Thom. Or at least, not as much as almost everything else in the house and the world at large.

“So tell me about him,” says Jen. “The real him.”

I lick my dry lips.

“I know there’s stuff you can’t say. But work around it.” She takes another sip. “You know you’ve hardly talked about him at all. Not since it happened.”

“He’s gone. What’s the point?”

“The point is to remember the good things. To hold onto the memories of your love, even if he had to leave you.”

“He didn’t leave me; he was stolen from me.” Still not regretting killing Scorpion. I’d happily do it again a dozen times or more. But even this anger is muted, dulled. Sadness is an ocean and I’m drowning.

She nods.

I lean my head back against the edge of the bathtub. “He was loyal and strong and hard at times. Brutal even. But he could also be sweet and funny.”

Jen’s small sad smile is back.

“And he was brave. Brave and smart. I know he didn’t tend to talk much, but honest to God, he was probably one of the smartest people I’ve ever met. Wouldn’t have wanted to play chess against him. Though he wasn’t perfect. He could be incredibly stupid about some things too. Usually things having to do with our relationship, which he was always messing up. But he always wound up fixing them too. The man just wouldn’t quit.” I sigh. “Until this.”

Jen raises her glass to her lips. “He loved you very much, you know?”

“That I do know. And fifteen or so minutes more and we’d have been married. I’d officially be Mrs. Lange, the widow.”

“I think you can call yourself a widow if you like. No one’s going to argue with you.”

I shrug one shoulder. “I don’t really care. It’s just one of those stray thoughts. Would have been nice to have some good memories of the ceremony as opposed to everything instantly going to hell. To have a document where he signed on the dotted line promising he was mine. That would have been nice.”