After Hours (InterMix)(104)

Kelly tensed, sitting up straight, his hand sliding to my neck. I sensed his anger surge and recede in a breath, dutifully suppressed. He began rubbing my back in slow circles. “Your sister’s in there with him?”

“Not yet. She’s been taken someplace to answer questions, so they can try to narrow down what’s wrong . . . She’s been in there over an hour.”

“Waiting game sucks, doesn’t it?”

I nodded, letting a few more tears slip down my face.

“You need anything? You or her?”

“I’m not moving until I hear some kind of update.”

For an eternity we sat there, the motion of Kelly’s palm hypnotizing me, eventually bringing a small measure of calm. When I found I could take a full breath again, I gently shrugged his arm away so I could sit back in my chair.

I’d used up the tissues, so I dabbed my nose with my cuff. “Thanks. For coming.”

“Sure.”

“It could be a long wait. Don’t feel like you need to stick around. It’s nice that you came at all. Especially after . . . you know.”

He didn’t acknowledge our fight. He didn’t do much of anything, except lean forward with his elbows on his knees, absently linking and unlinking his fingers.

I knew this version of Kelly. I’d gotten the briefest glimpse of him, that second night he came to my room, after Don had attempted suicide. This was how Kelly got, when he was mired in a situation he couldn’t control. Couldn’t fix things in the ways he felt competent at, with muscle or threats.

He couldn’t hit on me now, like he had that night when Don cut him. He couldn’t close himself inside some hard, empowering role, and in lieu of that option, he seemed to just turn himself off.

There were plenty of times I felt that shameful sting of weakness, but I never shut down over it. If anything it charged me up. Sometimes with anger, sometimes for the worse, but I never just went numb in the face of my own discomfort.

“You don’t need to be here,” I murmured, picking up a copy of People from another chair.

His gaze met mine but he didn’t reply.

“I didn’t ask you to come.” I opened the magazine, retreating from his stare. “And I can tell you can’t stand it.”

“Who can f*cking stand this? Flipping through magazines while you wait to hear whether a kid’s going to be okay or . . .”

“You don’t even know my nephew. You can just choose not to care. I wouldn’t blame you.”

His eyes narrowed. “How f*cking coldhearted do you think I am?”

I sighed, exquisitely exhausted. “There’s nothing you can do to help, and it’s obvious this whole place is making you uncomfortable.”

“If you don’t want me here, just say it. I’ll go.”

The thing was, I did want Kelly here. Not this Kelly, but the one who watched over me at work, the one who’d scared Marco off. Guilt jabbed me in the heart to realize it, but I wanted strong Kelly, even after all those times I’d resented that side of him. Now I was rejecting this helpless version of him, just as he so often rejected it himself.

I’d cared about this man, but I couldn’t have loved him, before. Not if I wasn’t ready to see him this way. Maybe he was a better person than I was, even being willing to be here, letting me see him so . . . stripped.

I chewed my lip, gnawed it the way the shame was worrying my insides. I took a deep breath and let it out, out, out, and turned to Kelly.

“No, I want you here.” He might not be my lover anymore, and we might not even be friends, but he’d come without my even asking, and he was prepared to stay. And I couldn’t think of another person in my life who’d do the same.

I touched his arm. “I’m glad you came.” My throat tightened, but I forced the words through—the absolute truth, despite how much I resented hearing it. “I hate feeling this helpless. I don’t want to be alone.”

He nodded, just a single dip of his chin, gaze dropping to the floor.

“I doubt we’ll be hearing anything soon,” I said. “You want to check out the vending machines?”

“Sure.”

We got up and wandered down the hall. I fished singles out of my wallet and bought myself a pop. Kelly got a Butterfinger.

“You need some air?” he asked.

“Yeah.” I tapped out a text to let Amber know where I’d disappeared to, and we headed through the lobby and outside, finding a bench that faced the circular drop-off area. For the moment there were no sirens, no flashing lights, no smokers stealing a taste of their vice. Just me and Kelly under the yellow glare of the awning’s bulbs. His candy wrapper crinkled loudly in the relative stillness, and my bottle hissed in reply.