The Next Best Thing (Gideon's Cove #2)(107)

“That’s all I have left,” I repeat loudly.

He looks at me another few beats, then bows his head. “You’d better get inside before you catch pneumonia.”

“Screw that,” I say harshly, startling myself. “I’m going for a walk.”

And with that, I storm off, across the street, into Ellington Park. I don’t look back.

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

EVERYTHING’S GONNA BE ALL RIGHT…Everything’s gonna be all right…Everything’s gonna be all right…

Just because Ethan said it, doesn’t mean it’s true, I tell myself as I careen along the gravel pathway. I’m already soaked, hardly noticing the puddles I slosh through. He’s upset that I’m moving on. And I have to move on. The image of him being tossed through the air, so damn…fragile…

My crappy lasagna surges up, and I barely make it off the path, throwing up violently into the bushes. Shaking, I stagger over to the nearest bench. Only then do I notice how close I am to the cemetery. A brief sheet of lightning illuminates the night, the asphalt road like a scar cutting between the granite headstones.

Somewhere in there is Jimmy’s grave. My husband’s grave. His body, that big, beautiful form I loved so much, lies in there. Closing my eyes, I tip my head back and let the rain pellet my face. How many tears have I shed for Jimmy? Enough that I used to wake up with salt stains on my pillow. Enough that the skin under my eyes was raw for the better part of a year. Enough that my mother gave me her ultra-expensive eye cream because I looked older than she did.

I know Jimmy loved Ethan. He wouldn’t have made a move on me if he’d known. Ethan had a crush, maybe. That’s all. Jimmy never would’ve hurt him. I’d bet my life on it. He asked Ethan to be his best man, for God’s sake. A half-formed thought darts through my brain at that…there’s something there…but it’s gone, like a fish in a fast-flowing river. It doesn’t matter. Jimmy loved his little brother. Everyone could see that. He’d sling an arm around the shorter, younger Ethan and ruffle his hair. “Hey, Little E.,” he’d say, then kiss his brother’s head.

For the first time, it occurs to me that Ethan must’ve hated that nickname.

I’m so tired. For five and a half years, I haven’t had a full night’s sleep. Except one, now that I think of it. The night Ethan watched over me after I’d come home from the hospital.

Something hot and biting rises in my chest, and I shove it down. It’s too hard. Love is just too frigging hard. Love someone, and they have the power to ruin your life. Jimmy took everything that night, the whole lovely, safe, normal future we were going to have, the person I used to be. I can’t let stories from Ethan—or Doral-Anne, for that matter—erase the Jimmy I hold in my heart.

“Everything’s gonna be all right…everything’s gonna be all right. Everything’s gonna be all right. Everything’s gonna be all right.” Come on, St. Marley, help me, I think, my voice cracking as I sing. Can’t imagine that Iris and Rose would approve of me praying to a reggae singer for help, but hey, I never really figured out the rosary. A nearly hysterical laugh wrenches out of my throat. Singing in a thunderstorm outside the cemetery. Jimmy’s widow has finally chugged around the bend.

I lurch to my feet and slog back to the Boatworks. My nose is running, my feet are like ice, and I can only imagine how I look, my hair hanging in sodden strands, my mascara puddled, no doubt, underneath my eyes. In other words, I probably look as good as I feel.

I make it up to my apartment, and wouldn’t you know? Fat Mikey finally succeeds in tripping me, and I fall over the giant cat, smacking my knee on the hard corner of the table. “Thanks, Mikey,” I say, another dangerous laugh rising in my chest like a storm surge. “The perfect end to a perfect night.”

A dime winks at me from the carpet under the table.

Without another thought, I pick it up and whip it across the room.

“DID YOU EVER FIND OUT SOMETHING about your husbands after they died? Something that surprised you?”

My aunts regard me with surprise. Mom looks up from her crossword puzzle, then looks back down to fill in another clue. It’s 10:00 a.m., and I haven’t slept in, oh, twenty-eight hours. I have eleven and a half minutes left on this last batch of bread, and I intend to put the time to good use. “Well?” I demand.

“What bee’s in your bonnet?” Iris asks, turning her attention back to the pastry dough she’s rolling out.

“I found out a couple of things about Jimmy,” I say. My voice sounds overly loud to me, and the Black Widows exchange a glance, confirming the fact that I’m acting insane.

“What things?” Mom asks.

“It doesn’t matter,” I say, shaking my head. “Did you?”

“Well, about a month after Larry died, I found out that he had a secret bank account,” Rose says slowly. “Fourteen thousand dollars in it. His name only.” She looks sheepishly at her sisters, whose mouths are hanging open. “I never found out what he was planning to do with it. Leave me? Pay off some illegitimate child? Bribe a judge? I never found out.”

“Been watching The Sopranos?” Mom asks dryly.

“What did you do with the money?” Iris asks.

“I invested in the stock market,” Rose cheeps. “Stevie never has to work in his life if he doesn’t want to.”