Hold (Gentry Boys, #5)(51)

“I don’t remember that,” I frowned.

I didn’t. There were a thousand rotten memories to choose from and none of them stood out too much against the others at the moment.

“It happened,” Cord confirmed.

“I’m sure it did.”

Chase had gotten closer to the body. He wasn’t crying but he seemed pretty damn close.

“I wish you’d loved us the way we loved you,” he said and the raw hurt of that honesty almost brought me to my knees. Cord let out a small, agonized sound and turned away. I stared at the floor. If the stories were true and hell possessed infinite rooms then surely this was one of them.

Chase tucked the blanket closer to the body of Maggie Gentry. Her papery skin had already begun to look strange. I tried to think back to the last thing she’d ever said to me but then decided I didn’t really didn’t want to remember it after all. It wouldn’t have been anything nice.

“Goodbye,” Chase whispered and then backed away. I watched him breathe deeply and close his eyes. When he opened them again they were clear and calm.

Cord was the one who’d wanted to come here and say goodbye but in the end he couldn’t seem to find the words. He touched her shoulder and then recoiled.

“You okay?” I asked him, and then mentally kicked myself for asking such a dickhead question.

Cord nodded but he was leaning his palms against the far wall with his head down, breathing hard like he was trying not to be sick. I was starting to worry about him. Our mother had been lost to us for many years. We knew it. And Cord has always been the most rational of us, the one who would talk me and Chase out of shit like diving into a raging canal during a flash flood as we tried to shove each other aside to prove who was the toughest. But I guess there was no way to tell how you’ll react to heartache until it happens.

I didn’t feel the need to get any closer to her. She wasn’t in there anymore anyway and if there was something to theories about souls hanging around for awhile, watching the world pass by, then she could still hear me just as well from across the damn room.

“We’re your sons,” I said, even though I’d stopped thinking of myself as anyone’s son a long time ago. “You don’t even f*cking know us and you never did. But we’re alive because of you. We survived in spite of you. And now we’re fine without you.”

I couldn’t keep the bitterness out of my voice. It hung in the air, as suffocating as the harsh odor of the room, a smell that tried to mask death and was only halfway successful. I’d already crossed the room and had my hand on the doorknob before I turned around.

“I hope if there is such a thing as peace wherever you are that you were finally able to find it.”

I opened the door and waited while Chase nudged Cord away from the wall.

Gaps and the black-haired woman were waiting at a polite distance down the hall.

Cord had gotten ahold of himself and shook the woman’s hand.

“Thank you for that,” he said and the woman gave him a sympathetic smile before returning to the room of the dead.

Chase looked at Gaps. “You know if any arrangements have been made?”

Gaps shook his head. “Benton’s been sitting in that cell and as far as I know it hasn’t even been brought up yet.” He paused. “I’d imagine they didn’t make plans for this so if he doesn’t come forward I can make some calls. You have a problem with cremation?”

“No,” I said quickly. “That’s actually better.”

“A lot cheaper too,” Gaps said. “How long are you boys planning on staying in town?”

“Not long. We’re not planning on hanging around after today.”

“Understood.” He motioned to the door. “I’ve got to get back on shift but let me walk you out.”

More time had passed than I’d thought. It was mid morning and I could see clouds hanging around over the mountains to the southeast. The sun managed to catch me right between the eyes and for a few seconds I saw nothing.

Then I saw something I really didn’t want to see.

“Mother f*cker,” I muttered.

Because there he was. Flushed, jowly and limping along on the other side of Main Street. He stopped in his slovenly tracks when he saw us. He raised a hand like he was hailing a f*cking cab.

“Mother f*cker,” I said again because it was all I could think of, standing there on the sidewalk while Benton Gentry waved at me.





CHAPTER EIGHTEEN


CHASE



I felt an odd sense of peace as the three of us exited the building where we’d visited our mother’s dead body. I hadn’t been expecting that, the relief. For years I’d waited for this news with sick dread but when it finally arrived it wasn’t the crushing blow that I’d always feared. Maybe because I’d finally come to accept that my mother wasn’t going to be saved. She wasn’t going to wake up one morning and smack her forehead and realize what she’d done to herself and to us. She wasn’t going to get help. All she would ever be was a miserable wraith with one foot on earth and the other in the grave. At least now both feet were together. I’d stared down into my mother’s face and wished her good luck in whatever world she found herself in next.

Anyway, that sense of peace was jolted when I got a look at Creed’s face and then a split second later saw exactly what he was staring at. Benton Gentry should have counted himself lucky that the width of Main Street separated him from us or else Creed would probably have charged him like a mad Viking. Benton looked somewhat the worse for wear and considering what a shitty mess he usually was, that was really saying something. He was disheveled, unshaven, dirty, and seemed about ready to collapse into a pile of bones on the sidewalk.