Last Light(56)

“No, no, no.” I staggered away from Seth. “I appreciate the ride, but—”

“Would you quit your whining?” Seth seized my shoulders and hauled me toward the complex. I stumbled along.

I told Aaron Snow that I wrote Night Owl.

Matt was in my condo.

Seth was walking me to the door.

And I was too drunk to process the implications of all this. My mind stalled.

I started to laugh. Everything was so f*cked-up. So many lies. A castle of lies. And Matt was its king, and I was the queen, holding together our elaborate deception.

“Darling, you’re going to be feeling this tomorrow,” Seth said. He helped me up the stairs to my door and unlocked it for me. My fine-motor skills were gone.

“Hey, so…” I blocked the doorway. “What—how much longer are you in town?”

“I’m leaving tomorrow. Our show was last night.” Seth peered into the condo. “Hannah, did you leave candles burning in here?”

“Huh?” I turned. Oh, shit.

Matt was nowhere in sight, but he’d lit a dozen candles on the coffee table and several more in the kitchen. The prelude to a romantic evening, under any other circumstances.

“You’re crazy. You could burn this whole f*cking complex down.”

“What’s up … what’s up with your tattoos anyway?” I braced my hands against the doorframe. Seth didn’t seem to notice me grasping at straws. He kept looking into the semidarkness of the condo, then looking at me.

“Goldengrove is … from a poem. So is ‘the penny world.’ It’s nothing.” Seth narrowed his eyes. “It’s about stuff we leave behind.”

“Stuff?” My voice trembled. I wanted to slam the door in Seth’s face, but I felt that if I lowered my arms, he would walk right into my condo.

“Yeah, stuff. Youth, innocence, ignorance. The best times, like—” He hesitated, his dark eyes fixing on my face. “Like when my parents were alive, and our family was normal.”

“Normal but loaded.” I laughed shakily. Wow. Inappropriate Comments 101.

“Hannah, did … did you do all this for me?” Seth nodded toward the candlelit living room. “Did you know I would be at the party tonight?”

“What? No. God, no.”

“You did, didn’t you? And that’s why you’re drunk. A little too much liquid courage, right?” Seth smiled, wonderment and disbelief on his face. “Hannah…”

He leaned down and crushed his lips to mine. The kiss stunned me to stillness—the heat and hunger of it. The loneliness behind it.

“Kiss me,” he mumbled, pressing me into the condo with his body.

When Seth slid his tongue between my teeth, I bit down—hard.

“Fuck!” He reeled away.

I backed into a wall. Oh, shit. I could see the night cohering into Seth’s deluded reality: I was the oversexed author of Night Owl, I was falling for him, and I was sending him signals with my drunken bumbling and candlelit condo. Shit, shit …

Seth cringed and touched his mouth.

“What … is going on here?” At the sound of Matt’s voice—dry, measured, and low with rage—I collapsed. I slid down the wall as he materialized from the hallway. He looked like he could kill.

Seth blanched. His expression was horrible to see. First emptiness—a face devoid of emotion—unable or unwilling to comprehend. Then hurt and a flash of confusion. How could this be? Eyes wide, mouth open in fear. Am I seeing things?

Finally, anger and understanding. Seth’s features resolved into a mask of hate.

“You son of a bitch,” he said. His voice shook with emotion. “You son of a bitch.”

Shadows darkened Matt’s face. He looked around, as if there might be a fourth guest, and then between me and his brother.

“What is this?” he said. “Don’t touch her. Don’t you f*cking touch her.”

“Matt, it’s nothing,” I said. “Seth just—”

I don’t know who moved first, though both men were on the edge of violence. Hands clenched. Jaws tight. Eyes wild.

Someone swung and they began to grapple. Matt got Seth around the middle and slammed him into a wall. A picture fell. Glass shattered. He hit Seth across the face once, twice, then Seth kicked and Matt fell. He kicked again, driving his foot into Matt’s gut. Matt groaned.

Matt rose and they collided, huffing and shouting as the sickening thump of blows filled the room. “Stop it!” I screamed. “Stop it, stop!”

I scrambled to my feet and launched myself at the brothers. Between inebriation and the flashing candlelight, I couldn’t see a damn thing. I hit hot muscle and tangled limbs.

“Stop!” I shrieked.

A fist plowed into my face. My head belted back. I heard a wheeze and a crunch like the sound of a broken accordion. White spots exploded before my eyes.

Someone said, “You hit her! You son of a bitch, you hit her!”

Another voice. “You hit her! You f*cking hit her!”

I tried to protest, and then the world went black.





Chapter 30


MATT


I sat in the back of the Civic with Hannah on my lap.

“Little bird,” I whispered, “wake up.”