Love Beyond Words (City Lights, #1)(93)
Soft hands gripped him and pulled him firmly away from the edge. Natalie.
She knelt beside him, the wind battering her, swirling her hair. He saw blood—black in the night—staining her cheek from a cut above her eye. He raised a shaking hand to her face, touching her lightly. He felt warmth and softness, and a strangled sob escaped him.
“Natalie…”
“I can’t believe you’re here,” she said, her hands pressing lightly on his chest, as if to prove he was solid. “I thought I’d never see you again. I thought…I thought…”
He wrapped his arms around her, held her fiercely. “I did this to you. I should have listened. I should have believed you. You never trusted him. Never.”
She shook her head. “You couldn’t have known how bad it really was. He was your friend. But oh god, Julian…” She shuddered against him. “He killed Marshall. He killed him and…”
Julian’s chest tightened. “What? No, Marshall’s not dead.”
“He’s…he’s not?” Natalie looked up at him. “Are you sure? No, he told me…David told me he killed him.”
Julian cupped her cheeks in his hands, his eyes boring into hers. “Look at me. David hurt Marshall, but he’s okay. He’s going to be okay. He’s at the hospital with Liberty and he’s going to be okay.”
Natalie sagged against him, and he did nothing but hold her for a long time.
Chapter FortyFour
The officer wrapped a blanket around Natalie. She moved out of Julian’s embrace long enough to pull the itchy wool around her, and then rested her head on his shoulder again. Another officer offered Julian a blanket as well, but he declined. They sat on a bench near the parking lot, at the top of the trail. A dozen officers milled about, talking in low voices in the beams of their squad cars. An ambulance added its spinning lights to the night that slowly became day. Behind her, down below, more officers were at the labyrinth, taking pictures, and waiting for the medical examiner to come and retrieve David’s body from the surf. Natalie didn’t look behind her, she looked forward, wrapped tightly in Julian’s embrace.
“We have to get some preliminary information,” said Officer Valdez, “while the EMTs have a look at you.”
Officer Valdez had a kind face and warm smile. He’d been the first to find them, the first to call Niko and tell him that everyone was all right, the first to explain how Jesse Tate had told another police unit at Club Orbit to send help here. They came too late, Natalie thought but it was okay. Everything was going to be okay.
“Full name and date of birth?” Valdez asked Julian as an EMT dabbed his chin with gauze and adhered a butterfly bandage to the split skin.
“Julian Rafael Melendez Mendón Kova?. June 2, 1986.”
There’s the big reveal, Natalie thought. A police report instead of a press release.
Officer Valdez’s pen hovered over his notepad. “Uh, would you mind spelling all that?”
#
At the hospital, Natalie’s bruised head was looked at and they administered a rudimentary test for concussion that she passed. Julian received six stitches under his chin and eight more at his brow, and then they were finally allowed to see Marshall.
His head was wrapped in gauze and he was groggy from the pain medication but he smiled to see Natalie and Julian come in. Liberty sat coiled in a chair beside his bed, gnawing on the sleeve of her ratty sweater.
Natalie hugged Marshall carefully, tears raining on his hospital gown, and then she and Liberty flew at one another, hugging and crying.
“Holy shit,” was all Liberty could say at first, over and over again.
Julian stood over Marshall’s bed, seeming at a loss for words.
“It was nothing,” Marshall told him, his words slurred from pain meds. “An elaborate ploy to get into your next book.”
They stayed until a nurse kicked them out so that Marshall could rest. It was after five a.m., she reminded them. Liberty wasn’t about to be budged, so she held Natalie close to say goodbye. “Tell me what happened. But not today or tomorrow. Someday.”
“I will. I love you, Lib.”
“Love you, Nat.” Liberty wiped her eyes, and then turned to Julian. “Get over here.” They embraced and Natalie saw Julian kiss Liberty’s cheek and whisper “Thank you” in her ear. She waved him off and returned to her post on the chair.
Julian and Marshall clasped hands. Julian’s face looked pained as he took in Marshall’s white bandages again.
“Don’t you fret,” Marshall said, his words bumping in to one another. “I’d do it again in a heartbeat…for her.” He winked blearily at Natalie. “And she for me and you for her and one for all, and we’re just the four f*cking Musketeers up in here.”
“Right,” Liberty said, rolling her eyes, “and D’Artagnan’s had too much Percocet tonight.”
Natalie leaned over and kissed Marshall’s cheek. There was so much she wanted to tell him but all that came out was “I love you.”
“Love you. I love everyone,” he said, drifting to sleep. “Love everyone.”
#
Detective Swanson, a sharp-looking woman in charge of sorting out the case, permitted Natalie and Julian to go home and rest until later that afternoon. “It’s going to be a long day of making statements,” she warned them, “so be prepared to do a lot of talking.”