The Devil and the Deep Blue Sea (The Devils #2)(53)

Six returns with gin and tonics for us both. Beth releases me and his arm replaces hers. Josh’s gaze narrows, and remains on us as Six’s mouth presses to the side of my head. Six is talking about what we’ll do this week in LA and I want to sink in my seat. I know I won’t be seeing him once we’re home, but I put up with it all for Beth’s sake until I can’t stand it.

“I’ll be back in a minute,” I announce, and I walk out of the lounge and into the shops, trying to talk myself out of crying as I look around. Nothing in my life is different than it was when I arrived in Hawaii twelve days ago, but everything that mattered before just feels meaningless now. I buy something for Tali, and then stop to watch as people swarm at a gate to board their flight. A man wraps his arm around his wife’s waist, shoots a warning glare at the people encroaching from behind. She leans into him, as if he’ll always be there. The day is probably going to come when she leans and he lets her fall, but I feel very alone watching them anyway.

I slowly walk back to the first-class lounge and just as it comes into view, a figure pushes away from the wall. Josh, his lovely brow furrowed, watching me.

“My flight is boarding,” he says. “But I wanted to say goodbye.”

“I don’t understand,” I whisper. I sound as if I’ve been punched. Even if we weren’t going to be sitting together, I thought I had at least six more hours to look over at him. “You’re not coming to LA?”

His shake of the head is so small it’s barely noticeable. He holds my gaze as if he knows I’m upset, knows why I’m upset. “I have to give a talk at Stanford tomorrow. I’m flying straight to San Francisco.”

“Oh.” I feel frozen, trying to ward off the wave of grief as it hits.

The speaker overhead announces the final boarding call.

He steps closer. Close enough that I can feel his breath against my face. “Tell me something real,” he says.

I try to smile but it’s twisted by sadness. I wish I could give him the entire world. I wish there was anything he wanted that my money could buy. But all he wants is a tiny bit of the truth from me, maybe because he knows it’s the hardest thing for me to give.

“When I was eleven, my dad got drunk and threw a bottle at my face,” I tell him. My dad was the only person who seemed to like me back then, but even he didn’t like me quite enough. “He lost visitation and that was the last time I saw him. That’s how I got the scar.”

What a sad, awkward little gift to give him. My way of saying I trust you, Josh, and I don’t trust anyone else. I turn to walk away so he won’t see me cry, and have taken exactly one step when he says my name and reaches for me.

And that’s all it takes: he closes the distance, pulling me against him, and his hands are cradling my jaw and his mouth is on mine as if it’s always wanted to be there. For one long, breathless moment, nothing exists but him and the way he is kissing me.

“I would give anything for things to have been different,” he says. And then he walks away, disappearing into the crowd of people boarding their flight.

I want to reach up to feel my lips, to assure myself the kiss really happened.

I want to run after him.

Instead, I return to the lounge on unsteady legs, feeling like something inside me just died.

Beth, Jim and Six all sit there, scrolling through their phones. We’ve traveled together for two weeks straight but Josh was the part that made me happy. Josh was the part that felt like home.

When our flight boards, Six grabs his blanket and spreads it over the two of us. Beneath it, he reaches for my hand. I suspect I’ve got about thirty seconds before he tries to move it to his dick. And I can’t do this, not for another moment.

“Hey,” he says. “I know we still need to talk.”

I pull my hand away and reach for the headphones. “No, we don’t. Whatever this was, it is definitely over.”

I honestly can’t believe I ever dated him in the first place.





PART V





HOME





“It’s almost too broad a topic for just one book.”

From Mainland US: Adequate Medical Care and Lots to See





32





DREW





I wake to sun streaming through the floor-to-ceiling windows of the cottage I’m renting at the Chateau Marmont. I have fifteen missed calls from Davis. Not a single one from Josh.

I shuffle out of bed only to draw the drapes closed, and then I return, flopping face down on the mattress.

I’m not sure how to go back to my regular life. I’m not sure what made my feet move before. I thought I knew. I thought I wanted to be vindicated, that I wanted to make more money than my stepfather, have more fame and clout than the whole family put together, and possibly use it to ruin my stepfather’s firm. But now it just seems…petty. Now it just seems like I’ve been fueling myself with rage because I had nothing else to drag me out of bed in the morning.

I get up long enough to order an Hermès scarf for Beth. I have it hand delivered along with a note thanking her for the trip and telling her how much I enjoyed spending time with her. I apologize, too, for the way things worked out with Six. It must have been pretty clear it was over on the way home, but there is a small part of me that wants to make sure she knows, that wants to make sure Josh knows, though it will change absolutely nothing. How could it? I can’t jump from one brother to the next, and Josh cares too much about his mom to throw that kind of grenade into the middle of the family, even if he was staying here—which he is not.