by Zavarelli, A
He didn’t.
I already knew he wasn’t at work since I’d called reception again on the way over. The temp on the phone told me neither he or Nicole came into work that day, and that was all the information she had. It was midweek, so he wouldn’t be at Belvedere Island.
That only left his apartment.
I dug into the bottom of my purse, retrieving the key ring I never thought I’d be using again. Only, the key I needed was missing.
Brayden.
I reached for the handle anyway, expecting it to be locked. But it wasn't. I swung it open wide and nearly collapsed from the sight before me.
Blood.
So much blood. Smeared across the floor, the breakfast bar, the walls. I couldn’t make sense of it.
The phone lay shattered on the kitchen tile. The bar stools were nothing but a splintered pile of wood, scattered across the living room floor. There was glass and furniture everywhere.
The blood was a dull red color, which meant that it had been dried for a while. I cupped a hand over my mouth as I searched the rest of the apartment frantically. Tears streamed down my face as I checked every room, noting that my sewing room had been locked and turned into a shrine like his dead family members.
Because Ryland thought he’d lost me too.
And if he was dead, I would die too. Knowing I never told him how much I loved him. Knowing I didn’t help him as much as I should have. Knowing that my own flesh and blood had done this.
My heart stopped functioning. I couldn’t breathe. I was hyperventilating. A strange wheezing sound came from my lungs every time I tried to drag in some air. I fell onto my knees in his bedroom, dragging his tee shirt to my face.
Oh God. It smelled like him.
Ryland.
Another sob heaved from my chest, and it echoed around the room as I repeated his name over and over again. I wanted to curl up in a ball and die. He was gone. I was so certain of it I couldn’t move. Grief had paralyzed me.
But then the front door slammed, and something like hope sparked to life inside of me. I dragged myself into the kitchen, where Nicole stood with a hollow and lifeless expression on her face. There was no shock, no confusion… only acceptance.
“Nicole?”
It was my plea for her to deny what I feared. To deny that I had any right to feel the way I did at that moment.
She didn’t respond. She was half comatose herself as she stared at me.
“Where is he?” I shook her arms. “Where is Ryland?”
“He’s… at the hospital.” She sagged against the counter. “I couldn’t stay there. I couldn’t smell the death all around me anymore.”
“Death?” I shook my head. “No, not death. He’s okay.”
She opened her mouth but nothing came out, and I shook her harder.
“He’s okay, Nicole.” I wasn’t asking anymore. I was telling her. Because I couldn’t accept any other option.
“I… I don’t know,” she whispered.
“I have to go to him,” I said, rushing for the door.
“They wouldn’t tell me.”
It was the last thing I heard before I left the apartment.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
“I’m his fiancé,” I blurted. “Please, you have to tell me.”
The nurse gave me a skeptical look, one that guaranteed she knew I was full of shit. But I didn’t care, and I guess neither did she. She took pity on me and typed something into her computer.
“It looks like he’s in recovery right now,” she said. “He just got out of surgery twenty minutes ago. He’s been given a strong sedative so it’s still going to be awhile until he’s able to accept visitors.”
“Surgery?” It was all I could do to get the most basic of words out.
“Yes.” She nodded. “He sustained several stab wounds during the attempted mugging. His shoulder, his chest, and his abdomen. He had a collapsed lung and internal bleeding. That’s all I can tell you right now.”
“But he’s okay?” I persisted.
“He’s stable,” she replied clinically. “Which is all I know at the moment. You’ll have to wait until he’s conscious, and then you can speak with the doctor.”
I opened my mouth to protest when she pointed down the hall.
“Get yourself a cup of coffee, honey and have a seat. I will send the doctor as soon as we know anything else.”
***
By the time the doctor came in three hours later, I’d practically worn a hole in the floor.
“Miss Valentine?” he questioned, his eyes scanning the file in his hand.
“Yes, that’s me,” I said quickly.
“He’s asked for you,” he said. “So you can go on in.”
I rushed towards the door before pausing at the frame to turn back.
“Is he going to be okay?”
“He’s in stable condition,” the doctor explained. “He’s very lucky that he survived, but he will need to be monitored closely over the next few days.”
“Thank you.” I clenched my hands together. “Thank you for… taking care of him. I don’t know what I would have done…”
“It’s okay.” He smiled. “Why don’t you go see him now.”
I nodded and scurried down the hall to Ryland’s room. The door was cracked, and I dragged in a mouthful of air as I pushed my way inside.
He was lying in the hospital bed, covered in blankets and tubes. I bit my lip to keep from making any noise as I leaned over and clasped his face in my hands. His eyes were closed, and he looked like he was asleep.
My first instinct was to pepper his cheeks with kisses while I smoothed his hair down with my fingers. He wouldn’t have wanted it out of place. He didn’t want anything out of place.
Big droplets of water splashed onto his face, and I realized they were coming from me. I was sobbing all over him. At how close I had come to losing him. I didn’t understand how Brayden could do this. I hated him. I hated him so much it scared me, and I feared what would happen when I saw him next. But I knew without a shadow of a doubt I couldn’t leave Ryland right now. I worried I might not ever be strong enough to leave him again.
“Why are you crying, baby girl?” Ryland’s voice was scratchy when he opened his eyes, staring up at me with the hint of a teasing smile.
I shook my head, unable to answer, and the tears continued to pour. Ryland brushed my hair back with his fingers, getting a clear look at my face as he tried to comfort me.
“Hush,” he whispered. “Don’t cry for me.”
“Don’t say that,” I snapped, threading my fingers through his. “Don’t tell me not to cry for you.”
A moment of silence fell between us, and when he spoke again, his words were heavy with the weight of relief.
“I didn’t think you would come.”
“Of course I would come,” I sniffled. “I love you, Ryland. That doesn’t just go away.”
He winced as he moved his body to the side, leaving a small gap between the frame and him.
“Come up here,” he pleaded. “Lay with me.”
I glanced at the cracked door, mentally calculating how long it would be before a nurse would come through it to scold me. But the longer I thought it about it, the less I cared. I needed to be beside him. To feel his warmth, his heartbeat, his life.
I crawled up and laid on my side, careful not to touch him anywhere on his torso. The blankets covered his bandages, and I was grateful for it. I wouldn’t have been able to handle that. Not yet.
Ryland clutched my hand in his and stared into my eyes as though he didn’t believe I was really here with him. There was still so much that needed to be said between us, and we both knew it. But neither one of us brought it up. Instead, he said the only thing he could in that moment. The only thing I knew within my soul was not a lie.
“I love you, Brighton.”
***
The nurse ended up kicking
me out after midnight. Ryland didn’t want me to go, but he needed his rest. So I promised him I’d be back first thing in the morning, and I meant it.
As I walked out of the hospital lobby into the cool evening air, someone clutched me around the arm and pulled me to the side.
I started to struggle when the familiar voice hissed into my ear.
“Relax,” Brayden ordered. “It’s me.”
I yanked my arm away and took a step back, glaring at his profile in the gloomy light of the hospital parking lot. A hatred I had never known bubbled up inside of me, and there was only one place for it to go.
I shoved him back against the wall. “What the hell is wrong with you?”
Brayden just blinked at me like I was acting crazy. It made me crazier. I shoved him again and slapped at his face.
“You tried to kill him!”
“Jesus, Brighton,” he spat. “Keep your voice down and stop hitting me. I’m bleeding all over the place as it is.”
On closer inspection, I realized he was right. Ryland hadn’t gone down without a fight. Brayden’s nose was crooked and both his eyes were black. But the blood stains all over his shirt had me shaking as I tried to calm down.
I reached towards him and then snatched my hand away. I couldn’t comfort him. I couldn’t justify what he’d done. Ever.
“Have you even bothered to see a doctor?”
“I’ll be fine,” he grunted.
“Well, I’m glad to hear that. Because I want nothing to do with you anymore.”
I didn’t even recognize my own voice. But I recognized the anger in Brayden’s eyes.
“So that’s it, huh? You’re going to choose him over your family?”
“I don’t want to choose anyone!” I cried out. “You're both making me choose. And right now, I have to choose him, Brayden. He has no one else. Because of what you and Frankie did to his family. And if that wasn’t enough, you went after him again! I can’t even wrap my head around that. I don’t understand what’s happened to you.”
“He’s killing our mother!” he argued. “Is that not justification enough? And do you really think it’s going to stop there? Who will be next? Me? And then what? You know he isn’t capable of love. He doesn’t care about you. He’s going to hurt you too.”
“He wouldn’t.” I shook my head vehemently. “You don’t know him like I do. He’s in pain, and he just needs someone to help him.”
“He’s a sinking ship,” Brayden spat. “And it disgusts me that you can even look at him knowing what he’s done to Norma.”
“What?” I scoffed. “Gave her money? It was her choice to buy the drugs, not Ryland’s.”
I didn’t know why I defended him on this. Deep down, I knew Ryland had malicious intent behind giving her that money. But I had tried to justify it was her actions that would cause her own demise, not his.
“She’s an addict,” Brayden snorted. “He knew exactly what she would do with that money. He wants her dead. He wants me dead too. And what’s going to happen to you, Brighton? Is he saving you for last?”
“I can’t have this conversation right now,” I snapped. “I don’t know what to do anymore. All I know is that I love him. And I want you to stay away from him.”
“Don’t worry about that,” he sneered. “I’ll be staying away from both of you.”
***
When I got back to Nicole’s apartment, I was surprised to find that my key didn’t work in the door anymore.
I stood in the hallway with warring feelings. I didn’t want to wake her up, but I didn’t want to go back to Ryland’s either. To see his blood everywhere. I couldn’t handle it.
Nicole solved my dilemma for me when she opened the door.
“He worried Brayden might come here,” she explained in a hollow voice.
She was still wearing a blood stained shirt, and her eyes were ringed with darkness. She also looked like she’d lost weight since I’d left. I thought I was too exhausted to deal with anyone else’s feelings, but Nicole was the exception.
I grabbed her by the hand and ushered her to the couch. I didn’t have the words to comfort her, but I wanted to try. Having Norma-Jean for a mother meant I lacked the nurturing instincts she should have instilled into me. I didn’t know how to nurture. I barely knew how to take care of myself.
“I can’t go through this again.” Nicole’s voice wobbled as she looked at me through bleary eyes. “I can’t do it, Brighton. I’m not strong enough.”
“You are strong enough,” I told her. “And this is not the same thing. Ryland’s going to be okay.”
“You don’t know that,” she argued. “You don’t know.”
“I do know,” I said vehemently. “I won’t let anything else happen to him. He’s okay now, Nicole. I just saw him.”
“He won’t stop.” She shook her head, the tears falling freely now. “He’s not going to stop until Brayden’s dead, you know that right?”
The truth of her words shook me to my core. And as much as I wanted to, I couldn’t argue with that statement. It was probably the reason Ryland hadn’t told the truth about what happened to the police. Because he wanted his chance at Brayden. My boyfriend and my brother both wanted each other dead.
“We’ll find a way,” I said weakly. “We have to. You and I, Nicole. We can do this together…”
“No,” she snapped. “We can’t. Wake up, Brighton. This is going to end badly. We both have to get out now while we still can.”
“I can’t get out,” I croaked. “But you’re right, Nicole. You should. Maybe you should take some time off. Go stay with your family for a while.”
I saw how much this weighed on her, and I didn’t want to see her broken. She’d been through enough already, and this wasn’t her battle to fight.
“I can’t just go.” She sobbed. “You have to come with me, Brighton. That’s the only way I’ll be able to do it. We could get a place together, in another city. Anywhere, I don’t care. Let’s leave…”
She wasn’t being rational, but judging by her face, she hadn’t slept in a while.
“We can talk about this later,” I told her in a gentle voice. “I think you should get some rest.”
Her shoulders slumped, and she nodded before rising on shaky legs.
“I guess you’re right,” she agreed. “Rest sounds like a good idea.”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
After tossing and turning for half the night, I felt even worse than the day before. I was anxious to see Ryland, but I also wanted to check on Nicole before I left.
It was past eight already, and she was usually up by now. I chalked it up to her being exhausted from the stress. When I paused outside of her bedroom door, I thought about letting her sleep. But I was going to be at the hospital all day, so I decided to wake her up instead.
When I opened the door, any rational thoughts about what I should do fled.
Nicole was sprawled out across the floor, a half empty bottle of whiskey and a pill bottle lying beside her.
A wave of dizziness threatened to overtake me as I knelt down beside her. She was face down in the carpet, and I couldn’t tell if she was breathing.
“Nicole! Wake up!”
She didn’t respond to my voice.
I flopped her onto her back and checked her pulse. When it thumped against my fingers, I let out a huge breath. I pulled out my cell phone and fumbled with the buttons when she blinked open her eyes.
“Shwhat are you doooing?” she slurred.
I brushed the hair away from her face and gave her a reassuring smile. “I’m calling an ambulance.”
She batted the phone out of my hand with surprising speed as her eyes flared with panic. “No. No hospitals!”
She tried to sit up but ended up slumping back against the bed as she shook her head frantically.
“No hospitals!”
She was becoming hysterical, and I didn’t know what
to do.
“Okay,” I relented. “No hospitals, Nicole. But I’m calling Matt.”
“Matt?” she blinked.
His name calmed her, so I repeated it again as I reached for my phone.
“Yes, see?” I showed her his contact. “Matt. I’m going to call him, okay?”
She nodded and wrapped her arms around her knees, looking very much like a small, fragile child. And I hated myself for not seeing it before. For not seeing how vulnerable she really was. I’d completely underestimated what she was capable of dealing with.
“It’s going to be okay,” I said again, edging towards her slowly as I dialed Matt’s number. “It’s all going to be okay.”
***
Matt’s pounding on the door sent Nicole into another bout of hysteria, and I cringed as I ran to open it.
“Where is she?” he asked, his eyes wild as he looked around the room.
“She’s in the bedroom.”
He tried to bolt to her, but I grabbed him by the arm.
“Matt, she’s… she’s seriously traumatized. I think she’s having some kind of breakdown, but she won’t go to the hospital.”
His shoulders fell, and he nodded as though he understood.
“It’s okay,” he explained. “I’ve seen her like this before. I know how to help her.”
“You do?” I felt like the world’s shittiest friend. How come he had all the answers, and I didn’t.
He strode to the room without answering and cradled Nicole against his chest. He rocked her in his arms, whispering soothing things into her ear while he rubbed her back.
The tension dissipated from her body, and suddenly I understood. It wasn’t about having the right answers. It was about being the right person. Nicole needed Matt because she loved him whether she wanted to admit it or not.
There was a hollow pain in my own chest at the sudden epiphany. Ryland needed comfort too whether he wanted to admit or not. His pain was four-fold what Nicole was going through, but he’d never let on to it. He’d never allowed himself to be vulnerable in front of me. He took his pain and twisted it into anger, and it was the only thing holding him together.
