Underside of Courage (Beautifully Disturbed Series Book 2)

by Sarah Zolton Arthur

  Well, what’s bad for my heart is good for my teammates, at least our project is coming along. It’s all I do, classes, work at the writing center, and work on the project. So far, our marketing plan is killer.

  Early on in the semester, when we were still brainstorming ideas for our marketing campaign, we weren’t sure if we were going to make up a product or market a real, as of yet, unmarketed one. Although, real products tended to get the better grades in Gregory’s past classes. Hart’s girlfriend came home to the apartment they share, where we’d been studying, with three bottles of this sparkling beverage for us.

  She knew the guy who made it, and knew we were looking for a product. The drinks, he calls them Pros, but we’ve been working on a better name since then, are chucked full of probiotics and eleven original herbs and spices. Wait, that’s KFC. I don’t know all that’s in these drinks, except for they’re super healthy, are naturally sugar-free (unless you pick a fruit juice flavor) and the natural one, which is the original flavor, tastes like a super crisp, clean Sprite.

  We’re presenting to Dr. Gregory, a healthy alternative for folks who don’t want to give up soda.

  Our product is new and relevant. I don’t know how we can lose.

  Which couldn’t come at a better time for me. If I can give myself something to look forward to, say, a trip to the Big Apple, then I know I’ll be able to make it the rest of the way through the semester.

  My sister left two weeks ago.

  I should be able to get out of the apartment and live my life. I mean, I know Collin left for a conference a couple days ago. And I hate myself a little bit more for knowing, for caring.

  He and Benton have had these Spring Break plans for months. Elle, Sabrina and Errol were supposed to have headed out with them.

  I spend the day lounging in bed.

  My phone rings, startling me from the nap I’d fallen into even though it’s too late in the day to be napping. Seems to be a pattern with me. My spring break has consisted of: watching TV, product development, and napping.

  Since Kay visited, I didn’t bother going home for break.

  What would be the point?

  To face their looks of sympathy or “we’ve all been there” or “it gets better” speeches. Because maybe they all have been through it and maybe it does get better. But that’s not what I want to hear right now. I’m not ready to hear it now. Yet the schmuck in me doesn’t want any one of them tearing him down either. Not that they would, well except for Kayna, and she’s still rooted firmly on the Col-And-Kip-Are-Meant-To-Be-Together-And-Will-Find-A-Way-Back-To-Eachother side of our breakup. All other members of the Daniels clan whether pro or anti Collin are too diplomatic to rip on him.

  The display says Benton Hayes. What the hell would Benton want?

  I’d hoped he’d gotten the hint already. I mean, they’ve tried several times to get me to come out with them since that scene at The Brew, but no matter what Elle said to me, they’re his friends and they were his friends first. Still, I grab up my cell and click answer.

  “Have you seen Elle?” He rushes into my ear at the same time I say, “Hello?”

  “Have you seen her?” he repeats himself, bordering on frantic. “Heard from her?”

  “No. Calm down, what happened?” I’m beginning to panic myself but force out my best authoritative tone as one of us needs to keep it together for the time being.

  “Elle, she’s gone. We were in Indiana for my grandmother’s funeral. Something happened and she took off. I know she headed back home, but no one’s seen or heard from her. What am I gonna do?”

  Shit! Elle gone? “Christ, where are you?”

  “Outside my apartment.”

  “Don’t leave, I’m coming. We’ll figure something out.”

  Since I agreed to go all in, hideous idea or not, I grab my keys off the dresser and jog out to my car, trying the whole time not to think. Unsuccessfully. All my thoughts go back to him being there with Benton, and how it’ll crush me to see him again. But at the same time, she’s my friend. Even without my participation over the past month, hence not being a very good one in return.

  Benton’s the first person I see, and it’s in his direction I head. Of course just as I thought, or tried not to think about, he’s there consoling his friend.

  At his look, which looks almost as lost as I feel, but I don’t know if his lost look is for her or me or the both of us, and I could kick myself for wanting that look directed at me for me. That look should be for me because he sees what he lost and realizes he’s lost without me. This is where my thoughts go. And with our friend missing, which officially makes me the king of assholes. At his look, I pierce him with one of my own.

  “I’m here for Elle.”

  Because in the end, it doesn’t matter anyway, if that lost look is for me or Elle or the both of us. He and I are over. I tried. Over and over. He had every piece of me laid out open, willing to give him everything if he could just give me something, anything back. It hurts so much to look at him when I know—I know—it’s not that he couldn’t, but he wouldn’t give me something, anything.

  When I reach Benton, I pull him in for a brief hug. Well, I meant for it to be brief, but the man feels as if he’s going to break at any moment and holding onto me is akin to holding on to life itself.

  What if we don’t find her? They were supposed to take care of her. That eye spasm is starting behind my left eye again. We have to get this search party, or whatever we are, moving. “Let’s check her apartment.”

  “Benton, you brought me a present,” Sabrina jokes, although without the same level of humor as when she first spoke those words what feels like twelve lifetimes ago now.

  “He has to take his own car,” Errol spits out, almost angry. His arm draped around her shoulder. “He’s too distracting. How can I search for Elle while such a ridiculously hot hottie sits in the back seat? Bri and I will spend the whole time checking out the rearview mirror.”

  I bark out a laugh. The insensitive asshole that I am. What he said wasn’t even that funny. More, familiar. Like how we used to be. So for a split second I’m carrying a whole lot of guilt.

  Seriously, who laughs when a friend goes missing? Apparently, we all do. As Sabrina, Errol and Collin laugh along with me. Even Benton snickers a little through his nose. It’s like laughing at a funeral. Sometimes people need that break, that release of tension, for sanity’s sake. And it burns out as fast as it came on us.

  Less than five minutes after piling back into our cars I roll to a stop in front of Elle’s old apartment, the one she shared with Kelly Prescott before moving in with Benton. It—god, I don’t even know how to describe the chaos in front of my eyes—looks like the place has been completely torched, and more than just because of the fire truck and several firemen milling about.

  Benton climbs out of the car he’s riding in before any of the rest of us exits ours. He stands in front of the burned out, shell of an apartment as if in a trance. The trance only lasts a minutes, until he moves one hand to hold the back of his neck, and the other hand to rest on his hip, like the rest of us, taking in the damage. Though he takes it in alongside Collin, as they both talk to a reasonably hysterical Kelly—who still lives in the apartment—Zena standing with.

  “Is everyone okay? What—” he starts to ask I’m sure the what the hell happened question we’d all like the answer to when she cuts him off with a half scream, half sob.

  “That crazy bitch torched my home!” Kelly cries and screams at the same time. She has snot running down her nose. I’ve never seen her so un-put-together.

  “What are you talking about?” Benton tries again.

  Elle. She’s talking about Elle. I don’t know how I know, but I know. How could our sweet Elle be capable of torching an apartment?

  “That crazy bitch was here” Kelly screeches again. “They found her phone in the microwave. I can’t believe this. I cannot fucking believe this.”

  So we have a ra
pidly deteriorating situation? Check.

  My friends are systematically and simultaneously breaking down? Check.

  Think Kip, think. You’re a smart man.

  On that thought I take in one really long breath and let it out slowly enough to clear my head, at least somewhat. And it hits me that was Elle’s ritual. The one she got from her therapist for anxiety. We’re going to bring Elle and her ritual back home where she belongs.

  “Benton.” The man, he’s crazy gone. Pacing. Both hands pushing his hair back to the top of his head exposing a worry-lined forehead. As much as I hate to, “Benton!” I snap more sternly to capture his attention. When he finally looks my way and actually focuses, I ask him in a softer voice, “She can’t do much without money. Does she have money?”

  “No. Uh—no. She left her purse.”

  “Do you know her bank?” I ask.

  “It’s, uh… it’s First Community Credit Union.”

  “Well with no card, she’ll probably hit there first thing in the morning. Banks are closed, she can’t get anything out until then.”

  He shakes his head, seeming to calm down until boom! Like my words suddenly, deeply penetrate, and he goes down into a squat, ass to heels, still clutching his head like he’s tripped a spring-loaded detonator and if he removes any part of his fingers or hands his head will explode like a ripe cantaloupe dropped off a ten story building.

  “What the hell will she do until then?” The sound of his voice almost breaks me.

  Keep it together, Kip.

  “No car, right?” I ask yet another question. I seem to be the only one asking questions.

  “No. Keys in her purse.” The words, unfortunately, come from him. The first words he’s spoken to me since that horrific day. My heart sinks, sinks to sinkhole depths because I miss the sound of his voice. Especially spoken so softly like he’d done just then. God, I’m pathetic.

  Stay on track. You’re here for Elle.

  “Then let’s split up.” I give what I think is a better response than throwing myself at the man and begging him to hold me, which is what I want more than anything in the world. To feel those strong arms around me again, for us to weather the storm together.

  Sabrina and Errol, finally join us. “We went looking a little bit,” Errol tells the group. “What’d we miss?”

  “We’re splitting up. Searching.” That’s me again, taking charge of the situation. “Abandon buildings within walking distance. Public restrooms like gas stations...”

  None of us are too happy about the list we’ve created, of places worse than abandon buildings and public restrooms where Elle might spend the night. Places we still have to check.

  There’s the park where a lot of illegal shit happens. And there are a couple crack houses nearby.

  Benton is a mess. An absolute mess.

  If Elle doesn’t come back to us unharmed, my mother’s priest will not be happy with all I’ll have to confess. But because at least one of us has to believe we’ll find her. “We’ll find her.” I try to assure him, as well as myself.

  “Errol and I’ll head south,” Bri tells us. “Take the historic district.”

  “Then I’ll do west and Benton, you and he can take east.” I wave a finger in Collin’s direction to avoid looking at him. “We can look north, but there’s mostly suburbs that way and no branches of her credit union that I know of. So she’s gonna want to stay in a direction where she wouldn’t have as far to walk.”

  With a head nod to everyone save him, I climb back into my Camry and head west.

  The rest of my night gets taken up with searching everywhere west of campus to have a possible hiding place for our girl. With no results. Texting back and forth, none of us seem to be having any results.

  When eight a.m. hits, our group converges bleary-eyed at the credit union’s main branch, the south branch, only to find out the manager, who has known Elle for years now, let her in early feeling sorry for her predicament. Who lets a woman withdrawal that much money without proper identification even if you know her? Can anyone say clusterfuck?

  And then there’s Benton. I almost miss the mess he was yesterday. It’s like someone switched off a light switch on his facial features, no more than that, his hope. From tired yet hopeful to completely…blank. And I’ve never seen that man blank—ever.

  So the five of us stand outside the credit union, making plans which have no chance of working. Well four of us make the plans. Because like before, Benton’s hopelessness has descended on us like a Michigan heatwave saturating every breath, the humidity of his emotion stifling. No relief to be found until she’s found.

  I can’t stand to watch him.

  Standing off alone by the car, with his chin drooped to his chest, hands resting at his hips, his eyes never look up from the heavy contemplation of his shoes.

  “He’s breaking,” Collin says, causing all our heads to shift, looking at our crestfallen friend.

  “Yeah, he is.” Errol agrees automatically.

  “Errol and I will take him for a while. That way one of us has him while the other searches.” The offer comes from Sabrina.

  “Kip.” Errol’s hand grasps my shoulder. “You should go with Col.”

  Excuse me? Go with him?

  No. No way. Not possible today or any other day until the day I take my last breath.

  “Sorry, no.” My eyes snap in succession looking first at him then Bri and finally landing on Errol before I’m able to pull myself together. “It’d probably be best if we take separate cars. Cover more ground.”

  “Listen Kip. I know I’m the last person you want to be around now, but he’s not wrong. We might cover more ground, but paying attention to driving means more chances to miss her.”

  Can I sit trapped in a car with Collin?

  I can’t sit trapped in a car with Collin.

  “You can’t ask me to do that.” And dammit if my voice doesn’t crack on the word “do” so he knows, again he knows how badly I still hurt over him. I never wanted him to know.

  “For Elle,” he says. Just that, “For Elle.”

  Take away the fact I actually want to help look for her, she’s my friend. I say no now then I leave regular old asshole behind for first class, grade A asshole. No redemption to be found.

  I cannot believe what I’m about to do. Sucking in a breath through my nose, I steel my jaw and bite out, “fine.”

  Collin is smart enough not to walk near me as we head to his car parked two over from mine.

  For a March day in Michigan, this one actually starts off nice. Mid-fifties so early in the morning. It’s hard to complain about mid-fifties, sun shining down brightly. I look everywhere but at him, but then I can’t look anywhere but at him. He’s so beautiful standing next to his door, waiting for me to climb in, rays to his back bathing his skin, his face, his eyes in an almost incandescent light. The love of my life.

  For Elle.

  You can do this, Kip.

  For Elle.

  Chapter 28

  Collin

  I can’t believe I have Kip sitting next to me again, and I don’t know what to say. How to act. A month ago he shared my bed. A month ago we shared a bed and now we have nothing to say. No, take that back. There’s volumes upon volumes to say, I just don’t think either of us knows where to start. And it’s all my fault.

  Something has to happen here. I’ve never been a fan of the silent treatment, but especially not from him. Col, you’re a grown-ass man. Act like it.

  I got him here. The hardest part is over, right?

  Say something… Grasping at air I say the first thing to pop in my head. “Thanks for helping. Ben’s trying but he’s pretty useless for now. He loves that woman more than anything. Her being gone, it’s fucked him up.”

  “I know the feeling,” he responds dryly.

  If that’s not a great big kick to the nuts. Not to mention a conversational door slam. He wasn’t supposed to answer. He was supposed to nod his head or l
ift his chin as a universal ‘I get it’ in order for me to slowly ease us into the talk we need to have. So now that he has, how do I reply?

  I’m sorry?

  The two lamest words in the English language. He doesn’t want to hear those words. And he especially doesn’t want to hear them from me. I know because shoe on the other foot, I would not want to hear them from him.

  Okay Collin, regroup. Keep it going. Say something. Anything… “So you have a date for your friend’s wedding?” Anything but that, stupid.

  His head whips to look at me. “Really Collin? Because I haven’t spent the past month nursing a broken heart. One of us hasn’t gone out ready to replace the other. So yeah, I’ve totally met someone and gotten close enough with him to invite him to an out of state wedding. Sounds just like me, doesn’t it?”

  “I didn’t sleep with him.” Why my brain chooses those words out of all the words I could choose, no clue. I guess because he needs to hear them.

  “That’s great for you,” he says back, acidly.

  “I just needed you to know. He was outside The Brew when I was walking in. He invited himself. I haven’t been with anyone else.”

  “You get off screwing with my head? I’m trying so hard to move on. Why can’t you give me that, just shut up and look for Elle?”

  “Because I miss you. I miss my best friend.”

  “Great. But it doesn’t change a thing. Not a damn thing.”

  “You know,” Elle says as Ben starts the car, “Kip is wonderful, he’s genuine and is full of a lot of love.” My head whips up, eyes wide, drilling her. She’s overstepped. Again. But has she? I don’t know.

  “She’s right, Col. He’d want you to be happy. My brother loved you—fuck he loved you.” Ben pounds the poor steering wheel with the palm of his hand. Things are starting to get way too serious again. I don’t want to talk about him. About Kip. My best friend telling me his dead brother loved me when all I can think about is Kip and how I…he’s so special.

  The strain in my voice becomes thick, coated with pain when I ask, “Aren’t you mad at me? How can you stand it knowing… knowing I’ve been unfaithful to Drew? He deserved better and I couldn’t take losing you. I won’t survive it.”