Filfthy (34 page)

R
oyal

“
Y
ou’re late
, Royal.” Pandora folds her arms when I return from lunch.

“First time for everything.”

“You’re lucky I don’t tell Daddy.”

“I’m staying late tonight to make up for it.” My fingers hook my belt loops. “Worked ten hours overtime last week. Highly doubt he has a problem with me grabbing an extra fifteen minutes at lunch.”

She pouts, and I know that look. She’s trying to start shit, and it’s all because she saw me run off with Demi.

“Who’s the rich bitch that came in here looking for you? New girlfriend?” Pandora leans over the counter, her tits falling out of her unbuttoned top. I don’t look, and I’m sure that pisses her off.

“Not new,” I say.

“Old girlfriend?” Pandora huffs through her nose.

“Yep.”

I clock back in at the computer beside her and turn to leave, only her nails dig into the flesh of my forearm.

Groaning, I face her.

“Does she know?” she asks, one pencil-thin brow arched. “Does she know what you are?”

A flood of panic courses through me so quickly it stings. Out of hundreds of scenarios, Demi finding out from someone like Pandora never crossed my mind. They were never supposed to cross paths in the first place. I never counted on Demi showing up in South Fork out of the blue.

“She knows everything,” I lie. I have no choice. I’ll be damned if I let Pandora hold anything over my head, especially my past.

The fact that Demi came to me today tells me we’re making progress. If Pandora fucks me over . . .

Pandora turns her back to me. “You’re a shitty liar, Royal.”

D
emi

“
O
h
, my God. Where have you been?” Delilah slams the passenger door of my car and yanks the seatbelt over her lap. “I’ve been calling you since this morning when I heard.”

“My phone died.” I point to my black-screened phone and the white cord running into the car charger. It didn’t die at all, but the excuse works in a pinch. And it’s easier than telling her what I was really doing.

“Have you been at the hospital? How’s Brooks?”

“He’s been with doctors all day. They’re running a bunch of tests, and I couldn’t really stick around since I’m not legally family, so I left.”

“You left? Like, you left the hospital.” Delilah cranks my heater. I turn it down a few notches.

I nod and flick on my right turn signal.

My sister slumps in her seat. “Oh. So did you at least say bye? Tell him you were coming back? Did he recognize you?”

“It was a little chaotic. There were a lot of doctors and nurses. I doubt anyone noticed I left.”

Delilah’s lips dance, moving from a frown to a smile and back. “Wait. So your comatose fiancé wakes up, and the first thing you do is leave the hospital?”

My hands shake, and I attempt to steady them with a firm grip on the steering wheel.

“You’re judging me, Delilah.”

“Damn right, I’m judging you. This isn’t like you. Like, who
are
you right now?” She shakes her head before giving me a sideways glance. “You’re hiding something. This is about Royal, isn’t it?”

My body tremors from head to toe, and my vision blurs. The closer we get to the hospital, the sicker I feel. But it’s an emotional kind of sickness. The kind you can’t fix with modern medicine.

I check my mirrors and veer off to the side of the road, pulling into a row of empty parallel parking spots in front of the Rixton County Courthouse.

“Jesus, Demi, what the hell?” Delilah angles her body toward me and scoots to the edge of the seat. “Are you okay? Tell me what’s going on. Now.”

My body expands with each breath, and still it acts like it can’t get enough air. I roll my window down and inhale the cool air like my life depends on it.

“I knew it,” Delilah says. “This
is
about Royal. He’s the only one who can make you act like a damn lunatic.”

When I’m finally able to speak, I meet her glaring stare and clear my throat. “This is about so much more than you know.”

“All right. Fine. Enlighten me.”

“The night of the accident, Brooks left me. He ended the engagement.”

Delilah’s judgmental expression fades and her eyes soften. “What? Seriously?”

“His bags were packed when I came home from work. He said he wanted out. And I didn’t try to stop him.”

She takes my trembling hand and sandwiches it between hers.

“Why didn’t you say anything?” Her head tilts, her voice just a smidgeon whiny.

“I didn’t think anyone would believe me. I mean, look at the timing.” My throat constricts. “And you love Brooks so much. You’re so excited about the wedding.”

“
I
believe you, Demi.”

“You . . . you do?”

Delilah nods. “I know you’d never make something up like this.”

“Yeah, but you’re my sister. You know me. All those people who don’t know me—you think they’d believe me?”

She shakes her head. “Probably not. Timing does seem suspect.”

“See?” I almost start to feel vindicated, like I’m not crazy for carrying on this little façade this past week. “But that’s not all.”

“Okay.” Delilah squares her shoulders.

“When he left, he was going to
her
.”

“Her?”

“He was seeing someone on the side.” It seems so polite to say it that way.
Seeing someone on the side
. Sounds a hell of a lot nicer than saying he was fucking another woman with his dick while also fucking me with his dick and I had no idea.

Delilah heaves, her hand flying to her lips. “How do you know?”

“Royal told me.”

Her sympathy fades in an instant. “Seriously? Royal told you all this? Okay. I see what’s happening here.”

My brows furrow. “I’m not following.”

“Royal’s manipulating you. He wants you back, and what better way to get you to think Brooks was a cheater?”

I laugh. “No, it’s not like that at all.”

“He’s totally manipulating you, and you don’t even see it. He won’t tell you what happened until you spend more time with him, right? And he wants to make sure you won’t ever go back to Brooks, right? Don’t you see? It’s clear as day, Demi.”

I refuse to believe. And she doesn’t know him like I do.

“Have you been spending more time with him lately?” she asks.

“Yeah.”

“So he’s getting what he wants from you. And what are you getting out of all of this?” Delilah’s hands flail when she speaks. She’s always had a penchant for speaking with her hands when she really wants to get a point across. “You’re right back in his web, Demi. He set a trap, and you walked right in.”

“You’re being dramatic.”

“Do you have proof of this alleged affair?”

I glance to my left, thinking. Racking. Remembering.

“No,” I say a moment later. “No proof.”

“So you’re making life decisions based on Royal’s allegations?”

“What do you mean, life decisions? Brooks ended the engagement. That was his decision, not mine. Don’t you think there had to have been someone else, Delilah? Brooks was crazy about me. Everything was fine in the days leading up to that night. Nothing was out of the ordinary. And then he left.”

She tugs on her bottom lip, staring at the numbers on the radio.

“Yeah, obviously he had a reason for calling it off. But you can’t take Royal’s word for it. You have to find out from Brooks.”

“Royal said he saw Brooks with another woman in Glidden,” I say. “And he said he went up to him, told him he was a friend of mine, and threatened to tell me unless Brooks made a choice. And Brooks obviously chose her, so . . .”

“Okay, assuming Royal’s not full of shit and that really did happen,” she says. “Who is this mystery woman? Did he describe her to you?”

“I didn’t ask. I didn’t want to know at the time.” My chest deflates, and I sink against the back of the driver’s seat. “All I know is that she lives in Glidden.”

Delilah rolls her eyes. “Girls from Glidden were always bitches.”

“I know this sounds completely insane, Delilah, but I just have this gut feeling that it’s Afton.”

Her eyes narrow and then grow round. “Afton? Like the reporter from the Herald?”

“Yeah.”

“Why do you think that?”

I rake my fingers through my hair and catch the grease and metal scent of Royal, quickly remembering how my hands were all over him just a mere hour ago.

I don’t know why I went there or why I did what I did. The last place I need to be is on my knees before the only man who broke me. Seeing Brooks this morning made me so numb that I just wanted to feel something.

“I don’t know.” I sigh. “I guess it’s silly. And random. I have no proof it’s Afton.”

“That asshole.” Delilah smacks the dash, lips pursed. “If he really cheated on you, so help me . . .”

“What are you going to do about it, huh?” I half-chuckle. My car grows silent, each of us lost in our own thoughts or maybe wrapping our heads around how screwed up this situation is. “We should probably head to the hospital.”

Delilah buckles up. “Yeah. Guess so.”

D
emi

“
T
here’s our girl
.” Brenda Abbott’s face lights when I step into Brooks’s new room. They moved him today, while I was gone. He’s down the hall from the ICU now, into a larger room better equipped for his recovery. The windows are bigger, and several bouquets of flowers and balloons line the ledge.

Brenda rises and takes my hand, and Delilah and I exchange looks. My sister gives me a reassuring half-smile, a silent promise that the
later’
s going to be okay if I can just get through the
now
.

“We missed you today, sweetheart.” Brenda’s voice is loud, and she speaks slowly, enunciating each syllable.

Is Brooks hearing impaired now? Is his mental capacity diminished?

“Hi.” I stare into Brooks’s familiar eyes when I get to his bedside. Feels like I’m looking at a stranger. My nerves tingle through to my fingertips, and my heart trots.

I wish we were alone.

I wish I could ask him my questions and he could give me his answers.

“Demi.” He says my name, though it comes out like scratched air. And then he smiles.

“Here, take my seat, dear.” Brenda points before pushing up a chair to her son’s bedside.

His fingers curl into a half-opened fist, like they’re stuck that way. And he’s propped up with a half-dozen pillows. His hair has been washed since this morning. I can tell, because it’s shiny and blond and neatly combed. With the exception of the fading bruises on his face, he looks more like himself now than he did this morning.

Brooks’s fingers twitch, and he uses all of his strength to reach for me.

I oblige, our gazes locked.

“I’m . . . sorry.” His apology is breathy and slow. Brooks’s green eyes search mine, blinking slowly.

I’m not exactly sure what he’s apologizing for. For leaving me? For the accident? For the credit cards? For the cheating?

I pat his hand the way a friend might, and I bite my tongue when the urge to tell him not to worry about it floats through my mind. It’s like an auto-response. Someone apologizes, and I tell them not to worry about it.

But it’s not like that now.

What Brooks did was beyond . . .

And I won’t brush it off, even if he does look helpless and remorseful and like he’s two seconds from crying.

I’ve never seen Brooks cry before. Four years together, and I never saw a single tear. He came close once, after an intense golf game with my brother.

He blinks, and a fat tear slides from the corner of his eye.

“I’m . . . sorry,” he breathes again.

Brenda doesn’t see any of this. She’s talking to Delilah in the corner, and they seem to be chatting about this weekend’s fundraiser—which I completely forgot about until now.

They stop chatting when Brenda turns to watch us and sees me looking at her.

“Everything okay over there?” she smiles and strides back over. Placing her hand on her son’s knee, she leans down. “Guess what, Brooks? Demi’s quitting her job so she can take care of you full-time. How wonderful is that? I always knew you were marrying a keeper. She’s a good girl, Brooks. Never left your side once. Except today.”

I see Delilah cock her head out of the corner of my eye.

Why Brenda would lie to him to make me look good is beyond me, but her little dig was one hundred percent intentional.

Brooks looks my way and mouths, “Thank you.”

Heat creeps up my neck.

Really?

He’s just going to pretend like we never broke up?

The weight of a warm palm on my back and Delilah’s chin on my shoulder grounds me for a moment.

“Hey, Brooks,” she says. “How’re you feeling?”

We all laugh, and I know exactly what she’s doing. She’s taking the heat off me, lightening the mood, and putting on a good face. But I know my sister, and inside she’s cursing his name.

He smiles, his face pained, and gives her a thumbs-up.

“Delilah, what do you say we grab ourselves some coffee and give our love birds some time alone together?” Brenda slicks a palm over her black bob.

My sister looks at me, and I give her my blessing. The second they’re gone, I shut the door and return to his bedside, perching on the edge of the mattress. His hand lifts, falling in my lap, his fingers touching mine.

He wants me to hold his hand.

I place mine on top of his, but I don’t hold it. I don’t interlace our fingers or give him any kind of indication that the past is water under the bridge.

“Demi.” He says my name again, like he’s starving and it’s nourishment. His other hand goes to his chest, slowly, and then points to me. No, to my heart. He’s saying he loves me.

“You . . . you love me?” I ask.

He nods, his eyes slowly closing and reopening.

“Brooks.” I pat his hand. “You left me. Remember?”

Brooks’s green eyes furrow. He’s confused.

“The night of your accident, you ended our engagement.”

He shakes his head from side to side in silent disagreement.

“Yes,” I say. “You did. You left me. Your bags were packed, you said you didn’t want to marry me, and you got in your car and drove away.”

He squints, glancing to the right and back, and then shakes his head again.

The doctors warned this could happen. Short-term memory loss is a highly common occurrence among victims of brain trauma.

“Do you remember anything about that night?” I ask. “Anything at all?”

Brooks’s eyes study mine, and his fingers twitch and attempt to uncurl beneath mine. He moves them enough to hook his pinky into mine.

And then he shakes his head no.