I can feel the blood draining from my face. She’s never spoken to me like this before; true, she’s always been a bit of a hardass and more than a little over protective, but seriously, this is the first time she’s spoken to me like I’m an idiot who can’t be trusted to make their own decisions. “What do you mean by that?” I ask.
Pippa puts her tea down on the kitchen counter, walks around it and takes both of my hands in hers. Her eyes are peaked with worry, her brows banked together in a frown. “I love you, Sloane. You’re like a sister to me. I know that’s no consolation to you—that you’ve been terrified for your actual sister, and that’s been a main priority for you—but you have to know I’m always going to look out for you. This guy…” She shakes her head. “This guy is bad news. The kind of guy you avoid like the ever-loving plague. And you’re not doing that right now. I’ve seen this all before, Sloane. This attraction you’re feeling, it’s like being pulled into the shadows, and I also know that that probably feels really good. It’s almost undeniable, probably. You’ve fought for so long and so hard to keep your head above water that sinking now seems like the best possible option. But trust me, it’s not. Giving in to someone like that, to a controlling guy who refuses to let anyone else hold any power over him, it won’t end well. He’ll break you. He’ll take everything you’ve built and tear it down, and coming back from something like that is so much harder than recovering from any regular addiction.”
I’ve been so still as she’s said this to me. I’ve blinked maybe twice, but apart from that I’ve sat frozen in dumb silence, trying to understand the words coming out of her mouth. I can’t sit still any longer. “You say you love me like a sister, Pip?”
“Yeah.” She nods, and her eyes are bright and a little too shiny—she looks like she’s on the verge of tears. “I do, Sloane.”
I squeeze her hands back, leaning forward and feeling my heart break just a little. “Then how can you not know me at all?”
Her lips part, her mouth falling open, and I know how this will go. We’re both volatile people. We’re about to have the fight. The fight that changes our friendship, maybe for good. Maybe irreparably. She pulls her hands out of mine.
“I do know you. I know that you—”
BRRRRRRRRRNNNNNNNN.
The robotic buzz of her intercom shuts down whatever she was about to tell me. My jaw is beginning to ache, and I realize I’ve been clenching my teeth. For a second we just remain frozen in silence, looking at one another. When the buzzer goes again, Pippa blinks and looks away, smoothing a hand over her immaculate hair. “That’ll be Lacey,” she says.
“Yeah,” I reply. “It will.” I get up and grab my coat, which is still slightly damp from last night’s rain. “Tell her to call me later if she wants to grab a coffee or something, yeah?”
“You’re not staying for the session?”
I’m already at the door, my palm feeling the press of the cool metal handle beneath it. “Not really standard for a civilian to be present during a patient’s treatment, is it?”
Pippa gives me a hard look. “She might not talk if you’re not here.”
“She’ll talk. She set up the appointment.” I hit the access button on the intercom by the door, then I open it and I hurry down the stairwell before Lacey—and probably Zeth—can make it up to her floor in the elevator.
******
In my book, running down flights of stairs are just as hard as running up them. My thighs and ass are killing me by the time I reach the ground floor. The fresh air hits me like a wall of ice, shocking the oxygen right out of my lungs. It’s cold. Way colder than it usually is in autumn, but for once the wind is absent, leaving the day still and calm. I’m waiting to cross into the park when my cell phone rings. Damn it. Maybe I was wrong. Maybe Lacey won’t talk unless I’m there. I don’t see why my presence would be so important, though. I mean, she has Zeth. He’s been her be-all and end-all for months now. I’m about to pick up the call and tell Pippa that Lacey will just have to make do with her brother, when I see the number.
It’s an out-of-state number. Not one I recognize. I’m not in the habit of answering calls from strange numbers, but the source of the call this time has me breaking rules. Maybe…just maybe…
“Hello?”
There’s a pause on the other end of the line, and then an entertained and altogether male voice says, “What’s up, Doc?”
A jolt passes through me. A deeply violent and unpleasant one. “What the hell do you want?” I demand. I know perfectly well who it is—it’s the man I recently discovered is married to my sister. I’d thought that perhaps it was Alexis calling me to, I don’t know, apologize for everything she’s put me and Mom and Dad through. But no. It’s not her; it’s her motorcycle-riding, tattoo-covered, smug-grinned husband.