Grant
“This is the fifty-seventh message. Fifty-seven days. I’m sitting here staring out at the Gulf, like I used to do with you. Nothing is the same without you here. I can’t even go near the bar in my kitchen. Remembering what we did there is too difficult. Everything reminds me of you. If I could hear your voice tonight, Harlow, if I could just hear you tell me you’re OK . . . I would be better. I would be able to take a deep breath. Then I’d beg. I would beg you to love me. I would beg you to forgive me. I can’t—”
BEEP
I stood on my balcony staring out at the water as voice mail cut me off, then disconnected the call. Watching the waves crash over the shore used to comfort me. Now they reminded me of the fear that had started all of this. The fear that had made me say words to Harlow that she didn’t deserve to hear.
Losing Jace had marked me deeper than I realized. You live your life never once thinking that when you walk away from a friend or loved one, you might never see him again. Drowning in the Gulf was the last way I expected to lose a close friend. It was unexpected and tragic, and it had changed everything for me.
I had wanted to protect myself from that kind of pain in the future. Moving on and living normally after that was impossible. Bethy, Jace’s girlfriend, was proof of that. She was like a ghost now. She never smiled, and she rarely spoke. The happy gleam in her eyes was gone. I hated being near her. I hated being reminded of what could happen to all of us. She wasn’t living without Jace—she was just surviving.
I let the hand holding the phone to my ear drop to my side, then tucked it into my jeans pocket and turned to go inside. Away from the water that had changed everything for me, that had changed the lives of all of Jace’s close friends. None of us would ever be the same again. But I knew that I couldn’t protect myself from that kind of pain. Because, like Bethy, I was just surviving now. With Harlow gone, I had no reason to smile. The pain was too much. Trying not to love her was impossible—it shattered me and brought me to my knees.
My phone started ringing, and I quickly jerked it back out of my pocket. Every time it rang, my heart started beating with the hope that it was Harlow. Rush’s name appeared on the screen. As much as I wanted to smash my phone against the wall in frustration, he was still my only link to Harlow.
“Yeah,” I said, closing the door and walking to my bedroom.
“I need your help. Meet me at the club as soon as possible. I’m headed that way now.”
I wasn’t going to the club. It was time for my nightly routine, and I didn’t want to face people. “Why? I’m exhausted.”
Rush muttered a curse. “Get your ass to the club. Tripp showed up, and apparently Bethy was at the bar drinking too much, and now she’s yelling at him and saying all kinds of crazy shit. Blaire wanted to go, but Nate isn’t feeling that great, and he wants his momma. I told her you and I would check things out and bring Bethy back to my house.”
Bethy and Tripp? That didn’t even make sense. Why would Bethy be yelling at Tripp? Jace had adored his cousin. Always had. There was no reason in my mind why Bethy should be mad at him. “OK. Yeah, I’ll see you in a few.”
“Thought so,” Rush replied, then ended the call.
No one had seen Bethy do much more than move quietly through life since Jace’s death. But she was drinking at the club? That didn’t make any sense, either. She worked there as a cart girl. Why was she drunk at the bar? Her aunt would fire her ass without blinking an eye if she found out. Not that it would stick. Blaire would get upset and ask Rush, who was on the board of directors, to do something about it. Della wouldn’t be happy, either, and seeing as how her boyfriend, Woods, owned the place—and did everything in his power to make her happy—he’d do something about it, too. But still. What the fuck was she thinking?
I grabbed my truck keys and headed out the door to deal with Bethy.
I could hear Bethy yelling the moment I stepped out of the truck, but I couldn’t see where it was coming from. It was too loud to be coming from inside, so someone had to have gotten Bethy to the parking lot. I closed my truck door and followed the sound. Near the staff entrance, I saw Rush holding Bethy’s arms down and talking to her. Tripp stood there, running his hands through his hair as if he wasn’t sure what the hell to do. Woods talked to him quietly, and all Tripp did was shake his head no in return.
“Come back to the house with me. Blaire wants you there. You need her right now. You also need to sober up. Tripp didn’t do anything to you, Bethy. You’re still grieving, and he was the closest person you could find to take it out on.” Rush’s voice was gentle but demanding.
“You don’t know shit, Rush! Youdonknowshit!” Bethy slurred, shoving at Rush’s chest. “No one knows! But he does!” she screamed, pointing a finger at Tripp. “He ruined me! He broke me. I wasn’t good enough. I was never good enough! It’s all his fault. He came back. Why did you come back, huh? Were you trying to hurt me? You fucking succeeded! You are the reason my life is hell on earth!” She was trembling now.
“Where’s Della?” I asked, drawing everyone’s attention to me. “Bethy needs a friend. We’re just gonna upset her more like this.”
Woods didn’t look like he wanted Della around. He had to stop protecting her as if she was about to break. She was strong and healthy. He didn’t know what fragile was. He had no idea.
“She’s asleep. She’s been up since five this morning,” Woods said in a hard voice that meant he wasn’t calling her.
“I need to leave. Seeing me upsets her. I thought I could talk to her, but she’s not ready. Not yet,” Tripp said. The pain in his voice was so damn obvious it hurt. He was possibly the one person who was suffering from Jace’s death as much as Bethy. Why wouldn’t she accept his help?
“Upset? You think I’m upset? I was fuckin’ upset five years ago. Now I’m . . . lost.” She said the last word in almost a whisper. Then she crumpled to the floor and wrapped her arms around her legs as she began sobbing so hard her body shook violently.
“We gotta do something. Blaire will know what to say. I should have sent Blaire and you. I just made everything worse,” Rush said, looking back at me. Then he turned his attention to Tripp and stared at him a moment. “You know why she hates you, don’t you?” he said in his simple, to-the-point manner.
Tripp didn’t respond.
“Yes! He knows!” she wailed. “He knows. But Jace never knew.”
Bethy’s drunken ranting wasn’t making any sense to me.
I hated watching this. I hated knowing that months after Jace’s death, Bethy was still a broken, empty soul. Stepping around Rush, I bent down to Bethy’s eye level. “I’m gonna pick you up and take you to Rush’s car. He’s gonna take you to Blaire, and you’re gonna let her take care of you. She’ll be there to listen. You can trust her. She loves you. Now, put your arm around my shoulder.”
Her sad, red-rimmed eyes stared up at me for a few seconds before she put her arm around my neck. I braced one arm against her back and slid one arm under her legs and stood up with her.
“Where did you park?” I asked Rush.
“Just down there on the other side of Woods,” he replied.
I glanced one last time at Tripp, who was watching Bethy with the same hopeless look I understood all too well. What didn’t make sense was why Tripp was looking at Bethy like he’d move heaven and earth to take her pain away. Did they really even know each other?