“Bite me. I didn’t have time to stop at my condo to change. Got any spare clothes here?” I knew he did. With Lacey away at college and the club a good distance away from where we lived in Ashford, Kade spent at least three nights a week in Boston.
He flicked his head toward the private bathroom. Mr. Robinson had it built just for Kade when he handed over the management of Rumors to him after we graduated high school. I beelined it into the spacious room. He was older than Kross, Kody, and me by a year, but we were all over six feet tall and fit into the same size clothes, more or less. I opened a cabinet adjacent to the sink and snagged a pair of jeans and a Hinder Band T-shirt. I changed quickly and stuffed the tuxedo into the cabinet. Since Chloe and I were no longer dating, I hoped I would never have to wear that monkey suit again. For a second, I thought to throw the tux into the trash but decided against it.
I went back into the office. “I left the tux for you, bro. You can make use of it when you marry that beautiful girl of yours.” Parking my butt in a chair, I propped my feet up on top of the desk.
“Where is she, by the way?” Kade glanced at his watch. When Lacey was home from college, Kade hardly let her out of his sight.
“No idea. Chloe spent the majority of time at the fartsy gala in the bathroom, and Lacey was with her. My guess would be they’re still in the bathroom.”
“What’s wrong? Chloe okay?” Kade pinned me with a glare. “Did you upset her again? You know her old man will have your balls on a skewer.”
“For three years you’ve been worried about her father killing me. I can handle Pitt. Besides, you know Chloe and I aren’t an item anymore. And her old man was pleased, if you ask me.” I couldn’t say for sure, but Kade’s best friend, Hunt, who worked for Pitt, mentioned Pitt had been in a good mood since Chloe and I had broken up.
“You’re not using her for sex, are you?”
“Those days are done, bro.” I wasn’t about to stay with a girl who wanted more than I could give. I saw my future with me and only me, although I couldn’t help but think of the girl who’d left me standing on the scorching tar street seven years ago. I dropped my feet to the floor. “Kade, have you ever thought about the Reardons? I mean, whatever happened to Lizzie and her family?”
He pinched his eyebrows together. “Where did that come from?”
I rubbed my chin. “For some reason, I’ve been thinking about Lizzie.” Her scent. Her dark hair. Her blue-gray eyes. Her long neck. Her plump lips—the ones I kissed and would give anything to kiss again. I’d bet at the age of twenty she was more beautiful than I remembered.
“Are you thinking of Karen? The anniversary of her death is coming up. It’ll be seven years since she died. And you always go weird on us around that time.”
I leaned on my knees. “So? I miss her.” Every one of us in the family missed Karen. She had been Daddy’s little girl, Mom’s princess, and to us boys she had been the most precious girl in the world. She had been happy, beautiful, and intelligent—sometimes too smart for her own good.
“Kel, we all miss Karen. But you hide for days around the anniversary of her death. I get that you have to work out your own shit. I get you loved her. We all handle emotions differently. Yet after seven years I’d have expected you to have come to terms with her death.”
Easy for you to say. You aren’t the one who can’t remember if you left the gun cabinet unlocked. You aren’t the one who was distracted by a beautiful girl who had walked into the garage that day as I was putting away ammo. My old man had told us that Karen found the combination to the gun safe. I wasn’t sure I believed him. He always had a way of trying to protect us, even our feelings. Somewhere in the back of my mind I suspected he wanted to shoulder the blame so my mom wouldn’t think that any of her sons were responsible for Karen’s death. I couldn’t bring myself to broach the subject with any of my siblings or my father, and I wasn’t about to now. If my mom found out I might’ve been the one to leave the gun cabinet unlocked, she could relapse and have to return to the mental health facility where she’d lived for years after Karen’s death. I couldn’t handle that. I couldn’t handle the screams that came from her room at night. I couldn’t handle her depressed and crying all the time. Most of all, I would die knowing that I was the one to send her back to the mental health facility. I would take my secret to the grave. Hell, I’d lived with it all these years. I could live with it many more if that meant my family was happy.
“No one gets over death. It’s just not that easy.” I pulled on my hair. “I often think about Gracie Reardon, too. How she must’ve been devastated. How could anyone handle killing their best friend, and at the age of twelve no less?”
“Kel, you need to talk to someone. Why don’t you go see Dr. Davis? He helped Kody when Mandy died. And he’s helped Lacey with her PTSD.” Kade’s voice held concern.