Chapter 42
Shatter It All
Briar
A tear fell and hit the marble countertop of my bathroom. Another dull splash. And then another.
Each tear heavy with every emotion I couldn’t comprehend in those minutes.
Happiness, worry, love, denial, joy, terror . . .
I had thought I’d known fear. In the last five and a half months, I’d experienced more than most people were ever plagued by in their nightmares.
I’d been stolen from my life. I’d been sold to a devil. People had tried to take me from the man I loved and then more had come, looking to take my life.
But this? This made those moments seem like childish fears. This made those moments seem like nothing more than being terrified that my parents would abandon me, or that I would be forgotten somewhere again.
Two weeks until the celebration. Two weeks until the raid. Two weeks until this world would be nothing but a nightmarish memory.
My hand dropped to my stomach as a strained sob tore from my chest.
Because those two pink lines could potentially shatter it all.
Chapter 43
Hello Girl
Briar
“Hello, girl,” an odd, familiar voice called out from the doorway to my room.
I straightened from where I was making the bed and looked over my shoulder slowly. Surprise and confusion swept through me as I took in the woman standing just inside the room with a smug expression on her face.
The shopper.
“Hello,” I replied, my tone giving away how stunned I felt seeing her there. I hadn’t seen her since the beginning of my time there. I turned to face her fully, my head tilting as I did. “No ‘stupid’ this time then?”
The woman just sent me one of her challenging grins, and lifted a slender shoulder. “You tell me.”
“I don’t know why you continued to call me that in the first place,” I responded gently as her gaze swept the room—every now and then resting on something for an extra moment before continuing.
“Don’t you?” she asked as she stepped up to me so she could search my eyes. “Where do you belong, girl?” When my brows only drew together, she tsked in that way I remembered. “Are you still trying to run away?”
I knew immediately what she was asking and what she wasn’t. She didn’t—couldn’t—know about our plans or about Lucas’s work with the FBI, but she remembered clearly from my first weeks that I’d wanted help to get back to Kyle. She had told me that by not helping me, she was saving my life . . .
My hand automatically fell to my uneasy stomach, and I prayed that it would stop churning so my answer wouldn’t be mistaken for anything but honest.
“From him?” I asked softly, then shook my head. “Never again.”
“Hundreds of women,” she said with a twist of her lips. “I told you I’ve encountered hundreds of women and dozens of these men. Never once has there been a man’s watch on the woman’s nightstand—even a first’s.”
I stilled, then looked over my shoulder at where Lucas’s forgotten watch lay.
“Never once has there been a jacket and tie resting on the chair of the woman’s desk,” she continued.
But this time I didn’t need to look. By the time I faced her again, I could see the articles of clothing from the day before out of the corner of my eye.
Even though the carpet had been replaced in Lucas’s room, he’d known I hadn’t wanted to be in there again—hadn’t wanted to continue to see the place where that man had died. Lucas had his clothes in his own closet, but we’d been using my room ever since, not that I could tell the shopper that. I knew even if I explained the dead man, it wouldn’t matter. No man in this life would’ve shared a room with any of his women, no matter the circumstances.
“I knew from that first day, from the time I was measuring you, that there was something different between the two of you,” she said. “To know that love can form in one of these houses gives me hope that anything in this world is possible.”
I wanted to deny it, to try to protect Lucas and myself now that we were only days from the celebration. But this woman had had months to say something, and hadn’t. William had figured it out before this woman had even come into my life.
We’d never fooled anyone.
My head had been shaking slowly in preparation of my denial and stopped suddenly when I realized what she’d said. “We didn’t love each other then.”
“Oh, stupid girl,” she said affectionately, followed closely by another tsk. “You didn’t realize what would happen because you were clouded by your fear and your sadness, and he did not want to realize it. That does not mean you didn’t love each other, even then.”
“But—”
“Why do you think I gave him the phone number, girl?” She lifted a brow and waited for my answer, but I didn’t have one. “Because I knew. Because I could see it. Because I knew that one day you would recognize that your soul belonged with his.”
I blinked quickly, shock filling me at her words.
I had thought she was just doing her job. I’d had no idea she was seeing something we couldn’t.
At that time, I’d been in love with Kyle and was desperate to get back home. Now? Lucas was my home. And all I wanted for Kyle was a chance to grieve for the girl he’d known and accept that I was gone forever.
Tears filled my eyes before rapidly slipping down my cheeks, and a strained sob caught in my throat.
“Oh, girl,” she scoffed. “No one has time for your tears. We need—” She broke off when I threw my arms around her neck and pulled her close to me.
She was the oddest woman I had ever met.
And I was so thankful for her.
“This shirt cost a fortune; do not ruin it with your tears.”
I laughed through my tears and pulled away from her in time to see her give me a kind smile before her face fell into that look she wore well—like I was nothing more than an annoyance.
“Now, allow me to bring in the gowns. We need to find one for you to wear to the celebration.”
Confusion flooded me as I gestured toward the bathroom that hid my enormous, too-full closet. “I have dresses.”
Another lift of her brow and twist of her lips. “Not for the celebration, you don’t.”
Hours later I had my dress picked out and hanging in my closet in a garment bag, and something about knowing it was there added an ache in my chest to the fear that had already been gripping me.
I hadn’t been able to say goodbye to the shopper. Not in the way I wanted to. I hadn’t been able to thank her for helping me see that everything I would ever want had been standing right in front of me.
Instead, I’d bit down on my lip and held back more tears as she’d left, stating, “You will still, above all, be the one I look forward to seeing most.”
I was lying on the bed, trying to force back the nausea and dizziness that never seemed to go away lately when the bed dipped from his weight and immediately cursed myself for not hearing him before he’d reached the room.