Yeah, he had a life again and it was actually looking a hell of a lot better than he could have expected. Better than he had even wanted, in all honesty.
He was falling in love with Bree. It was a slow, lazy drift, completely different from the way Alyssa had danced into his heart back when they were still kids.
But he’d mostly expected that. Everything with Bree was different.
The friendship that had always been between them had grown into something else and he could even admit, without feeling too guilty, some of it had started before he’d even left. The way she’d been there with Alyssa as she’d gotten more and more ill, the way she’d stood by him, a silent source of comfort during those last days. It had planted something inside him.
Falling in love again wasn’t something he’d planned on.
Wasn’t even something he’d wanted. The pain of losing somebody was enough to make most people leery, he guessed.
But it had crept up on him. Colby was a lot of things, but he wasn’t a complete idiot. Life was giving him a second chance at happiness and he wasn’t going to walk away from it.
Well, there were still a few unanswered questions there. Like how Bree felt, for one. He thought he knew, but he needed to know for sure. Needed to hear her say it. Tonight, he was going to see if he couldn’t get her to do just that.
Slowly, he stepped into the room, staring at the bed. He’d shared this bed with Alyssa for years. He’d saved this part for last, determined to work his way up to it, but now he realized he hadn’t needed to do that. He stripped the comforter away, folding it neatly and laying it in a box by the door. If the guy wanted the sheets and blankets, he was welcome to them, otherwise Colby would just drop them by DAV with the last of the books he still had to box up.
He stripped off the pillow cases, the top sheet, adding them to the box. Reaching under the mattress, he tugged the gathered corner of the bottom sheet. On Alyssa’s side, near the top, he did the same. His fingers brushed against something. His heart skipped a beat as he grabbed it and pulled it out.
Her journal. He knew what it was even before he saw it. There was a box full of them up in the attic and that was one thing he had no idea what to do with. He couldn’t just give her journals away, but throwing them out didn’t seem right. One thing Alyssa had done faithfully was write in it almost every day. Even the day before she died, she’d written something in it. Granted, it took her forever to finish an entry but when he offered to write it down for her, she’d always refused.
He hadn’t ever looked inside them but now, he found himself opening it, staring down at her familiar, flowery-looking script. Time ticked away from him as he read. The first entry was in February, the last one the day before she died. Most of what she wrote had his eyes burning. How she’d been so afraid most days, often angry. But the last few weeks were different. The entries were shorter, not quite as descriptive, but she’d been so weak that he understood why she didn’t go into as much detail.
He reached the last entry, but before he started to read, he closed his eyes and tipped his head back. When he felt a little steadier, he started to read. But three lines in, he wished he hadn’t.
Wished he had just thrown this journal in with the others or even in the garbage.
I got Colby to leave for a little while. Bree’s on her way over and I need some privacy for this. Can’t exactly have him lurking around while I ask this, right? I don’t think he’d understand me telling her that I want her to hook up with him.
That was all he read.
All he needed to read.
Snapping it closed, he stood up and started for the door, rage churning inside him, a sick sense of betrayal threatening to drive him insane. Bree—
Fuck.
He stopped and looked down at the journal in his hand. Abruptly, he turned and hurled it across the room. It hit the wall and fell to the ground. He almost left it there. Almost. He stormed down the hall, torn between just leaving again and never coming back and finding Bree, demanding that she confess the truth. That the past month had been a fucking lie. She’d slept with him, spent time with him because it had been the final wish her best friend asked of her.
He was going to be sick.
But he stopped in his tracks, turned, went back and got the journal.
He had to see the look on her face when she read it, had to see how she reacted when he asked her to explain what in hell the past month had been about. He’d been falling in love with her.
She was fucking him out of some bizarre loyalty, maybe mixed with a little bit of pity.
What really sucked was that he almost could have handled the pity. He fell in love with a friend, no reason she couldn’t do the same but he knew it wasn’t pity that drove her. How far would she have let it go? How far did her loyalty to Alyssa go?
He didn’t know the answer to that.
But he sure as hell was going to find out.
Sexy dress.
Check.
No panties.
Check.
Hair done.
Check…and she’d actually spent some time on it too.
Makeup.
Check.