Those memories were lost, every last one of them erased. Ruth had made sure of that.
We never talked about the night of the accident ten years ago. We never spoke about the night of the storm the year after, either. Somehow, that night was almost worse.
Horrified, I’d watched Ruth rip every last reminder of her old life off the walls and hurl them onto the soaked ground outside.
“I have nothing left, Aiden,” she’d screamed. “Nothing!”
Even as I’d collected every broken keepsake off the grass, the rain pelting my back like a whip for my sins while Ruth sobbed in a broken ball on her kitchen floor, I’d known I should’ve done more to stop her. Matthew had abandoned her. She’d neededme. But I’d barely been holding myself together. I hadn’t known what to do or how to help.
Most days, I still didn’t.
The distraction of packing away the box of groceries under my arm did nothing to stop the ghosts of shattered glass and splintered wood from stabbing my chest as if it were happening all over again.
Just once, I wish I hadn’t failed the important people in my life.
“Leave all that,” Ruth hurried me along. “Come.” She patted the empty chair beside her. “Sit down with me. Tell me about your week. How’s Harry?”
My eyebrow lifted, but I sank into the chair. This wasn’t where I thought the conversation would go.
“He was on the road a lot this week,” I said with an uneasy shrug. “I think he wants to spend some extra time with his mum to make up for it.”
None of that was a lie. I’d conveniently left out a hell of a lot of the truth, but it wasn’t a lie. Harry and I had parted on speaking terms, and his fist stayed in his pocket instead of having another crack at my face, but things were strained between us. My actions had dredged up too much of his past. He’d said as much.
Ruth was none the wiser. “Oh, I thought you might have asked him not to come. Perhaps because you have something to share with me,” she said, her voice far too sunny. “Something…private…reserved only for very best friends.”
My palms suddenly clammy, I roughed my hands along my jeans. Yeah, this was where I thought we were headed, and I still wasn’t prepared. “Uh—what?”
Ruth lifted her coffee mug. “Is there something you want to tell me?” A strange little smile twisted around the rim as she took a sip. “About a certaindoctor,perhaps?”
“I, uh…” I cleared my throat. “Don’t know who you mean.”
“Oh, I think you knowexactlywho I mean.” Ruth’s smile turned smugger than the last time she’d beaten me at Scrabble. In other words, pretty damn smug. “Tell me about what happened last Sunday night.”
My eyes narrowed. Someone had been blabbing, and I had a good idea who it was. “Yolanda Briggs stop by for your weekly coffee catch-up, did she?”
“Yolanda doesn’t just stop by for coffee. She fills me in on the town gossip, too.Allthe gossip. Times. Details.Everything.”
I tugged at the collar of my shirt. “I, um…” Why did the kitchen suddenly feel like a furnace?
“Spill. Last Sunday.”
“There’s nothing to spill. Sunday was nothing. I stopped by Lola’s…for…dinner.” I almost groaned out loud.
What a way to make it obvious, moron.
“Dinner, huh?” Ruth snorted. Yeah, she definitely wasn’t buying that bullcrap answer.
I scrubbed a hand down my face. “What exactly did Yolanda say?”
Ruth was only too happy to tease me with every embarrassing detail. “I believe herexactwords were that you were grunting and groaning and not giving that poor woman’s body a moment of peace as you ravished her for hours.”
My shoulders slumped, and I propped my elbows on the table, palms pressed against my eyes. This was…Goddammit.This conversation was nothing short of a train wreck.
“Forhours,” Ruth repeated with far too much glee for my liking.
“I think Yolanda’s exaggerating a bit on thehourspart.”
Ruth’s eyes lit up. “But it’s true?” A squeal erupted that almost shot me out of the chair. “You and Lola—finally? You’re together?”
