Page 101 of The Killer Card

Naomi

Late morning light streams through the hotel window and I scrunch my face as if I can close my eyes any tighter. Next to me the warmth of a familiar body shifts, an irritable grumble escaping bruised and bitten lips.

I turn my head, squinting my eyes just enough that the pounding behind them doesn’t get any worse. Graham is still asleep, not as content thanks to the light his body is beginning to notice, but enough that he looks as innocent as only being unconscious can make him. His hair is a mess, the bruises around his eyes still an angry purple.

For just a moment I imagine waking up like this every day. Maybe not with him covered in bruises from fighting a fucking cop. But I can imagine waking up to Graham. I can imagine sunlight catching in his golden curls every morning, him blinking those forest green eyes at me, the soft smile he only has when he first wakes up. The one before the mischief takes over. The one he only shares with me.

“Buenos dias…” he murmurs, sleepily.

I can imagine this. “Morning…” I reach out, gently brushing my thumb along his cheekbone. He winces faintly at the touch. “He got you good.”

“Yeah…” He grumbles, shifting beneath the sheets. “But I got him better. Long time fucking coming too.”

“It was,” I agree.

Hearing about his sister’s situation had broken my heart. I’d immediately started thinking through all the legal action we could take against her husband considering his position. It wasn’t impossible to press charges, but the process would not be easy, and the first step Sonya would have to take is leaving him. This poses the whole other issue of convincing her to leave the security of an abusive marriage for the insecurity of being on her own for the first time… Well, ever if I’ve understood Graham’s stories correctly.

I lift up, resting my arm and chin atop his chest as I watch him slowly come awake. “Are you alright…?”

His chest rises and falls beneath me. “I don’t know. Last night was… It was difficult. Between learning what she’s been through- what she’s still going through- and being arrested again I just… I’m honestly kind of drained.” He drags a hand through his golden curls. “Maybe I’ll feel better after I’ve made a few calls. And had coffee. Coffee is necessary.”

“Okay,” I sit up, ready to be there for him. Ready to try to repair what I’ve spent years cracking apart. Because if last night, if this last year, has taught me anything it’s that I want Graham around.

I’m not sure when the realization struck. Maybe it was the moment I boarded the plane back to Boston last February. Maybe it was when I saw him last night, dressed so pristinely in his three-piece suit it was impossible to tell he wasn’t of my social class. Maybe it was when I realized none of that shit mattered to me anymore- if it ever did- and that I am lonely as all Hell in Boston. My friends suck. My brother is overbearing and a nuisance. The sex I manage to have is mediocre at best.

And I miss him…

I don’t think I’ve ever put that into words, but that’s the truth of it. I fucking miss him when I’m away. Being here with him now, helping him get through the night, has actually been the first bit of useful I’ve felt since I left. Clara and Nelly have already started planning the big Santos wedding and I’ve been hardly helpful over the phone. Seeing them tonight was the first I’d heard about color swatches or flower arrangements or that it’s being held in New York at all.

It feels like my life is crumbling into dust and I’m not really sure when it started or how to pull it back together.

Brushing my shaking hands down my legs, I walk over to by suitcase. “We can go get coffee or mimosas and then I’ll help you call—”

“No,” he says, swinging his legs over the side of the bed. I stare at his toned back, watching as he reaches first for his underwear, then his pants, not quite processing that he just told me no. “I’m going to head back to my room. Shower. I’ll grab Eli’s phone on my way down to the café.”

“You don’t want my help?”

What is happening? What third dimension did we wake up in where Graham is rejecting any offer to spend more time with me? Unwelcome tears burn the backs of my eyes because it feels… It feels…

He looks back at me as he pulls on his shirt. His eyes flick toward the empty wine bottle on the table across the room. “Doesn’t feel too great, does it?”

For a moment all I do is blink at him, following his gaze to the bottle. My eyes narrow, realizing what he’s getting at. “That isn’t the same thing—"

“Isn’t it?” He grabs his phone from the bedside table, using it to point at me. “Because I’ve been offering to help you for years—”

“I don’t need help—”

“And you have completely ignored me. So, no I don’t need your help,” he crosses the room on bare feet. “But thank you for letting me blow off steam.”

My mouth opens and closes so many times I feel like a fish, standing there naked in front of him while he sneers at me like… Like…

Like you used to sneer at him?

“Graham,” I shake my head. “What the fuck—"

“It meant nothing.” His words strike me like a blade. The same words I threw at him less than a year ago in front of our friends and have regretted ever since. The lies I’ve carelessly tossed his way for years to protect myself from the depths of his care. “None of it meant a damn thing.”

“Graham—”