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He kept throwing new sins on her pile. She didn’t notice him adding any to his own. “And that’s my fault?”
“You stopped seeing your therapist—”
“That’s what this is about?” There it was. The one thing Harris thought would resolve everything. If she could just get better and be faster doing it. He never said the words, but she heard them.
“Yes, Elisa.” He glanced in the direction of the television room, as if waiting for Nathan to peek out. He dropped his voice even lower but the angry beat came through loud and clear. “You don’t trust Josh. You’re starting fights at Nathan’s school with women you don’t know.”
“One woman.”
“Your behavior has attracted attention. It’s getting people talking and wondering if you’re okay. Misplacing your pills. Taking the wrong medicine. Medicine no one in this house even takes, so where did you get it?”
The long list of her failures. He didn’t even hesitate when reading through them.
She didn’t know where to start, so she skipped to the end. “I have not taken the wrong medicine. Not willingly.”
“Do you hear how paranoid you sound?” But he wasn’t done. “And now there’s Rachel.”
Elisa froze. She had doubts she didn’t dare share. There was no way to explain the part about Concerned without explaining it all, and Harris’s pinched face and closed-off stance made it absolutely clear he was not willing to have a deeper discussion on anything related to Josh. “What about her?”
“You’re raising concerns about her. You don’t think I saw how antsy you were the last time they were here. You were nervous and odd, trying to take her aside to whisper things to her.”
She had a reason. A good reason. One she refused to share because it would give him more ammunition against her. “You don’t think her quick change of heart on the relationship is a problem?”
“I’m not convinced you understood what she said about her feelings in the first place.”
Elisa sat back hard in her chair. “Excuse me?”
“You’re seeing things and hearing things.” He shook his head. “I don’t know what the hell is happening with you. The shooting was awful, but it’s been eleven months.”
Get better faster. That’s what she heard.
“I can’t keep doing this with you.” This time he stood up.
Divorce. The end.
She could feel the worst coming, the thing she feared more than anything else, and all she could think was that Josh had won. “What are you saying?”
“When Josh and Rachel come back . . .” Harris lookedeverywhere but at her. “Maybe Nathan should spend some time with them.” Then he faced her again. “Until you get yourself together.”
Her world, already stretched at the seams, ripped apart. Shredded until she could feel every tiny tear. He’d tested everything about her—being a mother, being a good wife and friend, her home, her mental stability—and found her lacking.
“Absolutely not.” It took all the strength she had left to get those words out.
“You are not okay, Elisa.”
He was doing this to her. He and his brother. She’d never felt so vulnerable, so shaky and unsure, before.
“Maybe if you supported me.” Her voice bobbled and she hated the sign of weakness.
“I’ve done nothing but listen and support you, and I can’t keep doing either if you’re not going to admit there’s a problem.” He stood there, all tense and clenched. “With you. Not with other people. I don’t want to hear one more word about Josh, or Abby, or any negativity about the wedding.”
A raw emptiness crept over her. A pain so overwhelming it hollowed her out. Being there, listening to him, took all of her concentration and will not to double over and cry out.
She’d never seen this side of Harris before... the side that seemed to hate everything about her. “You’re telling me to shut up in my own house.”
“I’m begging you to get help.” The chair screeched across the floor as he knocked against it on the way out of the room.
Yeah, no doubt about it. Josh had won.
