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The cat stared up at her, didn’t make a sound.
Finley unlocked the door and pushed it inward. She waited for the cat to follow. One uncertain step after another, the scraggly yellow cat followed her inside. Finley headed for the kitchen and prepared a bowl of food and a bowl of water, using actual bowls instead of empty cat-food cans.
Then she opened a bottle of red and searched for a glass.
Finley stood in the kitchen and drank. She did a lot more of that lately. But tonight she was feeling particularly nostalgic, or maybeadriftwas the better word. She watched the cat devour the food, then lap up the water.
Lost, that was what she felt. Unmoored. Out of place. Her pulse reacted. That was it. She felt out of place ...adrift.
For the first time in more than a year, Finley considered that maybe the Judge was right. What was she doing here?
She stared at the worn-out floors, the ancient cabinets with their doors that didn’t quite hang right or even close.
Derrick.She nodded. “Yeah.” She stayed because it was her fault he was dead.
Was it? Really? She thought of Matt’s discovery about Derrick’s visit to Dempsey Pharma. Did that change her responsibility for what had happened? She had no idea.
Until she understood why Derrick had sought her out ... she didn’t know one damned thing for real. It was all supposition. Theory.
Well, one damned thing was certain. If Dempsey’s piece-of-shit son hadn’t raped women, none of this would have happened.
Fury twisted inside her. Tears burned her eyes. She wanted to scream. She stared at the bottle of wine. Wanted to drink more, but her stomach turned at the thought. Her life was funneling out of control ... draining away from where she was supposed to be and flying off into some place she couldn’t define.
The memory of Tark Brant snarling at her before Whitney Lemm shot him rammed into her brain.
The only reason you’re still alive is because someone wants you that way.
She jerked at the remembered words. Dempsey. His son. Derrick.
She had to find a way to get all that out of her head ... to stop obsessing over the past. To start living her life again.
Houser’s words seared through her.
“I will not allow this to define me anymore,” she said aloud.
The cat stared up at her.
Finley took a deep breath, set the bottle aside, and walked to the bathroom. What she needed was a long hot shower, then the wine. Then a good night’s sleep.
No more thinking about Derrick or the bastards who’d ...
Stop. Stop. Stop.
She hugged herself, surveyed the shabby bathroom. Stared at the shattered mirror in the vintage medicine cabinet her husband had insisted they had to keep.
“Why can’t you let this go?” she demanded, going weak again.
The questions and memories were impossible to hold at bay.
The fractured pieces of her reflection didn’t answer.
There were no answers to be found in this whole damned, shitty house!
She didn’t want to be here anymore. Hated this place. Rage roared through her. She grabbed the edges of the broken mirror and jerked with all her might. “I don’t like you!”
The top of the door pulled loose from the cabinet.
“I hate this house! I hate you.” She glared at her broken reflection before tugging again with all her might. The medicine cabinet came out of the wall, hit the wall-mounted sink before slamming onto the floor. She stumbled back, bumped the shower. Steadied herself and stared at the hole left in the wall.
