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“Congratulations, Rachel. This is… we should drink.” I swung my head around until I could find the oversized wood and iron clock on the wall. “A little early. Maybe tonight, though. Yeah. Bennett is working. We should throw a little party here for you and me and celebrate.”
“Sounds like we have more than just this to celebrate, too.” She looked at me with an arched brow.
Took me a second. “You were listening, weren’t you?”
“What kind of pseudo-sister would I be if I didn’t eavesdrop on your conversations, Con?” A smile, genuine and grateful. “You love him. And he loves you?”
My face matched hers. “Yeah. We worked through all the details this morning.”
Her smile faded as she shook her head. “I’m having trouble piecing the whole thing together. But it sounded like all this breakdown happened because Cordelia never told Bennett’s father when you were injured?”
I started into agreement, but stopped myself. That didn’t feel right. Yes, of course I could pin this whole thing on my mother. That wouldn’t have been entirely true, though. “It was no one’s fault but Bennett’s and mine. We both slowed down with communication while I was out there. The emails used to be every day, and then they weren’t. I had to focus on my job out there. Bennett had to focus on classes. We let ourselves slide to the point where what happened to each of us… we could have weathered that. But we didn’t have a good foundation and the little shanty we built crumbled apart.”
“And your foundation now?”
“One brick at a time. We’ll get there.” I nodded to myself. “But yeah. So far, we’re pretty solid. Everything came out in the open.Everything.” I took in a deep, cleansing breath through my nose and exhaled. “I should get back there. What time do you need to head out?”
“Around noon.” She rubbed my arm. “I’m happy for you, Connor. Bet you’re glad I called you when I did, eh?”
I laughed. Kissed her cheek. “More than you know.”
“See you around twelve.”
She left the kitchen. I stood there with the stack of my mother’s greatest play, currently unfinished and waiting forme,of all people, to complete it. Curious, I flipped up the first page to look at the second. Aloud, I said, “The stage is dimly lit, and the sound of rain and thunder can be heard from outside…”
It starts with a storm. Of course it does.
I re-stacked the papers. I would read this tonight over a glass of wine with Rachel. For now, the good news burning a hole in my pocket needed to be shared with Bennett.
Back in my car, I restrained from burning rubber while backing down the driveway and pulling out into the street. I thumbed through the steering wheel controls to find Bennett’s information through the Bluetooth and hit the Call button.
Just give him a little morsel and promise to repeat everything.
The phone kept ringing. I thought of him baking me a cake as a surprise. A silly notion. Maybe he ran out and got some coffee. Hell, maybe I should stop somewhere to get some. But no, I wanted to get back to Bennett as soon as I could.
The call went to voicemail. Odd. Bennett seemed eager to hear from me before I left.
Maybe he didn’t hear?
I called again. My fingers drummed along the steering wheel. No, maybe not a cake. Maybe he drew a bath for us. Yeah. I imagined him waiting for me, naked and soapy in a bathtub. Maybe some more candles like last night. Undoubtedly there’d be jazz pumping out from some hidden speaker. I liked that image. Bennett’s bulldog of a body plunged beneath the surface of hot water, steam rising…
Voicemail.
I called a third time. Concern had constricted my neck in a chokehold. Primal detectors fired in my brain as the hair on the back of my neck stood on end. Something was wrong. Something was definitely wrong.
Voicemail again.
My foot pressed the accelerator down. My house was only a ten-minute drive from Bennett’s and I could make it in much less time.
Two streets over from his, I drove past an SUV with tinted windows. Jersey plates.
My adrenaline spiked. Vision narrowed. Heart thudded hard enough that I thought its beating rocked the car.
Benny.
ChapterTwenty
THECARSTAYEDrunning as I thumbed the button for Park halfway up the driveway and was out the door before the thing stopped rolling. Bennett lived on a street without a yellow line, each of his neighbors veiled behind a thick forest of pines and oaks. The stillness of the early hour stood at odds with the war drums hammering in my chest as I sprinted up the walkway to his front door.
