Atone (22 page)

I'm alive.

Barely.

At least it feels that way.

Everything fucking hurts.

I try to open my eyes, but I'm too damn tired.

Someone's next to my bed, holding my hand. I can't turn my head to see who it is. I still can't open my eyes. Maybe I'm not alive. Maybe this is death. I want to move, but I can't manage to make the effort. I want to ask whoever it is about Beau, because I know it's not him with me.
Where is he?
The last thing I remember is his face next to mine, so I know he's okay. Or he was.

Goddamn, I'm tired.

This time I manage to open my eyes. It's dark. I'm alone. Where's Beau? He should be here. He'd be here if he could be. Maybe he didn't make it and I only imagined it. I try to call out for him, but my throat's been cut with razor blades. My cry comes out as an undecipherable groan.

My body's heavy. So damn heavy.

I try to call out again for someone. Anyone. I have to know he's okay. He would never leave me alone like this. Something must've happened. Where is he?
Where is he?

I can't coordinate my arms. There's supposed to be a call button. I need to talk to someone. I need to know what happened. My head is dead weight on my shoulders. All of my efforts serve only to wear me out and don't get me anywhere. My lids droop. I can't keep them open. I'm slipping…

The person's back, stroking my hand and whispering to me. I'm finally able to move my head. It flops to one side. I blink at Cora sitting next to me. She's smiling. I croak out incoherent gibberish that makes me cough. She hurries for a cup on the tray over my bed and puts the straw to my lips. I suck. Sweet, sweet water. Didn't realize how dry my mouth was until this moment. I drink too fast and choke. It fucking
hurts.
She takes the cup away and grabs a tissue to wipe the water dribbling out of my mouth.

I close my eyes, waiting for the pain to get the fuck back. It finally subsides.

“Beau,” I barely rasp out.

She smiles, but it doesn't go all the way to her eyes. “He's okay. He constantly asks me about you. He'll be glad to know your first word was his name. He's been worried about you.”

“Where?”

“He's okay,” she repeats. “I owe you for saving my brother.”

“Where?” I say more forcibly.

“He's in jail. There's been some issue with what happened. There's a cop outside, dying to get in here and talk to you. Are you up for it?”

“Jail?” I can't keep the panic from my voice. What the fuck is he doing in jail?

“It's a mix-up.” She glances toward the door. “The cop's back,” she whispers. “You don't have to talk to him if you're not up to it.”

“No. Want to.”

“She's awake,” a male voice says.

Cora puts the straw to my lips so I can have another drink. “Her throat is really rough and she's having a hard time speaking. Let me check with her nurse.”

“No,” I say. “I can talk.”

The man comes to stand at my bedside. “I'm Detective Johansson. We need to ask you a few questions about what happened to you.”

“ ‘We'?”

“My partner's talking to your doctor. She'll be right in. I'm going to need you to step out into the hall,” he tells Cora.

“Are you sure you're up for this?” she asks me.

“I'm okay.”

“I'll be right outside if you need me.” She squeezes my hand. “We're family now.” She gives the detective a dirty look that he doesn't see as she leaves.

I bite my lip to keep from chuckling. You always know what Cora thinks of you.

As soon as she's gone, the detective starts in. “There's some confusion about your name.”

I stare blankly at him. I'm not so doped up that I don't know assuming someone else's identity is illegal.

“Are you going to answer my question?”

“You didn't ask a question.”

“Why did you assume the identity of a dead girl?”

“Javier Abano wanted me dead.”

“Why?”

“I took a thumb drive that had information about how he abducted young girls and sold them for sex.”

“You were one of his victims?”

“Yes.”

“Who shot you?”

“Javier Abano.”

“You're sure about that.”

“As sure as you're standing here.”

“What happened?”

“Javier somehow found out where Beau and I were being held by the U.S. Marshals and the FBI. He broke in and tried to shoot Beau. I stepped in front of him and Javier shot me instead.”

I tell him everything I can remember until I passed out. He takes me through it again and again, going over why we were in that apartment in the first place. His partner appears partway through and asks some questions of her own. I'm so tired my words slur, but I keep going because what I have to say could free Beau. They ask me if I need a rest and if I want them to come back later at least three times, maybe more. I tell them no every time. I can't hold my head up anymore and I'm still talking with my eyes closed when a nurse comes in. She tries to put a halt to it. I have to work at raising my head to prove I can keep going.

The nurse doesn't buy it and shoos everyone out. She checks my vitals. I'm so tired, but I want to talk to Cora. I ask the nurse about her, but she tells me she left. I want to know about Beau. He's what I'm thinking about when I drift off.

I wake up three more times alone. It's day. It's night. It's still night. Or maybe the next night. I don't know what fucking day it is or how long I've been here. They tell me I'm healing well as they poke and prod at me. I finally get to eat some Jell-O and it tastes like heavenly green slime. But I can swallow it, so that's a plus.

The next time I wake up, Cora's back.

“Where's Beau?”

She looks up past me. I roll my head and there he is. I try to reach for him. He takes my hand. Tears stream down my face.
Finally.
Finally, I get to see for myself he's okay. He lowers his head to my hand. When he lifts it, his eyes are damp. I touch his beautiful face, trying to reassure myself he's real, that he's really here.

“I love you,” I blurt out.

He gets the biggest grin on his face. “I know. Took you long enough to figure it out.”

S
IX
M
ONTHS
L
ATER

She's got nothing on under that dress.

That's all I can think about as the officiant does his thing, and I somehow manage to repeat what I'm supposed to repeat, say my I-do's, and stand there stoically while Vera does the same. My fingers don't stop moving. I can practically feel the fabric balling as I hike it up. The hard peaks of her nipples tease me. The slight shine of the material shows me exactly where her belly button is and the curve of her belly before the skirt falls straight. There, right there, is where I want to be buried, balls deep. A line of sweat drips down my face and neck. I can't do shit about it, just like I can't do shit about the raging hard-on tenting the front of my pants.

One corner of her lips curves up. She knows she's torturing me. She's
enjoying
it. Her eyes are wide and innocent, but her mouth…
fuck
…her mouth. She runs her tongue across the seam of her lips, taunting me. As soon as I get her alone I'm bending her over the back of something or up against a wall or I don't give a fuck where. I just need to be under that dress and inside her.

Leo hands me her ring and I slide it onto her finger, stroking her palm how I want to be stroking into her. Her tits swell on her sudden intake of breath, straining toward me against the fabric.
Fuck
me.
I hope to fuck the sudden wet spot doesn't bleed through to the outside of my pants. She shifts her stance. I can smell her arousal and it shoots mine into another orbit. I'm gonna blow right here in front of all of our family and friends.

Cora hands Vera my ring and she slips it onto my finger.
Husband and wife,
I scream in my head.
Say it, already.

Finally.

I put one hand on her face and one on her ass, bringing her up against my hard dick, trying to get some kind of relief and to maybe torture her like she did to me. We kiss for the first time as husband and wife. She's mine and I'm hers. There won't be anyone else for me. Ever. I look down at her beautiful face and I can't believe what a lucky son of a bitch I am. She doesn't look like Emmaline. She doesn't look like Javier's property. She looks like Vera, soft and pretty. Her hair's a light brown, grown out around her face. She wears the dress I dreamed about all those months ago and my ring on her finger.

We turn to face the crowd and a cheer goes up. I tow her down the aisle. She laughs and follows. She knows where we're going and what's going to happen when we get there. We've waited a long time for this. For happiness. We've been to hell and back more times than we can count and now here we are, starting our life together with nothing and no one to stand in our way.

I find an empty room—a bedroom—close the door, and back her up against it. The material is soft and cool, in contrast to how hot the skin of her thighs is. Her hands work the buckle of my pants. I can't get enough of her mouth and go back in for another kiss. She wraps her hand around my dick and all the air leaves my body. In one motion I take control, lifting her to wrap her legs around my waist. I glide through her slickness. Just as I'm about to thrust into her, she stops me with a hand on my chest.

“I love you, Mr. Hollis,” she whispers across my lips. She doesn't say the words often, but when she does I know she really means them.

“I love you too, Mrs. Hollis.”

Her grin starts slow, taking over her whole face. She tightens her legs around my waist. I push into her and have to rest my head on her shoulder, breathing deep, while I try to gain some kind of control. Her pussy squeezes me in rhythmic pulses and I groan. She's doing that on purpose, trying to tear at my restraint. Before I have the thought I'm pounding into her. She fists her hand in my hair, holding on for the ride. I can't stop. She presses her face into my chest and cries out. I thrust into her a few more times, driving into her like a man possessed. I grip her hip and come hard.

My legs are weak and I struggle to hold us up.
Damn.
I hope I wasn't too rough. I raise my head from her neck to find her smiling smugly. I can't think of a single reason to move. When I'm inside her like this and she's looking at me like that there's nowhere else I'd rather be.

“I really,
really
love you,” she says.

“You're not supposed to say it during or right after sex. Doesn't count.”

“Of course it does.”

“You're killing me in that dress.”

“I could tell. So could the entire front row, part of the second, and probably some of the third.”

I chuckle and kiss my ring on her finger. It took me forever to find just the right one. It's perfect. I haven't been able to keep all my promises to her, so it was important to me to keep this one.

Someone pounds on the door, startling us.

“Stop banging your wife,” Cora shouts, “and get out here. The photographer's looking for you two.”

Vera hides her face in my chest in embarrassment.

“Fuck off,” I shout back. “We'll be out when we're out.”

“We should go out there,” Vera whispers.

I sigh and pull out of her, helping her to stand.
Damn Cora.

Vera laughs at my grumpy face. “I hope you can find your smile for the family photos. I don't want that sour look immortalized forever.” She pats my cheek. “We can spend our honeymoon naked in bed. But right now people are waiting.”

I make grumbling noises more for effect than how I really feel. Family isn't something either of us has had too much luck at, but it looks like that might be changing. My dad's been sober almost three months now. My mom hasn't been too rude to Vera. She's actually been kind of nice. Vera's dad and brother flew out from Kansas to San Diego for our wedding. They've been communicating by email and Skype for a couple months. The day before yesterday was the first time they got to see each other in person.

Meeting them has changed something in Vera, something vital and intangible. There's a shine in her eyes that wasn't there before. It looks a lot like hope. I like seeing it. I didn't think it was possible, but she's even more beautiful to me than ever before.

She slips into the adjoining bathroom while I put myself back together. It's stupid, she's just on the other side of the door, but I miss her. I shake my head at myself and hook a finger in the curtain to look out into the backyard. The Nashes volunteered their backyard for our wedding and reception. There's a small crowd, but they're all the people who matter to us. After our honeymoon, we'll go back to Colorado, where we live now, so we won't get a chance to see them very often. Neither Vera nor I had the stomach to stay in San Diego. Too many memories. Too many people to chance a run-in with. Colorado is a clean slate, a place to start over, where no one knows us and the only memories are the ones we'll make.

It's where Marie is buried.

Vera comes out of the bathroom and I grasp her hand. “Let's go take those family photos.”

Her smile holds a hint of wonder. She's not used to that word yet. We'll work on that. We're family now and nothing will ever separate us.

For my editor, Sue Grimshaw, who said, “Make book two Beau's book.” So I did.

And, as always, for my husband, Mr. Y, for buying into and supporting every single one of my crazy Lucy-and-Ethel schemes…including the one where I thought I could write a book.