Broken Wings (A Romantic Suspense) (2 page)

Besides all of those, there’s a long scar on my right leg where they collected skin from my thigh for the grafts.

My right hand is useless. I can bend my thumb and my first two fingers slightly, but nerve damage and burns left the rest fixed in place in a useless claw.

The worst part is the itch. It’s under the scars, and I can’t reach it no matter how I scratch. It goes away sometimes, and sometimes it makes me want to scream. When it gets bad enough I drink until it goes numb.

With my patch in place, I comb and brush my hair so it falls in a thick crimson sheet over the bad side of my face. Hiding scars like that always works in the movies. Real life, not so much.

Getting into my dress one handed is a struggle. Before I put it on, I tie a thick string through the tab of the zipper to help me get it up without bending my arm too much. My shoulder gets stiff, especially when it’s cold outside, or humid. My knee is a little better, enough that I usually don’t limp, but it clicks when I walk.

It’ll be time soon.

If I stand just right, I can’t see the scars in the mirror, only the straps holding my eye patch in place. As soon as I move, the illusion is broken. I’m very, very lucky that the fire didn’t take my nose. I lick my lips, wince, and check the time.

When I step outside into the chilly hallway air and take a deep breath, I close my eye and harden myself. I keep it pressed shut and pretend I can feel a fine layer of steel rising up from my toes, covering me, cold as ice and hard.

Let them look. Let them stare.

I take the elevator up one floor and walk to my mother’s room. I’ll be standing as her maid of honor at the wedding. I have to fight to keep my face still and neutral when the words slide through my head. The mask wants to crack. The steel wants to bend.

That which does not kill me makes me also stronger.

I knock on the door and Mom’s assistant opens it. Her name is Beth and she’s dressed professionally, but then she’s always dressed professionally. I slip past her and stride into the room.

While I was left alone my mother was surrounded by friends and family, helping her dress. She doesn’t have the veil on yet, but she’s in her gown with its long, flowing train, and she looks magnificent, even regal. She notices me as my cousin tugs a silk glove into place on her arm.

“Ellie,” she says, warmly. “Hello, honey. Are you alright?”

Of course I’m alright.

“Yes, Mom.”

It is a strange thing, to call someone Mom when you are an orphan.

My biological mother died when I was four years old. She developed a rare neurological condition. For the next two years, I lived with my father. Then he remarried.

He married Mom. I was forbidden to call her my
stepmother
. After Dad died she was all I had. She was there when I woke up in the hospital with half my face missing and my life ruined.

I still feel strange calling her Mom, just a little. She’s so young, young enough in fact to be my older sister more than my mother, only nine years or so older. My cousin, who is helping her dress, isn’t really my cousin. She’s close in age to Mom, only a few years behind. Her name is Laetitia.

If the groomsmen were here, they’d be drooling. Mom and Laetitia are both platinum blondes, both buxom, and Laetitia is an honest-to-god model, mostly working for lingerie catalogs. She’s tried to break into movies but so far all she’s gotten are minor tits-and-ass roles in direct-to-video horror movies, though it looks like her supporting role in the made-for-TV movie
Sharkapocalypse II
is going to be her “big break.” She’ll talk your ear off about how James Cameron directed
Piranha II
for Roger Corman if you let her. That’s what she wants to do, direct.

Really.

Mom sighs. “I’m not sure I’m ready for this. I’m so nervous.”

“I—”

Laetitia cuts me off, giggling. “You look gorgeous, Jess. Your new beau is going to have to pay the janitors overtime to clean the drool off the floor.”

“I think you look lovely,” I say, as they ignore me.

They settle her veil on her head and Mom stands to her full height and wriggles her shoulders. The top of her dress is held up by a strap around her throat and opens in an oval cutout to show her impressive bosom. Laetitia looks like her dress is going to burst around the chest whenever she moves. Fully made up and ready, they look almost like twins, and grin at each other.

I didn’t bother with much makeup. Can’t put lipstick on a pig, as they say.

“Honey,” Mom says to me, taking my hands. “It’s almost time. Take the girls upstairs, will you? Just like the rehearsal.”

I nod and turn to lead the way, mostly so I don’t have to see them gawking at me. There are twenty bridesmaids and half of them are extended family, the other half being Mom’s friends. I haven’t seen most of them in years. That means a lot of stares. A lot of whispers when I’m not looking.

When they think I’m not looking.

I focus myself and stride to the stairs like I’m going into battle. The elevator would take three trips with all these people. The guests, over four hundred people, are crammed into the hall. Flashes start going off and I almost stumble.

Then, when I see a ghost, my feet almost go out from under me.

Jack’s face draws my gaze like a lamp in fog. At first I think I must be dreaming, there is no way he could be here. Yet there he sits, in the front row, no less. I collect myself and walk past him, and his head swivels to follow me, his gaze locked on mine.

Jack is six foot five, still as lean and quick as I remember. He cuts a fine figure in his tux, even if he looks tired, his dark hair wild. I can feel his intense blue eyes even as I turn away, like hooks in my back pulling me toward him. When I step past him he rises a little but turns to look over his back at someone else and sinks down, frowning.

When I take my place and turn to face the guests, it’s him I seek out in the crowd. I can’t take my eye off him and I almost want to thank him for it. Four hundred people plus caterers and photographers all staring at me. Not at the other bridesmaids in their finery: me. Trying to get a better look at the scars.

I fight down a sneer and keep my face flat, but I want to scream at them.

Fuck you, fuck all of you.
I am what I am.

I stare at Jack.

Fuck him most of all.

The best man and groomsmen take their places. My stepmother’s husband-to-be enters, shaking hands as he passes.

Richard Marshall, Jack’s father, is fifty and looks thirty, slender and quick on his feet like his son and with a face unlined by age, the only hints of his years two knife-thin intrusions of gray hair over his ears. In his tux he gets some stares from my fellow bridesmaids. Even Laetitia sizes him up and offers a coquettish smile.

The judge—no priest here—officiating the ceremony is one of Richard’s friends in high places. Even he notices Laetitia’s antics, glancing at her until she stills herself and takes a more matronly stance.

The music swells. The guests stand, and the bride enters, glowing. One of my younger cousins carries her train, and another cousin’s daughter drops flower petals behind her. I have a big family; Mom has four sisters of varying ages.

None of my father’s side of the family are here. They weren’t invited.

Jack watches her walk the aisle and falls back into his seat, slumping in defeat. I can’t tear my eye off him as the ceremony begins and the guests sit down. He didn’t stand. He just sat there. Neither his father nor my mother take a glance his way. They’re too focused on each other.

Laetitia seems interested in him, though. She keeps peering past me and trying to get his attention with little pops of her chin, puffing out her chest.

Get away from him, you bitch.

I miss most of the words. I’m not paying attention. Judge Willis reads some Bible passages and the bride and groom recite the vows. Mom didn’t write her own or anything like that. She’s not much of a romantic.

They skip the part where they ask if anyone objects. I think Jack was waiting for it, he looks a little disappointed. He folds his arms and looks away.

It catches me off my guard when I hear my mom’s voice go soft and she says, “I do.” An electric shock runs down my back. I actually tear up a little. She’s been the only person in my life since the accident, and now she’s being taken away. I’m going to lose her.

It’ll be just me now.

Fine.
I want to sneer. I don’t need anyone else, anyway.

More ceremony, and it’s time for the bride and groom to make their walk down the aisle together. The crowd rises to their feet and the long process of shaking hands.

No limo ride. We’ll be heading one floor up to the ballroom for the reception.

It would cost a fortune if my new stepfather didn’t own the building.

I need to get down there. I belong with the bridal party, but they move without a care for me and take their places at the doors.

Jack catches my arm.

“Ellie.”

“Go fuck yourself,” I hiss as I shake loose from his grip.

“Nice to see you, too.”

Just ignore him. Just ignore him. Just ignore him…

I can’t.

Damn him to hell.

Jack

My hand closes around Ellie’s arm and she looks at me, hard. All I can manage is her name. God, it’s even worse up close. The sight of her scars twists my guts into a knot, but the worst is the hard look in her eyes… Eye.

“Go fuck yourself,” she says, so low only I can hear.

I’m too shocked to say anything as she shakes loose and strides down the aisle to stand with the other bridesmaids. My hand falls to my side.

I came six thousand miles for
that
.

What were you expecting, Jack? You haven’t said a word to her in ten years. Not since the accident.

Right now, in this moment, I could choke the life out of my father. I can see him at the end of the aisle, standing across from…fuck, is she my stepmother? How are we all related now? I need a fucking map. My family tree looks like an interstate cloverleaf.

My father has married Ellie’s stepmother. Knowing him, he insists she call him Dad now. They’re down there shaking hands.

Frank’s big hand lands on my shoulder.

“I had a feeling that’d happen,” he rumbles. “You’d best leave now before you start a scene. Your old man…”

“I flew over here. I’m going to talk to him. I’m done being held at arm’s length.”

“You know he pays my check, boy.”

“I know, Frank. I won’t bring this down on you.”

He sighs. It sounds like a freight train slowing down. “Try not to make me do anything I’ll regret. You know I gotta do what I gotta do.”

“Yeah, Frank. I know.”

I’m just part of the crowd, heading up. Nobody really recognizes me. Ellie has a huge family, or at least her mother does, but my father is an only child. Most of the people on the groom’s side are acquaintances, business partners, friends of friends.

Hangers on. His best man is one of his board members, not his
fucking son
.

Deep breath, Jack. I’m squeezing my fists together, so I let them go before I head upstairs. I flow with the crowd, nobody special, just another tuxedo. The crowd flows through and I keep my head down and away from my new stepmother.

Doesn’t work. Dad flinches when he spots me, but I pass by too fast for him to say anything and his face goes back to being a mask.

My new stepmother…confuses me. It’s weird thinking of her as Ellie’s mom. She’s more of an older sister. When I was younger the age gap was bigger, we were just kids and she was an Adult, but now the gap doesn’t matter all that much. She watches me pass, her face neutral.

Her sister? Cousin? Whoever it is, she watches me pass with more interest, giving me a smoky look that would bring most men to full attention.

She looks familiar. I think I’ve seen her in her underwear in an ad.

I adjust my jacket and keep walking, up the stairs to the top floor of the tower, and the expansive ballroom under a huge baroque dome. It’s a breathtaking space, windows all around with one side dominated by the ominous red glow of the letters.

I slip into the crowd and wait until the wedding party makes its entrance. My father and his new wife arrive in a cloud of bridesmaids and groomsmen, and everyone heads for the tables set up at the far end, in front of the stage.

I make my move fast, tossing someone else’s place card under the table to steal their seat. It takes a full five minutes for everyone to settle down.

Dad takes his seat next to my new stepmother and the best man rises to give a rambling speech that I don’t bother to follow. I’m too busy watching Ellie watch her empty plate and avoid my gaze.

Mostly. Her eyes…

Eye
,
goddamn it, her eye keeps flicking up, every time she forgets she doesn’t want to look at me. I don’t look anywhere else, just at her. There is nothing here but her. My innards twist at the sight.

She’s still beautiful. She has an innocence about her, something more than the sum of her looks, even though she is and always has been very pretty. I knew girls our age who peaked in high school. Ellie didn’t. She was radiant when she was fourteen and she’s radiant now, scars be damned. Her eye is as blue as the ocean at night, her skin as soft as a cloud, dusted with freckles around her mouth.

There’s no way to ignore the scars, though. Her face…melted. When she moves just the right way I can see it, the left side of her features frozen into a rough, fleshy mask. She sits with her head up, as if daring anyone to look, but she wears her hair over the injuries, and her chin constantly twitches, like she’s trying to hide and forcing herself out into the open. Her hand sits on the table, a useless claw in a glove to hide scars even harder to look at than her face.

The man who did that to her sits not five feet away, enjoying his wedding to his gorgeous wife. Ellie’s mother is gorgeous, and that’s about all she’s got going for her. When Ellie’s father was alive and all was right with the world, I wondered what the old man saw in his bubbleheaded assistant.

Of course I know what he saw, but Ellie was my first, and I think, my last.