Fade to Black (20 page)

She knew she had to keep it together, but she
was having a harder and harder time doing it. When she heard Hayden say no one
ever leaves her, she knew she had to do something.
Neither
one of them was going to make it out of there alive, so she might as well do
whatever needed to be done, because then just maybe, they would make it out
alive.
In order to do this, she had to put all thought of her son and
unborn baby out of her head. If they were in there, she might not be strong
enough.

Moving slightly to the side, she made sure
she was in the shadows and peeked over the short wall right in front of her. There
was a large shovel lying there. Very carefully, she climbed over the wall and
dropped quickly down. She held her breath for a few moments, thankful they kept
talking. In fact, it almost seemed like Devlin’s voice had become louder. He
must have seen her go over the wall, and was trying to cover up any sound she
might make. She needed to time her movements for when he was speaking.

Again checking around the column, staying
hidden in the shadows, she looked again. The dead man was between her and
Hayden, which might end up working out in her favor. Hayden seemed like her
back was almost to her and closer to the far wall of the balcony. Devlin must
have moved further down in hopes she might be able to sneak behind her. But
what Devlin didn’t know was she wasn’t leaving without him, and she needed
revenge for Dory. Hayden had to pay. Hayden had to hurt.

She sent up a silent prayer to her angel in
Heaven, knowing if Dory could do anything she would. Lily slowly slunk around,
building up speed until she was almost running, and swung the shovel like a
baseball bat, the way she’d taught her son to do.

~^~

Devlin kept a straight face as he saw Lily swinging
at the back of Hayden’s head. The thud of the shovel connecting echoed throughout
the canyon. He watched as Hayden hung limply over the edge of the wall, knowing
there was a long drop if she went over. He didn’t want Lily to have to live
with the guilt of killing someone for the rest of her life. When Lily pulled
the shovel back and was going to swing again, he stopped her.

“What are you doing? Let me end this.”

“No, Lily, it’s not for us to end.” He was
a little nervous about his back being turned toward Hayden, but he knew Lily’s
future was more important.

“The hell it isn’t. She killed my best
friend, she poisoned my son. She was going to kill me and take our baby. This
bitch needs to die.”

“Lily, you’re not like her. If you killed
her, it would tear you up for the rest of your life.”

“Step aside and let me find out for myself
if I can live with it.”

“No, you mean too much to me, I won’t let
you do it.” He tried to force her to stop for a minute and think about what she
was doing. When her shoulders started to relax, he knew he was starting to get
through to her. “Come on, we can lock her and Jimmy out here and see if we can
get help.” They walked back toward the house, and when they were at the door,
they heard Hayden.

“Oh…
Devlin, darling.”

Slowly they turned around to see her
standing on the wall, swaying back and forth. “Oh shit,” he said.

“My darling, dearest lover, it would appear
our time together is over. I’m sorry, I never wanted to let you go, but yet I
find it is time to say goodbye. You will forever be in my heart, although there
will be a deep dark hole there, where you once filled it so brightly. Now I must
move onto the next stage, without you.”

“Hayden, what are you doing?” His heart
sank, because he knew, she always was dramatic. “Don’t do something you can’t
undo.”

“Don’t you understand, darling? You’ve made
your choice, now this is the only other choice I have.”

“There are always other choices.” He
started to move closer to her.

“Yes, well in my case there aren’t any.”
She stumbled a few times to the left. “You see, everything is starting to fade
to black, and we know what that means in the business. Goodbye, my darling
lover. I’ll be watching from the other side.” She spread her arms and fell
backwards.

Devlin rushed to her, trying to grab onto
her as she fell away from him. Lily was beside him in an instant. They both watched
as ironically, the motion sensor spotlights came on, illumining her fall all
the way down, each and every bounce off the rocks was there in bright light,
searing into their memories.

Chapter
Twenty-Three

Lily
couldn’t get home fast enough. As soon as everything was taken care of with the
police, she was on the first plane home. She couldn’t look at Devlin even
though she knew she was wrong to feel that way. It’s not like she was blaming
him; in fact, she didn’t blame him at all. What she was ashamed of was the fact
she was so willing to stoop to Hayden’s level and was going to so easily kill
her. She missed Dory so much more now knowing how she died, sometimes she
wondered if it would have been better to never have known. She needed her so
much now. She was the person she could talk to about this, about almost killing
someone, but she wasn’t here.

Somehow she made it through parents’ day
with Leo. He asked where Devlin was but she easily used his business as to why
he was absent. Once they were home together, she would let Leo know everything that
had happened. Some of it she’d keep from him until he was older, but some he’d
have to know sooner rather than later. Like the fact he was going to have a
baby brother or sister.

Slowly she walked back to her bedroom and lay
down on her bed. Sabby curled up next to her, placing a paw on her arm. Everything
was so quiet, it was as if the whole town shut down and there were no children
playing anywhere. Lily rubbed her belly, amazed she was going to have another
baby. Of course this one’s father was going to be so different than Leo’s; this
one would be involved in their lives. She knew she could raise this child on her
own, but it wouldn’t be fair to the child or Leo, both of them would want
Devlin in their lives, and Devlin would make a wonderful father.

“Dory, I miss you so much. You’d know
exactly what I should do, or you’d at least tell me what you thought I should
do. You’d give me options; you’d listen to me and tell me if I was being dumb
or if I should take a chance. Damn her. She took you from me. You didn’t deserve
to die that way. You had so much love in your heart.”

She turned toward the window when a flutter
of color caught her attention. There was a beautiful colorful butterfly gently
landing on a branch right outside her window. Carefully, Lily stood up and walked
over to it, slowly sliding the window open. She was drawn to the butterfly and
put her finger out, and was amazed when it landed there. Bringing it up, they
were face to face, the butterfly slowly flapping its wings. A sense of calm
came over Lily. Dory would always be in her heart. No one could take Dory away
from her, or the memories they’d created together. She might not be able to
wrap her arms around her anymore, but she was still here. “Goodbye, Dory.”
Gently, she moved her finger and the butterfly flew away.

Sitting on the edge of the bed, she began
to think about her future. When her phone rang, she picked it up and looked at
the caller ID.
Devlin.
It was too soon, she didn’t
know when she’d be ready to see him face to face knowing he knew the worst in
her, what she was capable of. She turned the ringer off and set it face down on
the bed. This was part of her future she was putting off.

“Well, that wasn’t very nice.”

Lily jumped and gasped when she saw Devlin
in the doorway to her room. “What are you doing here?” Her eyes darted
everywhere but at him.

“We have to talk, and ignoring all my phone
calls isn’t going to work anymore.”

“I wasn’t ignoring them.”

“Really?”
He crossed his arms over his chest and waited for her to reply.

Looking at the muscles play in his strong,
tanned forearms as he clenched and unclenched his fists waiting for her to
reply, she knew she owed it to him to let him know it wasn’t going to work out.
“I’m sorry, Devlin, it’s all too much, and I can’t do this.”

“What do you mean do this?” He waved his
hand angrily. “What we have is more than a ‘this’ and you know it. Why don’t
you tell me what’s really going on, or tell me how much time you need, because
I’m not going anywhere. I’m going to be here for you whether you like it or
not.”

“You can’t decide what’s right for me.” She
stood up to face him, but still couldn’t look him in the eye.

“The hell I can’t. We’re in love, I love
your son, and we have a baby on the way. If you won’t suck it up and talk to me,
you’re damn straight I’m making decisions.”

“Screw you, Cross.
My
life, my body, my decisions.
Back off.”

“Get off your high horse and whatever the
hell crawled up your ass and let’s talk about this rationally.”

“Hey, I’m not the only one who’s being all
irrational. You need to take a page out of your own book there, buddy.”

“Why do you have to be so damn stubborn?”

“Why are you swearing so much all of the
sudden?”

“Because you matter.
Because
I’m doing whatever I can to get through to you, so maybe you’ll actually look
me in the eye. Maybe you’ll forgive me for bringing all this death into your
life and know if I could bring Dory back I would. I’m so sorry and it’s
all my
fault.” He sat down heavily on the bed.

Lily closed her eyes and looked up at the
ceiling, knowing she owed it to him to tell him the truth, not push him away
like she wanted to do. “Devlin, it’s not your fault.” She sat down beside him.
“It’s me.”

He laughed without humor. “Boy, I’ve never
heard that one before.”

“No, it’s me.” She turned to look at him,
really look him in the eye. “I’m the one who was so quick to take a life. I was
going to kill her without a second thought. The thought of revenge was so heavy
on my mind I couldn’t think of anything else.” She searched his eyes for a
moment before looking down again. “How could you love me knowing I’d do that?
I’m not worth it.”

She felt his fingers under her chin,
forcing her to look up at him. “Lily, honey, never could I think badly of you.
If our situations had been reversed, you would have been the one stopping me.
Don’t you understand? I stopped you because I hadn’t lost what you had. I was
able to think clearly, and I knew if you killed her you wouldn’t be able to
live with yourself. It would be hard, but I could deal with it if you never
wanted to see me again because I was the one who brought all this into your
life. I’d still fight for us, do whatever I could, but I’d deal with it because
I knew at some point you’d be whole again. If you killed Hayden, you’d never be
whole again, and that,” he made sure she was looking at him, “and that I
couldn’t live with.”

Tears flowed from her eyes, as there was no
way she was able to hold them back. “Devlin, I’m so sorry.”

“There’s nothing for you to be sorry about.
You’re human, and although you would like everyone to think so, you aren’t
perfect, you make mistakes.” He pulled her onto his lap. “But I will tell you
one thing.”

“What’s that?” She snuggled into him.

“You’re perfect for me. So perfect, in fact,
I think you should marry me.”

“Gee, Cross, you’re so romantic.”

He kissed her quickly. “Honey, we have the
rest of our lives to make sure I get this whole romance thing down.”

“We sure do, we sure do.”

Epilogue

One
Year Later

Lily
sighed and snuggled with her husband. The past year had held so many changes.
Accepting Dory’s death, a marriage, and a new life.
She
shouldn’t have been surprised, but Leo’s dad had not put up any fight when
Devlin had met with him and told him he wanted to adopt Leo. She was sure he
was just happy he wouldn’t be on the hook for child support anymore, not like
he ever really paid it anyway. SuperDad he was not.

Now they were all were Crosses. They had a
small ceremony, just the three of them on Thanksgiving. They both felt was the
perfect time since they had so much to be thankful for. Neither Devlin nor she
wanted anything large, and quite frankly, the vows that were spoken were for
the three of them. They were now a family.

Sighing when she heard the soft cries
coming from the other room, she knew their precious daughter was awake and one
of them was going to have to leave the comfort of their bed to get her.

Devlin jumped up. “I’ll get L.D.” There was
no doubt he loved both of his children, even though one of them wasn’t his
biologically.

Lily smiled at the nickname they’d given
her. There was no discussion, as soon as they found out they were having a girl
they already had a name, DoryAnn. They decided to call her L.D., short for
Little Dory so when she was older she’d know who they were talking about when
they told her all about the very special woman who was an angel in heaven
watching over her.