NO SECRETS NO LIES (SIN CITY HEAT SERIES Book 3) (25 page)

    
Jerra bit down hard on her lower lip to stop the trembling and nodded. Darrell
stared at her a moment longer. A part of him wanted to pull her into his arms
and tell her everything would be okay, but the other part kept reminding him of
her secrets, especially how she'd flown out of town and back without missing a
beat. He honestly wondered what else she was keeping from him.

   
 That’s what the breaking of trust did. When it started to unravel, it was
hard to tie it back up as tight as it had once been. For him, deceit was not an
easy thing to forgive – or forget. He wasn’t saying it was right because he was
nowhere near perfect, but that’s how he was. Take it or leave it. Maybe the
experiences they’d gone through had fucked them both up more than they
realized. He'd always thought that particular commonality gave them a strong,
unbreakable bond. Guess not.

    
With his heart suddenly aching from the loss of the closeness they'd always
shared, Darrell was turning to go to the bathroom when his cell phone rang.
Wondering who the hell would be calling him this late and why, he reached in
his pocket and pulled out his cell phone. Surprise replaced the frown on his
face when he saw it was Marcus.

    
"Hey, what's up, bruh? You ain't got nothin' better to do than call me on
the last night of your vacation?"

    
"Did Jerra tell you I called earlier?"

    
Darrell frowned at the brusque question. "No," he slowly answered,
swinging his eyes back to Jerra. "Then again, I just got in so..."

    
"I've been blowin’ your phone up. Your voicemail was full so I couldn't
leave a message. Never mind. We need to talk."

    
"Marcus, what's wrong? Somethin’ happened? Is Aleesha okay?" Worried,
Jerra hurried over to him.

    
"No, no it's nothing like that, but..."

     
"Just say it." Concern made Darrell's voice razor sharp.

     
"D, there's no easy way to tell you this, but...I...I saw Roni.
Darrell...she's alive."

    
Darrell’s expression of disbelief was swift. He walked back a few steps until
he thankfully  came in contact with the wall behind him. He couldn’t have
heard Marcus right.

    
"What?" His voice was surprisingly calm.

    
"I know how it sounds crazy, but Darrell I
saw
her with my own
eyes.
I saw her!
"

    
"What?!" This time the incredulity in Darrell's voice was
unmistakable. Darrell shook his head. "Marcus, come on. That's impossible.
What are you talkin’ about?? Roni...Roni's dead," he whispered hoarsely.

    
Jerra brought her hand up to cover her mouth as she kept her attention on
Darrell.

    
"Darrell, listen..."

    
"Hell no! I'm not listenin' to no bullshit like that, Marcus! We were
there! We were there when she died! Have you forgotten that?!"

    
"Were we?! Think about it, Darrell! Everything happened so fast. You
were...you were out of it. Yes, she flat lined, but
they were still working
on her when we left out of the room...!"

    
That
day was burned in Marcus’ memory. He remembered glancing over his shoulder.
Bryan was standing off to the side with his hands on top of his head, his face
reflecting disbelief at losing his cousin right in front of his eyes. Darrell
fought to stay in the room and it had taken every ounce of Marcus' strength to
wrestle him out. Seconds before he did, he saw Bryan stalk over to the doctor
and grab the lapels of his coat.

    
'
Mr. Jefferson, I'm sorry. She's gone.'

    
'Try again.' The words had been stiff and Bryan's face crazed. Almost
threatening. Marcus had never seen him look that way. "Her dying is not an
option." Marcus hadn’t heard the rest of what was said, but whatever it
was had been enough to spur the doctor into turning back to Roni.

    
Marcus
relayed this information to Darrell then told him about seeing her at the
shopping mall in Aruba. "D, you know I wouldn’t have called you and opened
up old wounds because of some bullshit. Man, she
looked
at me. We made
eye contact; she was as shocked as I was. That's when she hurried out. By the
time I got outside, the car she hopped into took off like a bat out of hell. I
tried to chase it down, but..."

    
Marcus stood on the balcony of his hotel room. When Aleesha slid the glass door
open, his eyes met hers. He'd already told her everything he was telling
Darrell. He knew she was worried about Darrell - but she was also wondering how
this would affect Jerra.

    
Darrell was silent for endless seconds as his mind tried to absorb and process
what Marcus just told him. If it had been anybody else coming to him with
something like this...

    
Jerra took a hesitant stepped closer. "Darrell...?"

    
He glanced up when he heard Jerra call his name; he'd been so caught up in
reliving the day Roni died, he'd forgotten she was standing there. He pushed
away from the wall.

    
"So...you sayin'...Bryan
knew
?" It still didn't even seem real
that they were having this conversation.

    
"He had to have known, D! He had to! Roni was incapacitated. You, me, and
Bryan were the only ones allowed in her room other than the staff. I mean...I
didn’t think until now. If you'd seen the way he looked at that doctor..."

    
"It doesn’t make any sense." Darrell was mystified, still not able to
completely believe any of it was true. "Why would he do somethin' like
that? And if Roni’s alive, why didn’t she contact me when she eventually got
better? She had to have known what I was going through. She had to have known
that if I'd been aware she was still alive..."

    
A cry of pain reminded him that Jerra was listening to everything he was
saying. He turned to her and felt his gut twist into a thousand knots when he
saw the look of devastation drawn on her face.

    
"Aleesha and I have rescheduled our flight for a couple of days until you
get here." There was no question in either of their minds that Darrell
would fly to Aruba as soon as he could.

    
With his eyes still on Jerra, Darrell answered in a quiet tone. "I'm
calling the airport when we hang up." His voice turned freezing cold.
"But first, I need to see Bryan. One way or the other, he's gonna tell me
exactly what the fuck is goin' on."

Chapter
32

    
After he and Marcus got off the phone, Jerra and Darrell stared at one another
as the quietness in the room enveloped them like a tight fist. Two hearts thumped
violently, struggling to stop from shattering into broken pieces for completely
different reasons.

    
"Roni's alive?" Jerra asked.

    
Darrell still couldn't believe it himself. "Apparently so. Marcus saw her
in Aruba."

    
Jerra's mind grasped wildly for an explanation, anything that would make her
life, which was quickly turning into a nightmare, only a bad dream. "How
can he be sure? He has to be mistaken. You...you scattered her ashes
yourself."

    
"If it had been someone who just
looked
like Roni, Marcus wouldn't
have even brought that to me. He couldn't have made a mistake like that. If
he's this sure - it's her."

   
"But...but...why would Bryan fake her death? And if he did and now Roni's
apparently alive and well enough to be living it up on a tropical island
somewhere, why would she have carried on this charade all this time and not
gotten in contact with you?"

    
Darrell stared at her for the longest time. "I don't know, Jerra. Why
would
a person do something so out of character when they know the impact it
would have on somebody they professed to love unconditionally? You tell
me."

    
Jerra's eyes faltered then slid away from his when she heard the innuendo laced
like cyanide in his words. She silently listened as he called the airport and
booked a flight out of Vegas to Aruba for in the morning.

    
After Darrell, paid for the reservation with his credit card, he went to the
closet and pulled out a duffel bag. Jerra watched him stuff a couple of pairs
of jeans and t-shirts in it along with socks and underwear.

    
"I'm going to see Bryan then heading straight to the airport."

    
"What?" Jerra looked up with a start as she realized he was leaving -
as in now. She followed Darrell into the bathroom where he threw a few toiletries
into his shaving kit.

    
Darrell's eyes met hers in the mirror. "I'll call you when I get
there."

    
"Wait, are you serious?? You’re just gonna leave?? Just like that."
When he picked up the shaving kit and went back into the bedroom, Jerra was right
on his heels. "Darrell. Darrell!" Seeing he had no intention of
answering her, Jerra grabbed his arm and forced him to turn around.

    
Exasperated, Darrell shifted his weight to one leg in a deliberate pose that
told her his patience was wearing thin.

    
Well that was just too damned bad! Jerra cocked an eyebrow and defiantly folded
her arms. "You can't mean you're leaving
now."

    
"It’s
exactly what I mean. Bryan needs to answer some questions, and if I don't go to
jail tonight after I'm done with him, then I'm heading straight to the
airport."

    
"And...you don't see anything wrong with just dropping everything at a
moment's notice because you've found out your ex-lover could
possibly
be
alive? You have a family now. A wife. A son. Where do we fit into this little
reunion you're running off to have?"

    
"My son is always going to be a part of my life. Always, so don't
trip."

    
Jerra felt as if he'd literally taken a knife and sliced her heart out.
"But...not me? Is that what you're saying?"

    
Darrell made a sound of irritation. "That's not what I meant! Don't put
words in my mouth!" He threw up his hands as if surrendering the
conversation to her. "You know what? I don't have time for this right now. 
Maybe there are things in both our pasts we need to confront before we can move
on with our future. What was it you said when you went on this journey to find
your daughter? It was something you felt you had to do. Well, this is something
I feel
I
need to do. After everything you told me, you can't say you
don't understand that." He stared at her, daring her to contradict her
explanation from earlier.

   
"I understand that if you want to use my mistakes as an excuse to be with
someone else, be man enough to say so."

    
The look Darrell leveled at Jerra was cold enough to make an Eskimo's piss
freeze in mid-stream. He picked up his duffel bag and walked to the door,
calling out over his shoulder. "Take care of my son. I'll call you when I
land."

    
After he was gone, Jerra turned around and sat down on the bed. She still
couldn’t believe he would just leave like this so she held her breath until she
heard the roar of his Range Rover speeding out of the driveway. Feeling as if a
part of her had died, Jerra grabbed the pillow and brought it up to her face to
stifle a painful scream.

    
She didn’t know how long she sat crying. When someone called her name, at first
she thought she was hearing things, but she lifted her head and turned swollen
eyes to the doorway of her bedroom.

    
Keisha dropped her purse and rushed over to put her arms around Jerra.
"Shhh. It's okay. Everything's going to be okay. I promise."

    
"H-how...how did you..." Jerra could barely talk as the pain in her
chest became almost unbearable.

    
"Aleesha called me."

 
   "I've lost him, Keisha."

    
"Sweetie, we tried to tell you to talk to him, but you haven't lost him.
Darrell loves you. He's coming back."

    
Jerra shook her head in denial before Keisha even finished talking. "You
don't understand. Keisha, he was so, so angry. And now...now that he knows Roni
is alive....you didn’t see the look on his face. He didn’t hesitate to leave me
to go to her."

    
Keisha grabbed Jerra's face and turned it around to look at her. "Jerra,
Roni is Darrell's past. They're not the same people they were."

    
"He still loves her, Keisha," Jerra sniffed. "He all but said
so. He told Marcus that if he'd known she was still alive..." Jerra
covered her face with her hands and broke down all over again.

  
"Honey, you have to stop," Keisha begged as her own tears ran down
her cheeks. "You have to think about your son - and your daughter. You're
meeting her in just a few hours, aren't you?"

 Jerra
nodded, taking deep breaths. "We're going to take this one hour, hell one minute,
at a time. I'm getting ready to make you some tea and you're gonna try and get
a little rest. I'll stay here with DJ while you enjoy your daughter. Those are
your priorities right now."