Rare (23 page)

“Both.”

“I don’t know how many pills, but it was… shit, more than a year ago, I guess.”

“Why did you do it?”

I considered her question. Pete said I’d nearly OD’d on his mom’s Valium, but I didn’t remember it at all. “I don’t know. I was feeling a bit crazy at the time.”

Danni nodded thoughtfully. “If I hid them somewhere in your place, would you lie to me to get to them?”

“No.” I didn’t know much, but I knew I wouldn’t do that. Lying to her would mean using Pete. I could
never
do that. “I don’t think I’d go looking for them; it’s just if they were right in front of me….”

Danni swept the bag off the counter and into her purse. “Okay,” she said. “I’ll put them somewhere safe. If Pete needs them, call. I’ll tell Joe where they are too. One of us will always be around, Ash. We’re only a few minutes away.”

She meant it as comfort, but it hurt that she’d fallen into Joe’s way of allowing my drama to dictate her life. I needed their help to support Pete, and nothing was more important than him, but it weighed on me that I couldn’t be trusted to care for him by myself.

A knock at the door broke the heavy silence. Expecting Pete, I left Danni in the kitchen and jogged to the front door. Ellie’s smiling face caught me off guard. Despite my good intentions, I’d never gotten around to tracking her down.

“Hey,” she said cheerfully. “I thought I’d come and make sure you had everything you needed. Can’t have you starving to death, can we?”

She breezed past me and into the kitchen before I could answer, stopping short when she saw Danni already putting groceries away in the cupboards. “Um, hi.”

Danni spun around, a warm smile forming, but Ellie’s face fell, and then there was silence, complete and utter silence.

The two women skirted around each other for the next hour. Danni cooked something up in the big pot she’d brought over while Ellie bustled around changing the sheets on the beds and cleaning shit that was already clean. She gave her seal of approval to the apartment, but I could see she wasn’t happy. I expected her to wait for Pete, but she didn’t. She left without giving me any indication of when I’d see her again.

I was beyond confused, but when Pete shuffled through the door that afternoon, I forgot all about it.

It took a while to get him settled. The car journey wore him out and made him sick. I sat in the bathroom doorway and watched him puke his guts up. I wanted to go to him, rub his back, and tell him everything was going to be okay, but I couldn’t, because he didn’t want me to. He wouldn’t even let me help him up.

He went to bed in a foul mood, and it was late by the time I had the balls to crawl under the comforter beside him.

Pete rolled over to face me. “Hey.”

“Hey, yourself. Headache?”

“Mmm, like a bitch. What’s up with you? You look kinda freaked.”

I doubted he’d respond well to me telling him that his surly demeanor was scaring the crap out of me. Instead, I attempted to explain the weird scene I’d witnessed between Ellie and Danni.

His response made sense, even if his delivery was a little short.

“It’s not rocket science, Ash,” he said flatly. “Ellie’s not used to sharing you, is all. She’ll get over it.”

T
HE
NEXT
few days were strained. It was a huge relief to have Pete home, but the sense that I didn’t truly have him back lingered. He wasn’t well enough to attend Tim’s funeral, and he didn’t give any indication of wanting to go, but I could pinpoint the day it happened as when what little humor he had left disappeared.

To me, Tim’s funeral was a stark reminder of what could have happened to Pete. I could have lost him forever, but for him, it was a trigger for the overwhelming guilt he felt at having a rookie die on his watch. Put together with the effects of major surgery and a debilitating head injury, it was enough to send him into a black mood he couldn’t seem to shake.

He slept a lot and barely ate. He hardly spoke either, and it became a common occurrence for him to switch off and look away when someone was talking to him. Sometimes, he even got up and limped out of the room. It was disconcerting for Joe and Danni and upsetting for Maggie, but for me, it was terrifying. It reminded me of the way I’d been when mental illness had taken over my life. Pete had spent months at the mercy of my dark moods, and watching him suffer now, I knew I was only experiencing a fraction of what I’d put him through. It made his demeanor easy to forgive, but now I knew how it felt from the other side, I was never quite going to forgive myself.

A week after he came home, he pulled himself up from the couch and shuffled into the kitchen. I watched him from where I was attempting to work at the table, cocking my head to the side. Something was off.

What came next happened in slow motion. Pete staggered. He put a hand out to steady himself, but there was nothing in front of him. His legs buckled and he sank to the ground.

I didn’t get there in time to catch him.

My heart skipped as I cradled his head in my arms and found the pulse in his wrist. Beneath his warm skin, it was strong and steady. The pounding in my ears faded as I realized he’d passed out. He’d taught me himself how to deal with fainting clients.

I leaned against the cabinet behind me with his back on my chest and his head lolled on my shoulder. I spoke quietly into his ear, waiting for him to come around, and it didn’t take long. He was only out for a few minutes before he stirred.

He groaned and brought his hand to his head. I squeezed his fingers so he knew I was there, but he seemed startled when he opened his eyes.

“What the fuck?”

“You, um, fell,” I supplied helpfully as he stared at me. Perhaps it was our position. It wasn’t often he found me behind him.

“Fell?”

“I think you passed out. Maybe you stood up too fast?”

He sat up, his confused gaze flickering around the room. “Great,” he said dully. “Did I take you down with me?”

“No, I didn’t get to you in time. Did you hurt yourself?”

“It’s hard to tell.”

He moved to stand up, wincing. I put a hand out to help him, but he ignored it, wrapping his arm round his abdomen and hauling himself to his feet. After a few false starts, he hobbled into the bedroom with me drifting behind him.

He sat down and blew out a long breath. A flash of irritation crossed his face when he saw me in the doorway. “What?”

“Do you have a headache?”

“No.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Really?”

I knew I was right. His eyes had that strange haze that seemed to come with the worst headaches he got. He stared me down until he figured I was going to hold my nerve.

“A bit,” he conceded. “But I don’t want any of that narcotic crap, so don’t even say it.”

I didn’t say it. My worries about having hard-core drugs in the apartment had proved unfounded, because even when he was in agony, he wouldn’t touch them. He hadn’t swallowed anything stronger for pain than a Tylenol since he’d left the hospital. The thought that he was doing it for my benefit rankled me, but at the same time, I knew it was more likely he just didn’t want to. Drugs like that messed with the mind, and he was having enough trouble there as it was.

I took my cue and left him alone for a while, though I checked on him periodically. The lights were off, but I could make out the hunched shape of his body as he fought the pain in his head. It was hard to watch, but there was nothing I could do for him. I couldn’t even lie with him because I knew from experience he couldn’t handle being touched when his head was pounding. In the hospital, he’d found comfort in me rubbing his neck, but he hadn’t let me anywhere near him since he’d been home.

I figured he was asleep when I came to bed around midnight, but he moaned as the mattress shifted beneath him. I put a cautious hand on his shoulder. I couldn’t see his face because he had his arms over his head, but the tension in his body was obvious.

“Pete?”

He groaned again, dropping his arms from his face. “What?”

“Are you sure you don’t want to take something?”

He stared at me for a moment. His eyes were so dark they looked almost black. In the murky light of the room they looked hollow, like empty holes where he used to be. He reached for his pillow and pulled it over his head.

“I don’t need any bullshit junk, Ash. Leave me the fuck alone.”

His tone was as flat as his eyes were dull. Defeated, I dropped my hand and moved away.

Over the days that followed, nothing much changed. Pete healed from the injuries I could see, but with each day that passed, every part of him I recognized slowly disappeared. The warmth that had drawn me to him was gone, and in its place there was nothing but cold, detached impatience. Life became still and soundless. The silence was heavy, loaded with everything that wasn’t being said. It was numbing and I hated it.

By the time I opened the door to an oddly familiar woman a week or so later, I was beginning to feel totally detached from the world around me.

I
STARED
at the tall, brown-haired woman. She smiled faintly, one of those cold smiles you got from people who worked behind reception desks. It looked like it hurt her face.

“Is Pietro here? Maggie told me this was his new address.”

Something about the tone of her voice set me on edge. For some reason, I couldn’t bring myself to stand aside and let her in. “You’re looking for Pete? Why? Who are you?”

“Who am I?” A dangerous glare flashed in the woman’s eyes. “I’m family. I think a more appropriate question is, who are you?”

For a split second, I thought she was trying to tell me that she was Pete’s long-lost wife, and the young boy hiding behind her legs was his son. The way our lives had panned out recently, nothing could surprise me anymore.

“What the fuck are you doing here?”

I whirled around. Pete was behind me, leaning against the kitchen doorway, his eyes narrowed and his glare murderous.

The woman folded her arms across her chest. “I tried to call, but apparently you’ve been busy trying to get yourself killed.”

“I called you too, Heidi. I called you five years ago. You took your sweet time getting back to me.”

The proverbial lightbulb clicked. So she
was
his sister. I wouldn’t have known to look at her. Her skin was as light as his was dark, and where his eyes were a rich, warm brown, hers were dull and flat, almost like mud. She reminded me of Megan. The sneer on her face was the same.

I took a wary step back, unblocking the door. It wasn’t an invitation, but Heidi took it anyway, walking right past me and into the hallway before I thought to stop her. My gaze cut back to Pete. He turned a withering glare on me. The black glint in his eyes scared me; I didn’t recognize the man behind it.

He moved, his body a blur as he closed the space between him and his sister, yanked her out of the apartment, and slammed the door behind him. He didn’t seem to notice the kid he’d left behind, and Heidi didn’t come back for him either.

I spent the next hour huddled on the kitchen floor with the young boy. My experience with children was limited; I didn’t cross paths with many in the tattoo trade.

Lacking any better ideas, I retrieved a dusty box of colored oil pastels and sat him on the floor with a pile of newspaper. Though cowed by the raised voices filtering through the front door, the boy was kinda chatty. His name was Liam. He wasn’t altogether sure how old he was, but between us we figured out he was either four or five. I shouldn’t have been surprised when he told me his mom was fighting with his Uncle Pete. The logical part of my brain had drawn that conclusion the moment I figured out who Heidi was, but it still jarred me. Liam said he hadn’t seen Pete for a long time, but he sent him birthday presents. As the kid rattled off his date of birth, I realized that less than a week before the train crash, Pete had been mailing gifts to a nephew I knew nothing about.

The night Pete was hurt stuck in my mind for many reasons, most of which I’d tried to forget, but aside from the obvious, Heidi was at the center of a memory I couldn’t shake. Until that fateful night, I’d had no idea she wasn’t Maggie’s natural daughter, and the conversation we’d had just hours before the train wreck played over and over in my mind, distracting me from the series of stick men Liam drew for me.

My mind swam. My memory still had its holes—holes I sometimes thought were best left unfilled—but I remembered every moment I’d ever spent with Pete. He’d never told me about Heidi, and he’d certainly never told me about Liam.

I didn’t get it. I tried, turning it over and over in my mind, but I didn’t understand. Pete had loved his dad. Losing him when he was just fourteen had hurt him more than he often cared to admit. He rarely talked about it, and the pain in his eyes when he did was enough to put me off bringing it up. Perhaps now I knew why. I’d never thought of Pete as a secretive person, but he’d hidden me from his workmates for years. Maybe I didn’t know him as well as I thought.

The notion lingered and left a bad taste in my mouth. I had no right to judge him—my own sordid secrets had nearly destroyed us both—but the idea that he could hide something so huge was unsettling.

“Are you friends with Uncle Pete?”

I glanced down at Liam. He had a sweet face, pale blue eyes that must have come from his father, and sand-colored hair. He didn’t look much like Heidi, and he didn’t bear any resemblance to Pete at all. “We live together.”

“Here?”

“Uh-huh.”

The kid stared around at the garish purple walls. “Your walls are like grape jelly.”

I smothered a snicker. Joe had bought me the paint as a dare. I’d taken the challenge, but we both knew I hated it. Now the bets were on to see how long I could stand it. Joe had aimed low; he was probably right.

“Why did you draw on your arm?”

“I needed the practice.” The kid was staring at the wizard on my arm, so I held it out for him. “I drew on Uncle Pete too.”