by Jade Kerrion
She pushed past him and ran from the library, leaving Cody alone with the fading sound of her quiet heartbroken sobs.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Cody tipped his head back and drained his third bottle of beer before setting it aside to stare out at the guest cottage next to the swimming pool. Footsteps echoed behind him.
“So,” Eric said. “Any particular reason why the guest of honor at the surprise party sent a message to Mrs. Meredith saying not to set a place for her at dinner?”
“Damn you.”
Eric sat down beside Cody and loosened his tie. “Why me?”
“I saw you at lunch.”
Eric smiled. “With Lisa. Yes, gorgeous, isn’t she?”
Cody fisted his hands in Eric’s shirt. “Why the hell are you flirting with another woman when you’re sleeping with Felicity?”
Eric arched his eyebrows, and a slow smile spread across his face. He shoved Cody’s hands away. “So is that why Felicity bailed on dinner? You railed on her too?”
“That woman doesn’t need your protection. She got more jabs into me than I did into her.”
“You didn’t hit her, did you?” Eric’s tone sharpened.
“No, of course not. I never hit women.” He was, however, at that moment, tempted to hit his brother. “How could you think that of me?”
“I don’t know you, Cody.” Eric shrugged. “All we have is Felicity’s word that you’re not a bad sort. Sometimes, we think she’s actually trying to convince herself. You’ve put her in an awkward spot,” he continued in a conversational tone.
“Don’t I know it.”
“Mom and Dad adore her.”
“Really? Why?” Cody asked. He heard the sharpness in his own tone.
“Open your eyes. Look around.”
He did, and for the first time, he noticed Felicity’s hand in the dazzling flower arrangements that instilled bursts of color, fragrance, and life into his family’s home. His shoulders sagged on a sigh. “She’s amazing, isn’t she?”
“Yeah, she is.”
“Settled right down. Wormed herself into all your hearts.” Sarcasm got the better of him.
“Didn’t take much. Mom and Dad were emotionally primed to welcome anyone you brought home.”
“I didn’t bring her home,” Cody protested, but even he knew he did not have much ground to stand on. He had brought Felicity home.
Then he had left her.
Eric continued, “She could have been the Wicked Witch of the West, and they would probably still have welcomed her with open arms.”
Cody snorted. “Doesn’t say much for their discriminating tastes.”
“They more or less gave up on discriminating when you ran away. Probably figured they had to lower their standards dramatically since you were intent on not raising yours.”
“I don’t need to take this crap.” Cody pushed to his feet, but Eric grabbed his wrist. Cody stared at his brother’s hand and assessed his chances of breaking free. Bloodying Eric’s nose in the process would have made him feel better. Eric was probably baiting him. Well, Eric would have to be disappointed; Cody had no intention of proving, without a doubt, Felicity’s assertion that he was a punk kid. “I’ve got to go.”
“Really?” Eric asked. “You’re going to leave Felicity here?”
Cody grimaced. Eric was right. How could Cody leave Felicity in tears on her first birthday without her twin brother? “I’ll bring her a tray.”
Eric’s grip loosened. He smiled. “Attaboy.”
“I’m not doing this for you.”
“Of course not,” Eric said. “I’m not expecting any favors from you.” His smile thinned, as if he had ceased to be amused. He shoved to his feet and walked away. “Goodnight, Cody.”
Damn. Cody scowled. He had not managed to confirm if Eric was sleeping with Felicity, but that wasn’t the point, he reminded himself. The point was that he had been an unwarranted and unmitigated ass, and he was not sure “sorry” was going to cut it—not when she hated him as much as she did.
~*~
Wrung out of tears, Felicity opened the door of the cottage and stepped out into the cool night air. She raised her face to the light breeze and closed her eyes. For a while, it was a mercy to not think too hard, not that she could. Her head felt heavy, and her thoughts dragged from trying to wade through all the tears she had shed.
She looked down and found a tray of food on the steps leading up to the cottage. She lifted up the silver domed food cover to find a bowl of wild mushroom bisque, a salad, and roast quail, framed with grilled vegetables and fingering potatoes. The quail was still slightly warm. A blue card peeked out from under the plate.
“Happy Birthday,” it said. “Love, Cody.”
A deep ache throbbed in her chest, but a half-smile curved her lips. Sighing softly, she sat down on the step and picked a grilled asparagus stalk off the plate.
Across the patio, a dark shadow materialized into the form of a man. The dim lights surrounding the pool identified him, and Felicity had time enough to brace herself before Cody called her name.
He stood in front of her, his hands jammed into his pockets. “How are you?”
“Tired,” she said honestly. “And a bit hungry.” She indicated the tray of food. “This trumps the cereal I was going to have for dinner, so thank you.”
“Can I sit?”
Felicity bit back the instinctive no. “Sure.” She scooted to the side to make room for him. The warmth of his body kept the chill of the night at bay. His muscular frame made it easy for her to sink into the comfort of being protected—not that she needed his protection, or that he had ever had the inclination to protect anyone. She shook her head sharply. She could not allow herself to get caught up in the notion that she meant something to Cody.
He broke the silence. “Do you remember your eighteenth birthday?”
She smiled at the chuckle in his voice. “Mine was a sedate lunch with my friends, but I definitely remember Darrell’s eighteenth birthday. And the visit to the police station.”
“Crazy fun. If he could still be grounded, your dad would have grounded him for a year.”
“Darrell would probably have talked his way out of it.”
Cody nodded. “Yeah. We had great fun together…”
As Felicity listened to his reminiscences of her brother, she found herself relaxing. She had not been close to any of Darrell’s other friends, and there was no one, literally, with whom she could share her memories of Darrell—except Cody. The memories, all of which inspired fond chuckles and even outright laughter, tugged away at the knot in the middle of her chest.
She drew in a deep breath and was surprised that she did not shudder when she breathed out. The tears had dried on her face. “I’m glad I came,” she said.
Cody paused, as if startled by the sudden change of topic. He looked at her quizzically but did not say anything.
“I came because I couldn’t forgive you, not from a distance—where you were a concept rather than a real person. It’s easier to hate from afar, just like it’s often easier to love from afar. Up close, it’s different.”
“And you’ve forgiven me?”
“No, but I’m working on it. Slowly.” Felicity picked apart the quail with her fingers, popping thin strips of succulent meat into her mouth. “I didn’t think Darrell would want me to go on hating you.”
“That’s why you came?” Cody asked.
“Of course.” She laughed at his startled expression. “You think I came because I needed a job? Well, I did need a job, but I could have probably found one in New York without too much trouble, even if I had to wait tables to get through the pinch. I’ll admit though that this job here turned out much better than I expected—room and board, your family, working on books and flowers, paying off my loans. But I came, primarily, for Darrell and for me. I didn’t want this—” she gestured vaguely at her chest. “—thing stuck in here.”
“Anger? Hate?”
“A bit of both. Resentment, that you knew Darrell and I didn’t.”
“You did know Darrell. You knew all the old stories.”
“But I didn’t feature in them. You did.” The surge of anger rose up again. Felicity grimaced and tried to set it behind her.
But Cody refused to let her. “We left you out,” he said, the tone of regret clear in his voice. His hand covered hers. “We didn’t think you’d notice, or that you even needed us. You were so self-sufficient, the only one of the three of us who had it all together—brains, looks, and the wits to keep out of trouble. I know I was a little afraid of you.”
“You?”
Cody nodded. “Your clear gray eyes always seemed to look right through me, as if you knew for certain what a punk kid I was—which of course, I was. I grew up though.”
“Really?” Felicity heard the skepticism in her voice; she was certain Cody would have heard it too, loud and clear.
“Takes some of us longer than others,” Cody confessed.
“It seems to me you got even wilder when Darrell went off to medical school. You were always fast asleep when I called Darrell on weekends. He mentioned ‘late nights’ and left it at that.”
“Oh, my overnight shifts.”
“What?”
“With the Alpine Rescue Team. I joined them after graduating from college. Rookies, you know, they always get the crap shifts. I was working from 10 p.m. to 6 a.m. most nights.”
So, Cody hadn’t been out barhopping and drinking himself into a stupor. Felicity was acutely aware of her little guilty twinge. “So that’s why you were always asleep when I called mid-morning.”
“Being awake mid-morning would have been higher expectations than I could have lived up to. Honestly, I don’t think I got up till about 4 p.m. most days.” He smiled. “Those were good days though. Got trained by some of the best in the business.”
“So you’re not the punk kid daredevil you used to be?”
Cody hesitated, and suddenly, he flashed a grin that made her breath catch. “I still do all kinds of stuff you’d consider incredibly harebrained, only now it’s all legal. Part of the job.”
“Even worse,” she said, but there was no bite to her voice. Her mind churned through new facts about Cody. “Do your parents know?”
“I’m sure my parents have found new ways to keep track of me even after Darrell…”
“You knew that they were tracking you?”
“Of course. You didn’t think my parents would let one of their precious heirs slip through their fingers? I was careful—though I’m sure you’d never believe it—not to go so far as to have your parents wash their hands of me. Who knew then who my parents might have set on my tail?”
Felicity sighed. “You do know that you and your parents have made a huge tangle of something that really didn’t need to be this complicated.”
His shoulders stiffened, and his voice cooled. “I couldn’t—still can’t—live here. I don’t expect you to understand.”
Felicity knew enough to drop the topic. There would be time later to uncover Cody’s bizarre reasons for running away from parents who apparently loved him. Besides, the huge crevasse between Cody and her remained unaddressed. She set her unfinished quail down, wiped her fingers carefully on the napkin, and asked, “Can you tell me what really happened that night?”
Cody went still. “You know what happened,” he said finally. “You read the police report.”
“I read the police report, but you told me I didn’t know what happened that night.”
Cody frowned. “I said that?”
“When you came to find me in New York, and I accused you of killing Darrell.”
He winced. “I say all kinds of crap when I’m mad. You shouldn’t pay me any attention.”
“Most people speak the truth when they’re mad. I’m betting you’re one of those. What happened?”
“Darrell said he wanted to spend Christmas in New York with you, so we flew in together, hoping to surprise you. He rented a car at the airport, and we drove over to see you. You weren’t in, so we decided to grab dinner first and then drinks, and then drove back to your place. And then the accident happened.” A muscle twitched in Cody’s jaw as he stared straight out at the pool, the waters glistening in the moonlight. “I should have driven, but Darrell said he knew the way better. I knew he’d had two glasses of wine at dinner—”
“Perhaps that explains why Darrell had alcohol in his system, but not the drugs. When did he start taking drugs?”
“Painkillers.”
“What?” Felicity asked.
“They were prescription painkillers,” Cody said.
“What? Darrell was addicted to prescription painkillers? He’d never—”
“He wasn’t. He was…” Cody sighed. “He…”
To Felicity’s surprise, Cody squeezed his eyes shut. A single teardrop leaked from behind his eyes. “Cody?” she asked, alarmed.
The words rushed out of Cody, like a flood of water from behind the shattered wall of a dam. “He was sick.”
“Sick?” Fear clutched at her. “What do you mean?”
“He was going to tell you. He’d just found out, and it’s not the kind of stuff you can tell over the phone—”
“Cody.” She used the brisk, no-nonsense tone she knew always got a reaction out of Cody. “You’re stalling.”
He raked his fingers through his hair. “Damn it, Felicity. It’s hard to talk about it even now, even after he’s gone. He, um…”
Felicity slipped her arm around his shoulders and interlaced the fingers of her other hand with his fingers. His hands were cold, she realized, and trembling. Darrell’s death had hit him at least as hard as it had hit her, and all this time, they had grieved separately, locked in individual cocoons of sorrow. She leaned against him and whispered in his ear, “Say it quickly.”
“He had some kind of leukemia—I don’t remember the name exactly—something that spread fast. It had gone too far for chemo. The doctors gave him two or three months.”
Felicity’s breath caught.
Cody squeezed her fingers. “I told him to tell you right away, but he wanted to be there to hold you when he did. That’s why we came to New York to see you. He had pills with him, for when the pain got too bad, but—” His voice cracked slightly. “I don’t know what happened. I kept an eye on him, but I never saw him take those pills. Maybe in the bathroom. He insisted on driving, but when he started swerving in and out of his lane, I told him to pull over. I’d drive. He was pulling over, but instead of stopping, the car shot forward. Maybe he stepped on the gas instead of the brakes, but he ran that light and hit the other car. Our car spun, almost flipped, but I managed to get it under control. I looked over and…and he was gone.”
Cody fell silent. Felicity said nothing either; what could she say? The police report had mentioned nothing except the drugs and alcohol in Darrell’s bloodstream and the fact that he had run the red light. The case was simple—obvious and clear-cut. Except that nothing was ever simple. Oh, Darrell. She looked at the suffering man beside her. Cody…
“I should have driven.” Cody’s voice was wracked with pain. “I came along specifically to keep an eye on him, and I screwed up. He was my best friend, and I let him down. I got him killed.” He turned to Felicity. “So, you see, you were right. It was my fault. I could have prevented all that if I’d just taken the damn car keys from him.”
Felicity drew in a deep, steadying breath. In that moment, she knew she was, between the two of them, the stronger one. She wrestled with grief, Cody with grief and guilt. “Whatever you did, he’d be dead now anyway.” She pointed out the obvious.
“But you and I would have had a chance to say goodbye. We didn’t.”
“I know.” She remained silent for a moment longer. “I don’t think the hurt and the loss ever goes away, but we’ll find the happier memories easier to cling to.”
“How did you get to be so wise?”
Practice, Felicity wanted to say. After losing her parents and Darrell, she was an old hand at dealing with the hurt and loss accompanying the death of a loved one. But she said nothing. Instead, she stayed close to Cody. They breathed in unison, their warm breaths fogging the cool night. She lost track of time, and truth be told, she did not care. For the first time since her brother’s death, she felt at peace.
Finally, she roused herself. “I should be getting in.”
Cody nodded. “Do you want me to take your tray back to the house?”
That’s right, she thought. Stick to the ordinary, the routine. It was the safest path forward for Cody and her. “Sure, thank you for dinner.”
He smiled as he picked up her tray. “You’re welcome.” He turned away but paused, looking over his shoulder at her. “When you come by to swap out the flowers next weekend, will you at least ring the doorbell so I can say hi?”
She stared at him, and then smiled. She supposed there was no harm in saying hi once a week. “Sure, I’ll do that.”
“Thanks, Felicity. And happy birthday, again.” He turned and walked across the patio back to his parents’ home—the home where she knew he would not spend the night, however late the hour and long the drive back to Evergreen.
His farewell lingered as she prepared for bed. Happy birthday, he had said. And, in spite of how it had started out, she knew it had been a happy birthday.
CHAPTER EIGHT
The doorbell buzzed, yanking Cody out of sound sleep. He blinked blearily at the alarm clock. Who in God’s name would have the gall to visit him before noon on a weekend—?
Felicity.
He leapt out of bed, dragged on a pair of jeans, and rushed to the door. He flung it open but saw no one. Damn, he had been too slow—
“Hi!” The greeting came from somewhere below his waist.