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The back door creaked opened and Bennett stepped out halfway, his brow furrowed. “You guys ok?”
Turning away from him, I folded my arms across my chest, unable to even look at Bennett after everything Elijah said. Bile rose in the back of my throat, but I forced myself to swallow the burning shame.
Elijah, on the other hand, snorted. “Yeah. Just great.”
“K… well, I made dinner, if you’re hungry.”
“I don’t have much of an appetite,” Elijah replied. He crossed the yard toward me. As soon as he was close enough, he squeezed the back of my neck and pulled me against him, none-too-gently. “You’re no good to us dead.”
Nodding, I blinked back the tears before he saw them, keeping my gaze downcast.
Elijah gave my neck a final squeeze and walked away. He murmured something to Bennett and disappeared inside, presumably to find Olivia.
“My love?” Bennett was still in the doorway, but from the confusion in his tone I knew Elijah didn’t tell him what he interrupted. If he had, Bennett would have been in the yard screaming at me, too, in a plethora of languages. “Dinner?”
“I’m not hungry.” Still without looking at him, I scooped up Annabel from the chair and cradled her against my chest. I held her close, absorbing the vibrations from her purring, and made my way toward the house.
Bennett stepped outside all the way and held the door open for me. The heat of his gaze followed me inside, only dissipating when I climbed the stairs, Annabel’s tail swishing behind me.
30
Bennett
The days following Cole’s murder were grim, to say the least.
Elijah threw himself into trying to determine the identities of Cole’s kidnappers, using whatever extralegal resources he had. I gave him Kai’s number and a blank check to buy whatever he needed, whether it was information, technology, or a murder-for-hire.
Jake stepped up and took care of the actual business while Leander and I were preoccupied making all of the funeral arrangements.
Fearing for her safety as well as her mental well-being, we brought Olivia back to the teal house. Even if I was the one they were ultimately after, she was still safer with Leander and I together than staying on her own.
She didn’t eat for days. Neither did Leander. The two of them survived on liquids, refusing even the most basic meals I tried to coax them into eating.
Leander hardly spoke, unless it was about funeral arrangements. Olivia didn’t speak at all. She could generally be found crying at all hours of the day and night, though the location varied.
The first time she crawled into bed with us, I thought it was a dream. It was me, of all people, she came to first. Lifting the covers, she slipped beneath them and squirmed back against me, draping my arm over her shoulder. The similarity to my own situation a few months back wasn’t lost on me, except my heart had only been broken — not ripped out of my chest and smashed into a thousand pieces.
In the morning, Leander gave her a quizzical look, but he didn’t say anything. I certainly didn’t — I had zero room to talk. When I hit the lowest of low without Leander, it was Olivia I’d gone to. It was only fair I return the favor.
The next night she fell asleep between us, once again using my arm like a blanket. She clung to Leander’s hand all night, even when he tried to roll over. It seemed the only time she slept was if one of us was with her, whether it was in bed or on the couch, and even then it was a toss up if it was going to be restful or not.
“I’m worried about her,” Leander said one night after she’d fallen asleep on his lap in the living room. He stroked her hair gently, his mouth downturned. “The only time I’ve seen her like this was when her mother died.”
“I’m worried aboutbothof you,” I said softly.
He sighed and reached for my hand. “I’m sorry. For all my melancholy, I don’t handle death very well.”
“Gee, I can’t imagine why.” I ran my thumb back and forth over his knuckles.
“What I don’t understand is...” He tipped his chin toward Olivia.
“Were they...?”
Shrugging, he looked as clueless as I felt. “I thought you’d know.”
I held a finger up and ducked into the kitchen, retrieving Cole’s cell phone from where I’d stashed it. After the police dumped the data, they gave it back. The rest of his personal belongings, however limited, were still in evidence.
Scrolling past the scores of angry texts from Olivia in the days leading to Cole’s death, I whistled low.
