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Chapter 29
FOUR MONTHS LATER
“Ugh,” Tara groaned when the axe hit the floor. “Whose idea was this anyway?”
“Who wears heels to hatchet throwing?” Cornell asked. He looked at Benton, who took a sip of his beer. “You’re a lawyer. Aren’t you supposed to know better? Your girl is a danger to herself and others.”
Benton shrugged. “Picking my battles, man. Just stay a few extra feet back.”
Cornell shook his head, watching Ali beside Tara as she steadied the axe beside her head, aiming. The breath he had been holding whistled out of his mouth when it landed right in the center—bull’s-eye. His eyes found hers when she turned, giving him a shrug and a small, smug smirk.
“You trying to tell me something?” he asked, pressing his mouth into a line as she slid into the seat Benton had vacated.
Ali took a sip of her beer. “I didn’t say anything. But you might want to reconsider those ugly sconces you ordered for our bedroom without telling me.”
“An axe to the head isn’t worth getting my lighting choice,” Cornell said, reaching under the table and squeezing Ali’s jean-clad thigh. “It might be worth the risk, though, for pie at our wedding instead of cake.”
Ali laughed. “I said I’d think about it.”
“You absolutely cannot have pie at your wedding,” Tara objected.
“You don’t have to come, Tara,” Cornell teased. “Maybe Benton doesn’t need a plus one.”
Whacking him in the chest, Ali shook her head. “Would you stop? She’s my maid of honor.”
Tara narrowed her eyes. “And don’t forget, this maid of honor has a speech to make. Don’t both of your families still think you two met at work?” She turned to Ali and smacked her red lips. “I need to reapply. Come with me.”
Cornell’s hand slid off Ali’s leg as she stood, following Tara to the bathroom. “I’m only playing,” he joked to Benton. “You’ll have a plus one even if we blacklist your girlfriend.”
Benton released a breathy laugh before looking over his shoulder and then back at Cornell. “You psyched?”
“For the wedding?” Cornell asked. “Not really.”
Apart from the dessert, he didn’t care about what the upcoming nuptials looked like—it didn’t matter to him if his tux was navy or black or if they went with a band or a DJ—those were details he would leave to Ali and her mother. All Cornell cared about was looking down an aisle and seeing Ali at the end of it.
“Marrying her?” He took a sip of his beer. “Can’t wait.”
Benton smiled. “She seems good. Better.”
Cornell nodded. “I guess time, you know?” And therapy.
Ali still saw Linda once a week, and he also was still seeing his own therapist—James. Time hadn’t erased the dark clouds littering their relationship entirely—Ali still had the occasional nightmare, the sporadic spook that took her back to that fateful night. Cornell still had the bout of anger, of guilt. But all of that was less. When he focused on the present—standing in their home that they owned, that they had begun to fix and make it their first home together—he was grounded by the idea that there was still so much more for them.
Shifting his pressed lips from side to side, Benton nodded.
“What?” Cornell said curiously. “You look like you’ve got something to say.”
Benton sighed, lifting his glasses to rub his eye.
“Benton, if I’m going to see your face forever in our wedding pictures, you better spill.”
“I wasn’t going to say anything. But if I were you, well, I’d want to know.”
Cornell’s eyebrows knitted together. “Know what?”
Benton cleared his throat. “It’s Graham Jones, right?”
Swallowing heavily, each hair on the back of Cornell’s neck stood up. “I never told you his name.”
