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She didn’t look up. “Hmm?”
“You sure you’re okay?”
“Personally? Like physically? I’m super-duper all right. Except people keep asking me how I’m feeling. My arm’s broken.” She held up the sling.
He didn’t like all the qualifiers. “What about not physically?”
She flopped her head against the headrest. “Once we get home.” The way she clamped her mouth shut and turned her gaze out the window made him think that was that.
It didn’t relieve his desire for answers.
The short drive felt as if it took forever. When they reached the house, she was out of the car before he shut off the engine. He found her in the kitchen, pacing. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the flashing light on his phone. He had new messages, and that meant he’d had service at least for a while. It would wait. “Talk to me.”
She planted her palms on the counter near the sink and dropped her chin to her chest. “You should sit down.”
“Why?”
“Because... that’s what you tell people before bad news.”
She’d said she was finephysically, and he knew they were about to part ways. What did the doctor tell her? He could stand there and second guess, or do what she asked and get answers now. “I’m sitting.”
“So, I... That is—there were pill bottles in the bathroom cabinet.”
“Which is good. They didn’t rebel and try and take over the shower.”
She turned to face him but didn’t give the tiniest hint of a smile. That was a bad sign. She leaned back against the counter. “Two prescription bottles that were suspicious. Or odd. Or I’m not sure what to call them.”
“Okay?” He liked this less and less the longer it went on. He was tempted to demand she spit it out, but he didn’t want her to shut down.
“I—um—asked Dr. Phillips about them. Because he prescribed them. Not that he’d be able to tell me—patient doctor confidentiality and all that—but I had to ask.”
“Whatever it is, you can tell me. We’ll deal with it.”
She dragged in a shaky breath. “Nana didn’t die of natural causes.”
“Tell me.” His patience was vanishing beneath growing concern.
“She had Alzheimer’s disease. She didn’t want to lose her memories, so she...”
Fuck.He knew what came next. The reality screamed from the back of his mind. It was why Nana’s letter said she’d never see him again. Why no one saw this coming. He couldn’t accept it, though. A woman who loved life so much. It wasn’t true. “She what?”
“Ended her own life.”
Killed herself. Committed suicide. Took the selfish way out and left the rest of them behind, to cope with the consequences. A wash of black surged inside Jonathan, and he pushed back hard, swallowing it and burying it beneath a heavy blanket of numbness. “I see.”
“Don’t do this.” Bailey frowned. “Don’t pretend this doesn’t matter.”
It was what it was.
He didn’t believe his own denial. The ink of grief rushed forward, and again he forced it aside. “You’re misreading me. I’m notdoinganything.” He grabbed his phone and stood. “I need to catch up on work.”
“Jonathan,” she called after him.
“I need to be alone.” He wouldn’t turn around. Couldn’t look her in the eye. Doing that would crumble the tentative wall he built inside, and he needed time to secure the barrier. Thinking about it clenched like a fist around his heart and made his step falter. He kept walking, out the front door, down the path, and God knew where beyond that.
Some place he could check into the office. A quiet spot. Checking his messages would help him focus on the people who didn’t choose to give up.
Most were friends and colleagues, checking in. With each new note asking if he was all right, either because of the storm or Nana’s passing, more questions bombarded him. How long was Nana planning this? Were there hints he missed? Something in her letters, about the disease and her desire to escape it? Could he have stopped it?
