Page 141 of Lace 'em Up

I turn away.

“Don’t go,” she whispers.

My toes dig into the floor, jaw clenching so tightly that my teeth protest.

“Just stay,” she says, still whispering. “Just stay and talk to me. Tell me what’s running through your head.”

“I can’t.”

She touches my shoulder. “Try.” A beat. “Fight.” Another. “For me.” I turn to watch her throat work, eyes glimmering with tears. “Fight for us.”

Thirty-Eight

Rory

Be brave and kind.

“Stay,” I plead. “Please.”

For a second, I think he’s going to.

That he’ll take me in his arms and tell me he’s sorry, that he loves me, that he’s glad I’m okay and we’ll figure this out.

But then his expression locks down.

And he takes a shaky step backward.

And another.

Then one more.

“King,” I begin.

But he’s in the hall now, and before I can reach for him again, he’s turning away, disappearing from sight, footsteps echoing on the floor.

I move after him. “King!”

He’s already twisting the handle, wrenching the door open.

“King!”

He doesn’t stop.

Just walks through, pulling the door shut behind him.

And by the time I make it down the hall, manage to wrestle with the handle and open the door—my ribs protesting my jerky movements (but the ache in my heart a thousand times worse)—his car is gone.

The garage is empty.

And I’m alone.

Again.

Fifteen minutes later, after waiting for King to come back, waiting and hoping and maybe shedding a tear or thirty, I’ve given up and am slowly approaching the stairs, trying to figure out what the hell my next steps should be when I hear the door slam open and collide with the wall in the mudroom.

Stella, likely, back with Zeus and hoping to find her son relaxed and calm, my plan to honestly and gently break the news to him successful.

Something that’s so far from the truth, it’s laughable.

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