Page 42 of Sunrise Malice

“Will that fix her?”

He shakes his head. “But it will deter anyone else in the future.”

I laugh at the absurdity of that. “As if I’ll ever invite her over again.”

“Don’t do that to yourself.” His expression softens. “I know what you’re thinking right now. You think it’s your fault.”

“Tell me it’s not.”

“It’s not,” he says and comes around to sit next to me. He takes my hand and holds it tightly between his own. His palms are big, firm, and dry. “You had a friend over. You did nothing wrong.”

“I knew about the war.”

“Yes, you did. But I took all the precautions, and look what happened? My driver was on the wrong fucking side of the road. My guards reacted too slowly. I failed you, and I failed her. But I won’t let this happen again.”

I lean into him and hold his hand. I stare at Kim, thinking about her laughing in the hot tub, about her crying over what my father did to me, about her joy and her lightness, and I’m so afraid I’ll never have any of that again.

If this dims her—if this breaks her?—

I won’t be able to live with myself.

An hour passes. Eventually, I tell Julien he should go.

“I’m not leaving your side,” he says firmly. And so far, that’s true. He’s been texting with his men, and he took a few calls in French, but otherwise he’s been right there.

He doesn’t owe me this. He’s my husband, but only on paper. What happened to Kim isn’t his fault, and he doesn’t have to sit around in this hospital room while I feel sorry for myself and spiral into a dark pit of self-loathing.

But he still doesn’t go.

And after a little while, I realize I don’t really want him to.

I’m strangely comforted by him. Julien’s big and strong, and he’s brooding almost as much as I am, but he’s gentle when he takes my hand and holds it. He doesn’t push me to talk when I don’t want to, and he doesn’t complain about how long we’re staring at Kim’s sleeping body.

All he does is stay with me.

Kim goes into surgery.

The doctor says it’ll at least be a couple of hours. Julien convinces me to go home with him, and promises we’ll head back to the hospital the moment she’s awake again. I’m pretty sure he bribes the nurses to call.

It’s around ten at night when we get back to his kitchen. He takes another call and barks angry commands. When he hangs up, he pours two glasses of wine, and we sit together at the island, my knee touching his.

“Who was that?” I ask, nodding at the phone.

“Jean. I shouldn’t yell at him like that, but it’s been a stressful evening.”

“Is everything okay?”

“The guards got the license plate for the truck, but it was stolen. Jean found it abandoned in Southside. They’re still hunting for the men that did this.”

I drink and regret asking. I don’t want to know the details. “You don’t have to. Go out of your way, I mean.”

He shakes his head and puts a hand on my thigh. I like the way it feels there. “Someone tried to hurt my wife. They hurt my wife’s friend. That can’t go unanswered.”

“Even though this isn’t a war you really want?”

“We’re past that now.”

I drink my wine and lean my head against his shoulder. I stay like that for a minute, but I keep seeing Kim in my head getting knocked down by that truck, her body bouncing against the pavement. All at once, I get to my feet, and take his hand.

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