Page 134 of The Spider & the Storm

“Yeah, guess so.”

He folded his arms against the table. “So, anyway, how have things been with you? Any changes?”

I swallowed at the dryness in my throat. “Things are pretty much the same as they have been.”

Luke blew out a heavy breath and rubbed a hand over his mouth. “Son of a bitch. Are you serious?Still?”

“It's been two weeks since I was last here, Luke. What did you think was going to happen in that time?”

“Uh, it's been over a year since I've been here. They have to get bored eventually.”

I cocked my head at that, staring at my brother like he'd also lost his damn mind the moment he lost his freedom. “You think it's gonna be so easy for Tommy to get over the fact that he lost his fuckingbrother?”

“Tommy can go to hell,” Luke fired back. “He doesn't need to take his shit out on you.”

“His brother isgone,” I replied harshly, enunciating every word to try and get it through his thick skull. Like he wasn’t aware.

Luke flattened his hands on the tabletop and leaned over it, bringing his face closer to mine. “And so isyours.”

“You're not fuckingdead, Luke.”

He shook his head and pushed off the table, leaning back and turning to glance out the barred window. “You know what I mean.”

I didn't honor him with an answer, but I knew exactly what he meant. I was reminded of it every single day when I left for work, knowing I was going to return home to an empty house, just as I had every day since he'd lost all control and choked the life out of Ritchie Wheeler.

Of course, there was also the never-ending torment.

As it turned out, people couldn’t separate a killer's family from the killer himself, and ever since that day in the movie theater, Tommy Wheeler and his poor old mother had made it their life's purpose to make mine a living hell.

It had started as shouted obscenities from open car windows or a flipped finger if we ever crossed paths in the grocery store. Then, it escalated to nasty notes left in the mailbox and garbage thrown onto the front lawn. The latest incident had been waking up to the wordsLUKE CORBIN BELONGS IN HELLwritten in spray paint across my car windshield.

The cops suggested getting surveillance cameras on the property to catch Tommy or his mother or both in the act to build a case against them and take them to court. But I didn't want to take them to court. I didn't want to make a big fuckingthing out of it. All I wanted was to be left alone to wallow on my own shitty branch of grief, and if there was a way to establish that without having an order of protection slapped on the two of them, I'd take it.

“You know, it might sound crazy, but maybe you should talk to them,” Luke suggested gently.

“Oh, right. Good idea. I'll just call them up and invite them over for dinner. I cannot foresee a single thing going wrong in that scenario,” I muttered sardonically.

Luke's glare turned to stone. “Don't be a jackass. Next time you see one of them, lay it out. Tell them their beef isn't with you; it's with—”

“Do you really think they're not aware of that already? They wroteyourname on my car, Luke, notmine. But you're in here, where they can't get at you. You’reprotected. Me, though?” I thrust a hand toward the window. “I'm out there, trying to live my fucking life, which hasneverbeen a walk in the park, in case you forgot. But then you had to go and …”

I couldn't get the words out, no matter how badly I wanted to throw them in his face. All I could do was raise a clenched fist, then drop it to the table, shaking my head and staring out that window. Too afraid to look at him and see the guilt in his eyes. Too afraid I wouldn't see any guilt at all.

Nothing was said between us for a few minutes, and I wondered why I even bothered anymore. Every other week, I made the two-hour drive to come see him, where I'd listen to him talk about stuff that had happened since our last visit. Always with accompanying laughter. Always with a tinge of joy and excitement he'd never had before during his life on theoutside, where he'd put all his focus on simply getting by and not on getting happy.

Here? He was happy. He didn't need to say it; I already knew. And I resented him for it.

“I don't know what you want from me,” he finally said after minutes of silence. “How many times do I have to tell you that I'm sorry?”

“Sorry doesn't change anything,” I replied, still unable to look at him. “Not for me … or them.”

I could see my car from where I sat, and I thought about leaving early. I thought about never coming back at all. I thought about what my life might be like if I ran away and never saw my brother or this place ever again. For a second, it didn't seem so bad. In fact, it was almost tempting, until I glanced back at him and realized that, despite how badly I wished I could hate him, I didn't.

“Shit's gonna get better.” He said it like a promise. “It has to.”

“I don't know about that.”

“They're gonna move on, one way or another.”

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