Page 13 of Shattered Hearts

Stella doesn’t say anything, but Willow didn’t ask because she wanted a response. She thinks she already knows.

“Then there’s nothing you can tell us.”

“I’m sorry.”

Admittedly, she looks sorry, her mouth turned into a frown, but I doubt she understands the seriousness of Zarah’s mental state. It’s difficult to care about something if it’s not smack in your face. Willow’s protected from the harsh realities of life in this little apartment and her hundred thousand dollar vases. Nothing can touch her.

Not even the hideous things her husband and son have done.

“We should go,” I tell Stella, hefting myself off the sofa. There’s no point in lingering if she has nothing more to say. I don’t know what I was expecting. An epiphany, maybe. A clue, at the very least.

Something I could show Zane and say, “Here. Here is Zarah’s cure.” But I can’t.

Willow may have revealed a hard truth. That Zarah won’t get better. Can’t. That night may have broken her in a way she can never recover.

I’ve thought it but never said it aloud. I’d always hoped the drugs were the culprit.

I asked Zarah to marry me on the contingency she gets better. We may have to plan our future on the idea she won’t.

Or that she can’t.

Fuck.

“Oh, not yet. Please. I get so few visitors. Stay. I had fresh produce delivered this morning and I can put together a fabulous salad. Do you like bleu cheese dressing? I make it from scratch.”

She gestures us into the kitchen, and I catch Stella’s eye. She lifts a shoulder, and we follow Willow into a small, but tasteful, kitchen.

Around bites of lettuce, tomato, cucumber, and green pepper, Willow engages Stella in gossip about people I don’t know, and by the vague answers Stella gives her, she doesn’t much better.

“I read about the award the paper presented your brother. You must be very proud,” she says, clearing our enormous salad bowls.

“I am,” I say, but I don’t want to talk about Max.

“And your stepfather. How is he coping with Max’s death?”

“You know Rourke?”

Willow fills a carafe full of water and pours it into the back of a fancy coffee machine. “Oh, yes. Senator Cook and my husband are very close.”

“I didn’t realize.” I should have, I guess. Birds of a feather and all that.

She smiles indulgently while she plates thick wedges of chocolate cheesecake. “Why would you? You spend all your time with your father, don’t you? What’s it like being a private investigator?Remington Steelemade it look so glamorous.”

“If you call running after druggies and digging through garbage glamorous, then, yes, it is.”

“You know how to follow breadcrumbs, put clues together.” She sets the dessert plates in front of us, and the little silver fork disappears in my hand.

I scowl. “Life doesn’t work like that. Assholes are assholes and what they do is in plain sight. There’s no putting clues together. I find the bastards and bring ’em in.”

“That isn’t exactly true, or you wouldn’t be here.”

She pours coffee and sets a cream and sugar tray in the center of the small table. I add cream to cool my coffee and down half the mug, wishing the caffeine would jumpstart my attention span. Willow has given us nothing, but Stella seems content to sit and I won’t leave without her.

“We were hoping you could help us with Zarah’s treatment. You said you can’t. There’s nothing left to say.”

“I saidIcouldn’t.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” My patience is growing thin.

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