Page 52 of Lone Star

Axelle’s grin widened. “Nice.”

“Did they identify the men who did it?” Eden asked.

“Someone went to check, I think.” Michelle frowned. “But I have no idea yet what they found out. Not that I’ll be told.” She tried to say it neutrally, but she heard the bitterness in her own voice.

Eden’s look sharpened a fraction. She stared a moment, considering. “Are things alright?” she asked, finally.

“Ha! No. There’s apparently a cult moving into town.” But she knew that wasn’t what Eden had been asking, not with that gaze.

Eden confirmed it with a subtle tilt of her head. “No. With you. With your family. Are you okay?”

Goosebumps broke out all down the backs of Michelle’s arms. “Yes,” she said, flatly. “Of course.”

Axelle’s smile slipped away, her mouth tightening.

Eden’s look became very patient, and Michelle knew the urge to snarl at both of them; another of those ugly instincts like she’d had with Jenny earlier.

Just hormones…she tried to tell herself.

But it wasn’t.

To her shame and horror, her eyes started to burn, her vision to blur.

“Oh, damn,” Eden murmured.

Michelle spun her chair a quarter turn away, so she faced her black computer screen. The reflection that greeted her wasn’t pretty; face crumpling and twisting as she fought to check her emotions. Exhaustion washed over her, as it so often did lately; she’d been blaming it on pregnancy – and thatwassome of it – but there were echoes of a different kind of weariness: a bone-deep, spiritual fatigue that, now that she acknowledged it, had been building for months, long before she’d even found out she was expecting again. A sense of the sky – this big, clear, blue, fathomless Texas sky – bearing down on her, weighting her, in a way the low clouds and smog of home never had. She felt heavy; felt cumbersome, in a way that had nothing to do with her growing belly.

“My marriage iswonderful,” she managed past the lump in her throat. “Candy is loving, and kind, and he’s the best father. There’s nothing wrong with my family,” she snapped, savage on the end, resentful. How dare Eden even suggest such a thing?

But the tears spilled over, running hot down her cheeks. She dashed at them with the back of her shaking hands, furious, but they kept coming.

“Dude, you made her cry,” she heard Axelle say in a reprimanding tone.

“No,” Eden said softly. “This has been building for a while. Hasn’t it, Michelle?”

Michelle sniffed angrily, desperately trying to regain her composure; she hated crumbling like this in front of these women – in front ofanyone.

Her angry retort died on her tongue, though, when she saw Eden’s expression. Soft, and sympathetic – and, even worse, understanding.

“Michelle,” she said, so gently, and Michelle’s tears only came faster. “I’m not suggesting you don’t have a wonderful marriage. I know you love Candy, and your son. That isn’t what I’m saying.

“But I think.” Her tone became even more delicate. “That, if you’re anything like your uncle – which, from what he’s told me, you are – then you’ve perhaps been feeling a bit restless.”

Michelle’s breath caught. The words hit hard – but not in a bad way. No. Like a much-needed slap.

One instantly followed by a rush of guilt. “How can I be restless?” she asked, sniffing, wiping at her face again.

Eden produced a tissue seemingly from thin air, and Michelle took it with a nod of acknowledgement.

“I’m not,” she continued, and paused to blow her nose. “I work constantly. With balancing the books here, and worrying after the bar. And TJ, and trying to stir up some good will toward the club with the city…” The list felt endless. If she wasn’t asleep, she was going, going, going.

“Yes,” Eden said, with another sympathetic smile. “But I wonder…perhaps…if you’re doing anything for your soul.”

Another mental slap.

God, that was it, wasn’t it? Maybe?

She shied hard from the idea, and blotted her face dry with the clean corners of the tissue. She took a big, shaky breath, and finally grabbed hold of herself. When she spoke, her voice came out halfway normal. “I appreciate what you’re saying.” Not really, but politeness never hurt. “But the only problem here is that I’m pregnant, and tired, and full to the brim with hormones. And that little murderer on the loose problem we talked about. Thanks for worrying, but I can handle myself.” Firmer: “I think Uncle Charlie brought you here for your investigative abilities, not to be a marriage counselor.”

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