Page 73 of The Hard Way

“No.” I turned back over and looked through the peephole. She was two-thirds of the way up. When she looked up next, I saw her as an outsider might see her, a young woman, determined and beautiful. It made me ill to imagine her going to jail. I couldn’t let it happen.

Odin put a hand on my shoulder. “Would it be so bad? Seeing her? Surely she’d forgive you.”

“It’s not just that.”

He waited, and I got the feeling he’d already known it wasn’t just that. That he knew it was more. “Ice.”

“It’ll hurt because I want it too much. Seeing her again when it can only be for a moment will hurt. Not being able to hang around with her or go back with her will hurt. If she loves me more than she hates me, that’ll hurt, too.”

“You don’t always get to decide how love happens,” Odin said. “It’s pesky that way.”

“Dammit.” I struck the tears from my eyes. “Okay.” I sat up and pulled the nose off my face.

“Who am I?”

“You’re my husband.” I rubbed the stupid nose putty off my cheeks. I didn’t want to look like a mutant. “Always and forever.”

Odin came to me and thumbed a bit of putty makeup off my cheekbone, and then he kissed me. “You look beautiful.”

The creaks of Vanessa climbing drew nearer. I took a breath as her hat and then her head rose up over the side of the platform. She gasped.

Odin grabbed her wrist. “Easy.”

She barely acknowledged him. Her eyes were wide, fixed on me, and then she smiled. “Youarehere!” Her smile was like the sun. “Oh my god, Melinda! You’re alive! I knew it!”

I stood, wanting to go to her. “Vanessa…”

Odin pulled her up.

And as soon as she was over the edge she came to me, throwing her arms around me in a big Vanessa tackle hug. “I knew it!”

“Nessie!” I said, using her kid name, holding her tightly. I pulled back and looked at her. “Oh my god. Look at you! How pretty you are!” I pulled her to me again. “I’m so sorry, so sorry.”

She stiffened then and pushed me away. “You’re here in town,alive, and you don’t even come home? What the hell?”

“There wasn’t a choice.”

“No choice? You can climb up here, but you can’t come through our front door?” The anger was coming now. “What did we ever do to you—”

“It’s not you guys.”

“No? Really?” Vanessa was full-on crying—raging, really. “You let us think you were dead!”

“I know.”

“You know what it did to Candy and Kaitlin? You dying? And me? And then you’re buying those Paris Hilton comforters. And those fucking notes? I thought I was going insane.”

“I’m so sorry. I wanted to help.”

“You think we care about you sending money? You think that makes up for anything? And then I would think, no way, if it’s her, she wouldn’t leave us alone to fight for ourselves. But then you’d say something about Paris’s dog that only you would say, but then I’d think no, they identified your body, totally burned. How could you?”

“I’m so sorry,” I said.

“Sorry isn’t enough.”

I shook my head, throat clogged with emotion.Sorrywas all I had.

“Burning is a horrible way to go, did you know that?” Vanessa said. “I researched it.”

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