Page 112 of From West, With Regret

Heath’s fist is the first thing I see when I gather the strength to look up. It connects with my jaw, and I stumble backward. I grab onto a chair in the dining room and slump over. Blood spills from my mouth onto the rich, dark wood, a sickness washing over me. The bar is quiet now. The live band has stopped playing, and when I look around, the entire crowd has fallen back, creating a circle around us. Every single person is frozen, staring at us.

I try to catch my breath. I spit, letting the blood spray to the floor. A sharp pain stabs at my ribs from the inside, the sensation even more intense when I try to take a breath.

London races down the stairs, pushing through the outer edge of the crowd to get to me. Her eyes are wide with shock, bouncing between Heath and me.

Heath stands on the opposite end of the circle the crowd has made, close to the front door. Blood spills from the top of his head, down the side of his face.

When London reaches me, she places her hand on my back, urging me to focus on her. But I don’t trust Heath. I don’t trusthim as long as he’s near London. His mission is to kill the both of us, and I have no reason to believe he won’t follow through on that promise, even if there are hundreds of witnesses.

I wipe the back of my hand across my mouth when someone emerges from the crowd, standing between Heath and me.

My mother steps back unsteadily, her mouth agape. “Heath?” She glances back and forth between her two sons. At first, I think she’s looking at me with just as much surprise and unanswered questions swimming in her mind. Then I recognize her expression. The one of suspicion, as if I somehow knew Heath has been alive this whole time. As if I knew about Heath’s insane scheme to fake his own death. Like Imustbe involved in some way.

“Mom,” Heath slurs, unable to make eye contact with her. He sways again, stumbling on his own feet. Falling back on his heels, he crashes into a group of people near the middle of the dining room. No one catches him, gasping as they step back, allowing him to fall to the floor in a heap.

Groaning, he rolls onto his side and attempts to stand. He squeezes his eyes shut, staying on his hands and knees as he attempts to regain his bearings.

“What are you doing here?” my mother asks. “How are you alive?” Tears well her black-lined eyes. She blinks, allowing them to spill over, leaving trails of white across her pink-dusted cheeks.

Alden, Holt, and Asher appear at the edges of the crowd. When they see my face, they immediately turn their attention to my brother, ready to pounce on him, but I raise my hand and shake my head. I don’t want to make this a bigger scene than it already is. I just want my brother to leave.

“How are you here?” my mother asks Heath again.

Dots flicker in my vision, and I swear, London’s hand on my back is the only thing keeping me anchored to the floor,holding me to this earth, saving me from being swallowed up by the darkness.

Heath’s once-blue eyes have now turned completely dark. Pools of black cloud his vision as he stares at our mother. He points directly at me with a shaking, angering finger.

“My so-called brother is fucking my wife!” he booms, filling the eerily silent bar.

I immediately feel everyone’s eyes move to me. Including my mother’s.

“What?” she gasps.

“I’m not fucking her, Heath.” I snarl, anger getting the best of me. I feel lightheaded, and I think the pain from the blows to the head and falling down the stairs are starting to catch up to me, but I don’t lose focus. “I’m in love with her, and I’ve been in love with her since we were kids.”

“Kids?” my mother asks, her penciled brows pulling together. “What do you mean, West?”

Heath lets out a bitter laugh. “Oh, this is a story I’ve learned while following them over the past several months. One you won’t want to miss hearing, Mom. Old-fashioned love story right there.”

My mother turns her attention back to Heath. He begins making his way over to me, shoving chairs aside and bumping into tables along the way. The wood creaks against the marble floor.

“West and London came from the same shithole foster home,” Heath continues. “And it seems my wife’s little memory loss wasn’t so little after all. She’d forgotten all about how she was in love with West before.”

My mother covers her mouth with her hand. With teary eyes, she slowly turns to look at London, then me.

“Glenna,” London says, stepping closer. “I?—”

“I don’t understand.” Glenna turns back to Heath, ignoring London and me.

“Heath faked his own death,” I say with as little emotion as possible. “He’s been stalking us for months. He tried to kill us when we took our trip up to Albany.”

Heath’s now standing a table length’s distance away from me, and I swear, I can still smell the whiskey on his breath. Though it could be the blood still pooling in my mouth. I can’t differentiate anything anymore.

“Is that true?” Mom asks, her eyes bulging out of her head. “Heath?”

“Yes.” He whips his head her way, staring coldly in her direction.

“How?” Her face transforms from confusion to realization. “Is that where the money went?Youtook it?”

---