Page 82 of Her Wicked Knights
If anyone was smothering her, it's Hadley, and she knows as much. "She didn't run away. You can't really believe that?"
"What else am I supposed to believe?" Hadley shakes her head. "I know you guys don't want to believe that she could have left you guys. Trust me, I don't want to believe it was so easy for her to walk away and leave me alone, either. But that's what happened."
"No." Tripp shakes his head. "No, she could be in danger. She could need our help!"
"She doesn't need you!" Hadley snaps.
As soon as the words leave her tongue, she puts a hand over her lips, as if she can press the words back in.
Tripp stares at her for a moment in shock, not saying anything as her hand falls away from her mouth to reveal her lips parted around the mistake. That was cruel and unnecessary, and downright wrong. Marley does need us... even more than she needs her sister. And it's a truth that hurts Hadley, which is why she's taking her shit out on us.
"You're wrong." I shake my head, thrusting the phone back into her hands and walking away before I resort to fighting with her. "One day, you'll see how wrong you were."
I just hope it's before Marley ends up in a fucking casket because Whit's drained her of every use he has for her.
Whit may have been there, in the memories with us. He may be bound to us. But I don't believe that he's bound to her by anything other than a need to control her, to take from her. He may need Marley, but he doesn't love her. And that makes him fucking dangerous.
I don't look back to see if Tripp or Rev follow me. When I slide into the truck, they haven't even appeared at the front door, so I take that as my sign that they're giving up.
But I'm not. I'm not relenting, because she's out there, and she needs me as badly as I need her. She just doesn't know it yet.
38
Marley
Therearehighpointsand low points in life, and all you can do is keep moving forward, whether trudging uphill, sliding down nearly out of control, or marching forward. But this low? This low is so low I'm not sure I can climb back up.
My heart is hollow, like a figurine that's been knocked off the shelf so many times and pieced back together without all the pieces, less and less each time so that everything slips right through. I'm paranoid, I'm exhausted, I'm fucking broken.
Losing my parents was tragic, and it was my first real taste of grief. I had my fill of it, but then everything happened, and Audrey died, and it was like being force-fed more grief. And then I was forced out of town, leaving me choking on the grief of losing everything, everyone. My best friends stood by me every step of the way, stepping back to let Audrey in when she arrived. I worried for a bit that we were growing apart, but in Audrey's absence, they came back to give me everything I needed. Maybe I'm a fool for thinking it may have turned into something more if I stayed. Maybe I'm wrong for craving that physical connection that I had with them right before I left. Maybe if I'd stayed,nothing would have changed between us; maybe we would have drifted apart eventually.
I never planned to leave the town I was born and raised in, but that choice was taken away from me. The only thing I could do was stay reasonably close so that I could feel them, so that I know they're just out there, that maybe one day I can go home, and all of this hell will be over. But even if going back didn't risk Hadley's life, I couldn't return now. Not when I'm brokeandbroken. I'm so fucking broken.
Sleep is as distant a memory as my life before that night, despite having enough prescriptions in my medicine cabinet to make people think I am certifiably insane. I've tried therapists, psychiatrists, grief counselors... each of them had their own recommendations. Eat better, give up caffeine, take these pills, keep a journal, start a workout routine, oh that pill didn't work for you? Then try this one instead.
It's fucking exhausting all on its own, and I feel like a lab rat being experimented on. It's what brought me here, to this office building to try again.
I don't know why I'm even bothering, since this hasn't worked out any of the other times. Maybe because it's my only option if I want to live. Maybe because I want to exhaust my options before I let myself contemplate whether I even want to live without everyone and everything that made my life worth living.
The lobby is empty when I open the door into the medical building, which is eerie, but not exactly weird. It's a Monday after closing, technically, but I'm hoping to catch the doctor before he heads out and get on his books as soon as possible. I tried calling, but I lost my nerve. The staff may have started to leave from the other doctor's offices in this building, but clearly someone is still here, or else the front door would have been locked.
I follow the signs to floor five and take the first door on the left, relieved when I try to open it and it gives.
The front desk is empty, but the lights are still on, which I'm taking as a sign that the whole staff hasn't left yet. Maybe the doctor is still finishing up some notes.
"Hello?" I call, moving toward the hallway behind the desk, scanning the empty room like someone will suddenly materialize and tell me I can't go back there. But no one does, and as I pass the empty reception desk, I see a purse on the chair. So, someone's still here.
"Doctor Whittier? Hello?"
There are only three doors in the hallway. One appears to be a bathroom, so I move to the next one, hesitating when I place my hand over the doorknob. What if he's still in there with a patient? What if I walk in in the middle of a session and the doctor gets so pissed that he refuses to work with me? He may very well be my last hope.
But if he's my last hope, I'm already doomed.
And I'm already here.
I knock once, a polite warning of the intrusion to come, and then open the door to step inside.
The doctor isn't in the middle of a session, it turns out. He's actually sitting at his desk in a large, executive leather chair, with his hands gripping the arm rests as he leans back, his eyes closed so that he hasn't spotted me. And he wouldn't have, if I could contain the surprised gasp that slips out of my throat when I spot the woman beneath the desk, her platinum blonde hair tucked back with a pin and her hands braced on his thighs... hisnakedthighs.
