All Things Pretty, Part Two (Pretty #3.5)(16)
Author: M. Leighton

Her eyebrows are raised, her eyes wide, and she’s backtracking. “Okay, okay. I didn’t mean to upset you. I just thought…”

“Well don’t.  Don’t think. You don’t know half of what’s going on.  Dad only knows what I told him.”

This time she does smile.  “Maybe Dad knows more than what you think.”

“Like what?”

“He thinks you love her.”

“So what if I do?”

“Nothing.  Not…well, not really. We all want that for you.”

“Thanks, but I don’t need your permission.”

“I know you don’t.  Look, don’t get all defensive. I’m just worried about you.”

“Well, don’t be. I know what I’m doing.”

“Sig, you’ve never wanted…this. This kind of relationship.  Love.  And I’m just concerned that now that you’re jumping in…”

“I’m not jumping in.”

“Okay, okay. I just…Just forget it.”  She raises her hands in surrender.

Now I feel bad. I sigh and run a hand through my hair. “I appreciate the concern, but I know what I’m doing.  Just trust me.”

“I do trust you, Sig.  I just worry about what will happen if this doesn’t work out like you think.  You never wanted to fall in love, to risk losing someone like we lost Mom. And now that you’re taking the chance, it’s on a woman who…”

“It’ll all work out. One way or the other.  I promised her I’d fix this and I have every intention of keeping that promise.”

After a few seconds of mulling over my words, Sloane narrows her eyes on me.  “You-you aren’t considering doing something stupid, are you?”

“Like what?”

She leans in closer, like if looks hard enough she might be able to find an answer.  “Like something stupid.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.  I’ve talked to the DA. It’ll all work out.”

“And if it doesn’t?”

“It will.”

“But if it doesn’t?”  Her voice is getting louder, more frantic.  “Sig, promise me that you won’t do something crazy like throw your life away for this girl.”

“I’m not going to–”

“Sig, promise me.”

I stare down into my sister’s knowing eyes, so much wiser than what I ever gave her credit for.  Maybe living with a tattoo artist has given her a lot of life experience in a short amount of time.

“I can’t promise you anything,” I confess evenly.

Sloane gasps.  She knows what this means for someone like me.  For someone like the people in our family, who bleed blue and never bend when it comes to the law.  “You’d do that? For her?”

She’s asking if I’d give up my career for Tommi. If I’d give up my family for her. If I’d give up my life, all that I’ve worked for and all that I know for her.

And the answer is yes.  Because my entire existence would be shit without her.

I cross my arms over my chest. “I’d do anything for her.  I just hope I won’t have to.”

Mouth hanging open, Sloane stares at me for a couple of minutes before she says anything else.  And even then, she’s brief.  “I hope she’s worth it.”

“She is.  She already is.”

My sister leans in, rising up on her toes to kiss my cheek.  “I love you, big brother.”

“I love you, too, little troublemaker.”

Her smile is hardly visible as she turns and walks off down the driveway.

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE – TOMMI

I haven’t slept a wink all night long.  I’ve cried until I ache from my stomach all the way up to the top of my head, yet I’m not tired. Not really. I’m exhausted, but I’m not tired. My mind won’t shut off long enough to let me get tired.

I’ve been curled up in a ball on my cot most of the night.  I tried to sleep, even pretended to be asleep for a while.  It was the middle of the night–I don’t know what time exactly–when I heard muffled footsteps coming down the hall of the jail.  I didn’t move. I just waited.  It was dark in my cell, but fairly bright outside it.  Through the slits of my eyes, I saw an enormous shadow fall over me.  I didn’t need to see the details of his face or his body to know that it was Sig.  I could smell him, sense him, feel him.  I don’t know why I feigned sleep.  But I did.

He stood watching me for a long time.  Maybe close to fifteen minutes. At one point, I saw him shift and lean his forehead against the bars. I heard him sigh so deeply, I think I felt his breath fall across my cheek.  But he didn’t say anything.  Didn’t make another sound, in fact.  Neither did I.  What do you say to the man you love when he’s the man who put you in jail?

Well, last night I said nothing.

I wanted to ask about Travis, but I couldn’t bare it.  Of course, I wanted him to be okay, but in a way, I hated the thought of him being just fine without me.  All of a sudden, in the lonely concrete square of my life, it felt as though I wasn’t needed.  Anywhere.  By anybody.  That even though I’d lived a lie and killed to protect him, Travis would just move on and be fine without me.  That’s what I should want. It’s what I do want.  It’s just hard to see that right now.  When I’m locked up and everyone else is free.

After that, the harsh light of day seemed to bring nothing good. I was left alone with nothing but doubts and regrets and fears, crowding in on me.  Eating away at me.  Slow, like a cancer that was gnawing ruthlessly at my soul.

Sometime around lunch, I suppose, the DA came to see me.  He told me that Tonin produced my brother’s frozen body and that the medical examiner will be conducting an autopsy immediately. He asked me what would be found. I told him.

He asked me other questions, let me tell my side of things.  It was all very clinical and unemotional.  I’m not sure that worked in my favor, but I just felt so cold and so…numb.  Like I’d cried so much, I was empty inside.

After he left, I was taken back to my cell.  To wait, I guess.  To be tortured by minutes that tick by like years and a bleakness that threatened to drag me under.

Now, it’s afternoon.  Despite the sun slanting through the window at the end of the hall, the world is getting darker and darker. I feel myself sinking into oblivion and the desire to resist it lessens with every passing minute.