Total pages in book: 128
Estimated words: 120230 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 601(@200wpm)___ 481(@250wpm)___ 401(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 120230 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 601(@200wpm)___ 481(@250wpm)___ 401(@300wpm)
I only ever took a pill when nothing else would work—and I slept like the dead.
As Vansi threw back the tea, I turned off my laptop and pulled on my own jacket. I’d given my best friend my beanie, but my jacket had a hood that I tugged over my head. The others had realized what we were about to do, gone silent.
Ash walked over. “You sure this is a good idea?” he murmured under his breath.
“She needs to say goodbye on her own terms.” I glanced over at where Vansi was robotically swallowing tea. “Otherwise she’ll tie herself in knots wondering if he’s just badly wounded and we’ve hidden him away somewhere. She wasn’t rational when he died. She is now.”
Ash, his hands on his hips, ducked his head.
When he lifted it back up, his eyes held knowledge stark and painful. “I wish—” An abrupt cessation, his jaw working.
He’d been about to mention Beatrice.
The lover he’d never seen dead.
The friend who’d simply vanished one day.
Unable to help him with his demons when mine yet howled, I walked over to Vansi. “Ready?”
“No.” But she rose, her hands shoved into the pockets of her jacket.
The air outside the lounge was shards of ice in our lungs.
“Jesus, you weren’t kidding.” Her eyes snapped to the windows, which showed a scene of impenetrable darkness. “Why does everything feel muffled? Is it still snowing?”
My chest expanded on a rush of relief. My friend was back. “No break since it started.” Predicting what she’d ask next, I said, “Ash and Grace climbed up to the tower, couldn’t get a signal. We’ll have to wait until the weather clears to try and get some help.”
“What about that spot on the bridge that gets a signal?”
“According to Darcie, it’s not as reliable as the tower. We can try tomorrow morning if the snow stops—no point attempting it in this weather.”
“Too late for Nix,” Vansi said softly as I led her to the cellar door. “I’m so glad he and I made up. We had sex right before he left the bedroom and it was like before—passionate and full of love and happy.” A wobble in her voice, but she swallowed it back. “We were so happy.”
My friend wasn’t one to share such intimate details of her life. But I understood her well enough to guess that she wanted someone to know they’d been in a good place, a beautiful place, that their last words to each other had been of love. “I’m glad, V.”
“I don’t know what I’m going to do without him. He worked so much that I used to joke I was a singleton—but I wasn’t. I always knew that he’d turn up in our bed sooner or later, snuggle up to me. Coming home to me was the best part of his day.
“He told me that so many times and you know how he was. Not mushy. But the way he said that . . .” Her breath caught as we stopped by the cellar door. “Will you give me time alone with him?”
“As long as you want. There’s a light—switch is just inside the door.” I touched my fingers to her arm. “We had to wrap him up. If you want, I can go down and make sure you can see him. I know you need to see him.”
Vansi’s nod was jerky.
When I opened the door to the cellar, it was to find that we’d never turned off the light.
Good.
I didn’t like the idea of Phoenix alone in the dark.
Where before I hadn’t wanted to touch his body, now I was just sad. It was much easier to unroll him from the blanket than I’d thought it would be. Almost as if he was helping me. The sheet took longer, especially as I wanted to hide the bloody section.
I was breathing puffs of white air and sweating inside my jacket by the time he was ready for Vansi. His face was still, his skin tinged blue, but the sheet had soaked away the blood and so he appeared battered . . . but oddly at peace.
That was the first thing Vansi said when she knelt down beside him. Brushing Nix’s hair off his face, she said, “Hi, baby. You look like you’re sleeping.”
I left without another word, going up the stairs to sit with my back against the wall beside the door. The position put me opposite a wall with another one of those old-school paintings.
Thankfully, this one was just a paddock of sheep.
I considered reading more of Clara’s diary on my phone, but didn’t have the heart for it. Not now. Not with Vansi saying goodbye to Nix, who shouldn’t be dead. There was no logical reason for him to be dead.
But he was.
The lights flickered.
And I realized I had another reason not to read on my phone. I had to conserve my battery. Who knew if the generators were designed to function in this kind of temperature? If they went out, we’d be reliant on the light from the fire and whatever flashlights or candles there were in the house.