Once her sister-in-law had wiped at her eyes and blown her nose, Nikki turned toward her. “Do you want to put this off for a day or so?”
“No. It’s not going to get any easier.” She crumpled a tissue in her hand. “Would you mind making me a cup of tea?” she asked.
Nikki recognized the plea for privacy. “Sure.” She placed a comforting hand on Janine’s shoulder—whether or not her touch did any good, Nikki needed to offer something to her brother’s wife. “I’ll be right out there if you need me.”
Janine nodded and Nikki headed into the other room. Making two cups of decaffeinated tea kept her busy and when the doorbell rang, she was grateful for yet another reprieve before having to face Janine’s grief and the rest of her dead brother’s things.
She glanced through the peephole. This wasn’t a reprieve but pain of another kind. She unlatched the lock and opened the door. “Hello, Kevin.”
“Nikki.” He gestured over her shoulder. “Can I come in?”
“It’s not up to me. Janine’s inside.”
“She called the station and asked if they were finished with Tony’s things. I’d stopped by to talk to O’Neill and the captain asked me to bring Tony’s things over.”
“You were at the station?” To her knowledge, he hadn’t stepped foot in the place since giving his final statement after Tony’s death.
“It’s no big deal.”
She disagreed, because much of Kevin’s present dissatisfaction with life, in Nikki’s opinion, stemmed from leaving a job he loved. One he was good at. One he’d walked away from thanks to the misguided notion that he was responsible for Tony’s death. She’d thought he wasn’t ready to deal with the past, but maybe she was wrong.
She glanced at the bag in his hand and sighed. Yet another thing for Janine to cope with. Nikki stepped back to let him pass. His masculine scent overpowered her senses, but not her reason. She hadn’t forgotten Kevin’s abrupt dismissal earlier or all it signified for their future.
Or lack of one.
“Whatever you say. Listen, Janine really isn’t up to tackling Tony’s work stuff right now. The bedroom’s full of piles of things that the Salvation Army’s supposed to pick up and she’s really hurting.”
“I don’t doubt it.” His eyes filled with compassion and emotion for Janine.
Nikki understood him enough to know he was also blaming himself for his role in her sister-in- law’s pain. But she knew better than to reach out to him. She’d been slapped down before.
She grabbed for the bag Kevin carried and glanced inside. Tony’s uniform—the one he’d worn the night of the shooting—had finally been released by the police. “Can you take it home and I’ll bring it back later in the week?” she asked, thinking of how upset Janine had been minutes earlier. “She can get to this last, after she’s dealt with everything else.”
He hesitated. “Are you sure?”
Nikki nodded. “She’s a wreck in there.”
“Okay then. I trust your judgment.” He took the bag out of her hands.
“How’s Max?” she asked, unable to help herself.
“Sober right now. But he’s not in pain either, and that means he’ll probably drink again.”
She nodded. “Is he working?”
“He must be, because he has the money for alcohol. He’s not getting it from me since I’m paying his rent directly to the landlord.”
Enabling his father. Taking responsibility when it wasn’t his to take. “Did you read the literature I gave you?” she asked.
“I appreciate the effort you made, but unless Max wants to be helped, there’s nothing I can do.”
She shrugged her shoulders. “Suit yourself.” She didn’t ask if he wanted to be helped. He’d have to come to that conclusion on his own. She’d obviously done all she could toward guiding Kevin in the right direction. Toward family. She couldn’t make him take those final steps there.
She pointed toward the bedroom. “I really should get back to Janine.”
“I can let myself out.”
She turned and headed for the bedroom, unwilling to spend another moment looking into Kevin’s dark eyes and wishing for things that couldn’t be.