His Brother's Bride

“The seat belt on the driver’s side broke,” he told her now, wishing he felt as emotionless as he sounded. “The one on the passenger side didn’t. That’s why I lived and he didn’t. Being thrown from the car is what killed him.”

“And because you should have been driving, it’s your fault he was killed and not you.”

Damn. Who would have thought, after all the recriminating things he’d said to himself, it would hurt so much to hear her say those words?

“Yes.”

“Bullshit.”

She must not have understood. He’d have to figure out a way to make it clear to her.

“That seat belt breaking was an act of fate, Scott,” she went on. “It could just as easily have been the passenger belt that broke.”

Wrong.

“I’d had a recall notice on it. Three of them.”

“On the driver’s side belt.”

That was the one.

“I’d already taken the damn thing in for a recall on a floor mat—one had doubled up under a gas pedal and caused an accident. And I’d had it in for a fuel-system recall that had turned out to be nothing more than an indicator light.”

“So you didn’t bother to take it in for the seat belt.”

“I was going to...”

Maybe. When he’d had the thing serviced the next time.

“If this is true, you could have sued the company.”

“For my own lack of responsibility?” he asked derisively. “Why should they pay for that? And what were they going to be able to do to make amends for my having killed my brother? Bring him back?”

“Of course not.”

Arms still around her shins, she laid her head on her knees. After a while he wondered if she’d fallen asleep.

He leaned his own head back against the tree, reluctant to disturb her.

“Why did you get so drunk?”

Her words were like a knife jabbing into him.

“What was bothering you so badly the night before Paul died?” she persisted.

Scott needed to move. To stretch. His joints ached from sitting on the hard ground for so long.

He couldn’t move.

“I...”

“I have to know what was driving you, Scott.” Her tone brooked no argument. “I have to know...” The words dwindled off to a whisper as her voice broke.

She was crying.

With a sick feeling in his gut he realized that she’d been sitting there all this time, quietly crying.

“Because it seemed like the only way to forget how much I hated myself.”