If she dies … I could die with her.
I almost did after her accident.
“Graham should be finding the very best doctors.” I turned back to her. “Right?”
“Of course.” She returned an easy nod that didn’t match her pensive expression. “I’m doing some alternative treatment. Less pain for me, less pain for—”
“What’s going on?”
I turned to Graham, stepping into the room with wide eyes flitting between me and his naked wife wrapped in a blanket.
“Ronin brought me my bag,” Lila spoke in a rush.
Graham’s uneasy gaze locked with mine, asking me questions without saying a word.
Did I see Lila’s bruises?
Would I tell Evie?
What did I know?
“He’s not going to tell Evie about the cancer.”
His head and gaze inched from me to Lila like a million things chased around his brain, expression blank, lips parted.
“The cancer …” he whispered.
“I’m sorry,” Lila murmured. “He walked in. I thought it was you. He saw the bruises from the leukemia. He’s not going to tell Evie.”
I didn’t promise that.
Without taking his attention away from Lila, Graham brushed past me to embrace his wife, kissing her softly on her head while she buried her face into his neck. I took it as my cue to leave. What would I say to Evie? I … I didn’t know.
“If you suffer, she will know. I won’t be able to hide it.” I didn’t know if Graham knew about my connection to Lila. I wasn’t talking to him anyway. Without another look back, I exited the room, shutting the door behind me.
A sob broke from Lila as I stood there, listening for a few more seconds.
“How did this happen?” she sobbed.
“Shh … nothing has happened. I told you, baby, you’re fine. We’re fine. Okay? You believe me, right? There’s nothing to tell. He won’t tell her. Everything is fine. I promise.”
I couldn’t walk away. Graham’s assessment didn’t help my situation. They were both in denial. And I was in the middle.
As I started to take a step away from the door, Graham’s tone changed into something less sympathetic. “He saw you naked?”
I couldn’t hear her response, maybe she didn’t have one or maybe it was a simple nod. Had he walked in and seen Evie like that, I would have been upset too … not at Evie, just the situation.
“Did that turn you on?”
However, I would not have asked her that, even if the thought crossed my mind. Lila wasn’t turned on by me seeing her; she was horrified. I felt her horrific fear and embarrassment.
“Are you sure?”
Again, I didn’t hear her answer. And I should have walked away, but I couldn’t. My trust in Graham was complicated, to put it mildly. I didn’t trust him to do right by his wife, and I hated the feeling that settled in my gut, but I couldn’t help it. He coveted my wife too much. Where did that leave Lila? Well, that was what I wanted to know. So, I listened.
She grunted.
He shushed her.
“When I fuck you, do you think of him?” he asked in a strained voice as the unmistakable sound of flesh slapping together crawled through the cracks around the door, a whisper … an erotic echo.
I didn’t want to know that answer. Running a rough hand through my hair, I took slow steps away from the door, giving myself time to pull my shit together before Evie looked at me. Even if I thought of telling her the truth, it wasn’t going to be on a holiday trip with the kids.
With each step, I focused on the ringing in my ears—Lila.
I felt a mix of sadness and an overall dull, numbing pain. Was it the news?
Did I feel her?
Did her emotional pain seep into my existence? Was it what they were doing in the bedroom?
Did she not enjoy it?
I just wanted to rid her from my body, but I couldn’t. I took a part of Lila or maybe she took a part of me that day on the mountain. It fucking sucked not having complete control, a broken autonomy like someone else was pulling the strings. I was nothing but a puppet, a voodoo doll.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Graham
I fucked my wife and thought about my best friend. I hated the bruises on her back; it made it more difficult to picture Evelyn because she didn’t have bruises on her back. No … Evelyn’s back was perfect.
Everything about Evelyn was perfect, except she married the wrong man. She let him crawl between her legs and put babies in her belly. That didn’t please me. But I would eventually forgive her, and we would raise Franz and Anya as our own.
Franz … who the fuck names their kid that?
“Graham … it … it hurts …” Lila whined.
It hurt because we didn’t fit like I fit with Evelyn. I stopped. The last thing I needed was Lila sulking like a victim after Ronin saw her situation. I could barely touch her without her skin blooming in shades of reds and blues. She collapsed forward, burying her face in the pillow, leaving her marred back staring at me and a raging hard-on pulsing for Evelyn. I closed my eyes where the only thing I could see was Evelyn. Then I jerked off onto Lila’s back.