Baddest Bad Boys by Shannon McKenna, Cate Noble, E. C. Sheedy

way to survive this.

     

    Julia sat on the chair next to the telephone table, immobile as a rock. Stupefied, she stared at the answering machine.

    She couldn’t take it in. It wasn’t possible. Not William. She’d just seen him, talked to him. That very afternoon at the prison. The fateful message had been blinking on the machine when she stumbled in after the long drive back to the luxurious desert lair that she’d shared with William. One of his many residences. William had been very wealthy.

    Her hand reached out. It felt numb, an appendage that belonged to another person. This hostile alien insisted on punching the Play button of the machine again, like a self-flagellant wielding the lash.

    Click. The message began to play once again, the words pounding at her like rocks, bruising flesh, breaking bones. “Hello, this is a message for a Ms. Julia Kirkland,” said a flat, nasal male voice. “I’m Bob Bruckner, a member of William Geddes’s legal team. I have bad news. Mr. Geddes died this afternoon. I’m sorry to say that he took his own life. He drank a container of sterilizing hand gel from the prison bathroom dispenser, and the ethanol depressed his respiratory system. Mr. Geddes left a note asking that you be contacted, which is why I’m calling this number. Uh, I’m very sorry for your loss, Ms. Kirkland. If you have any questions, feel free to call me at this number.” Bruckner rattled off a number, hesitated, as if feeling the urge to say something more. He let out an embarrassed grunt. Click.

    Julia pressed her hand against the heavy raw silk of her white Gucci suit jacket, pressing it hard against the raw, screaming empty spot inside her. Gone. Her William was gone. Her fingers closed around the fabric of the jacket, crumpling it in a white, shaking fist. She never would have guessed that he’d do that to her. She’d been so certain that he’d find a way to escape. He was so smart, so indomitable.

    She must have looked so strange today in that place, in a white designer suit. Blazing with the jewels William had given her. All done up like a doll to visit a maximum security prison. But it had seemed appropriate. A gesture of respect and love. All she could offer him.

    She closed her eyes and saw it all again, every detail. From the moment they led him into the glass-fronted cubicle. He’d been so pale. Hollows under his cheeks, shadows under his eyes. The orange jumper and harsh lights made his skin seem blue. And the bruises! Someone had beaten him! It made her so angry, she wanted to vomit.

    But his eyes still burned like lasers, transfixing her like always.

    He had been so brave and noble, to pay the whole price for what they had done together. He’d forbidden her to turn herself in, or to confess. Insisted that she stay away during the trial. It nearly killed her.

    She would have died for him. Anything.

    You have to carry on, he’d said. You fly for both of us now.

    It made her cry to think of it, but William despised tears, so she forced them back. They picked up the phones, but neither spoke. So many things could not be said in words, particularly not in front of listening ears. Others were too obvious to say. How it tore her heart out to see him like this. How she wished she could suffer every blow in his place. The worst pain could be sweet, if it was suffered for love.

    William taught her that, in the eight years they’d been together.

    She’d been barely seventeen when he’d found her, cheerleading at a high school football game. He’d found her e-mail address, and quickly became the one ray of light in her monumentally shitty life. The one person in the world who understood her. Her true soulmate.

    It had taken her months to work up the courage, but she’d finally let him take her away from the insanity of it all. Her cold, uncaring bitch of a mom, the rich, bloated lech of a step-dad with the hot eyes and the wandering hands. The stupidity of panting high school