“Childhood friend,” she said. “I thought you would know that. Since, you know, you were her boyfriend and all.”
“Yeah,” I said. “I know some about you. But that doesn’t mean I know everything.”
Angela nodded, looked at me, and then shook her head. She turned back to the highlights, and figuring I had lost this potential train of conversation, I also looked back to the television.
“We met literally in preschool,” she said. “We were like sisters for the longest time. We only separated when we went to college. I went up north to Berkley. She stayed here at USC. I believe that’s around the time you two met.”
“Yep,” I said. “Probably why I didn’t know you well, you were up north with the hippies.”
Angela almost—almost—smirked.
But there was also something about the moment that was profoundly unexpected. When I looked at her, whether it was because of the lighting or because of the way her lips started to curl up... she almost looked…
Beautiful.
I had to stop the thought there before it went any further. The idea of considering one of Shannon’s best friends as anything other than objectively attractive, to put emotions on it, was a dangerous and disrespectful move.
Still, the thought had come, and it was not something I had had to force.
“I came back down for UCLA law school about three years ago, but we were both so busy that we almost never hung out,” Angela said. “I knew of you, but I was never a fan. Shannon had trouble saying no.”
“I did my best to never give her a reason to have to,” I retorted. “I treated her with respect and learned her boundaries, even when she was too nice to say what they were.”
Angela turned her head slightly to me, allowing me to see her left eye look me up and down. There was a certain feeling of being evaluated for my trustworthiness.
“Damnit, Lane,” she said, putting her head in her hands. “I came here to clean you guys out of town. I held you responsible for her death, I really did. But when I went over to your clubhouse a week ago... call me crazy, but the way you spoke about her made me doubt it for the first time. I still think you should never have brought her over—”
“I’m well aware,” I snapped.
But this was different than a week ago. Angela wasn’t criticizing me to humiliate me or try to make me confess something—she was just stating her personal beliefs, not a legal one.
“Sorry,” I said, a word I never thought I would utter to her. “I didn’t kill her, but I blame myself for her death. If I had just been smart enough to keep her the hell away from my father’s house... she didn’t want me to be alone. How fucked up is that? I was the one who couldn’t say no when I most needed to.”
“That’s how she was, though,” Angela said wistfully. “She knew you were in pain with your father’s passing and so she didn’t want you to be alone. No matter how much of a risk that put her in.”
This was never an easy topic to revisit, and I didn’t think it would be for the rest of my life. Yet there was something oddly calming about having such a talk with someone who knew her as well as I did, perhaps even more so. Most of Shannon’s friends had shunned me in the aftermath, and even her father more or less refused to face me. For the most part, if I was being really honest, no one but Patriot supported me.
I deserved it, though. I held Cole in such contempt and such anger that no one in the club could reasonably approach me, and my arrogant demeanor outside the club ensured that no one would be interested in helping me.
Angela really was the first one to hear me talk about it like this. I couldn’t help but wonder if I was the first one she’d talked to about the case as well.
She was...
Don’t think it, Lane. Don’t let yourself go down this road right now. Stay focused.
“I respect the hell out of your drive to bring her the justice she deserves, Angela,” I said, meaning every word.
Now she turned her body to me, resting her right arm on the bar and her head in her hand as I spoke.
“I think it’s pointed in the wrong direction—Cole’s to blame, I saw him standing before her with a gun, but... anyway, it’s not me nor is it anyone in the Reapers. I take full responsibility for her death in the sense that I should never have brought her over, but the responsibility of justice falls to my missing brother and to the Fallen Saints.”
Angela bowed her head, nodded a couple of times, and sipped on her drink without looking up. She let out a sigh, brushed back her hair, and raised her face to meet mine.
“Maybe this is bad to say to you, Lane,” she said. “Especially because I’m still not sure if your club is better or worse for Springsville. But I’m beginning to have doubts about how I’ve viewed you for the last year. Maybe you weren’t so bad for Shannon.”
I didn’t consider myself an overly emotional guy, and I certainly didn’t react in such fashion, but Angela’s words hit me with a force I could not have anticipated. I was left reeling in the positive sense of the word—I finally had someone besides fellow Reapers telling me I had treated her well.
Shannon... the love of my life... the most beautiful woman I’d ever known...
