Harry and Stew, finished greeting their cousin Caleb, came over to Orchid.
“Hey, stranger,” Stew said. “What, did you switch sides?”
“No switching sides . . . and don’t go starting that rumor. My big brother seems to have lost his mind, so we’re just trying to help him remember what he’s given up,” Caleb answered for her.
Orchid looked at him with gratitude, then turned to kiss both men on the cheek. “How’s your girlfriend?” she asked Harry, remembering his stories from their July Fourth outing.
“Lucy’s upstairs,” he responded. “She’s a talker, I’m warning you.”
While they chatted, Stew picked up Orchid’s bag. “I’ve got this,” he said.
“Thanks,” she said.
The house opened to a series of bedrooms and a laundry room on the ground level. Betsy pointed out the room she’d set aside for Phoenix, then led them to up two flights of stairs to a bedroom that Orchid remembered from the previous summer. While Stew deposited her bag and Betsy led Caleb down the hall to his room, Orchid looked out the framed window at the view she and Phoenix had admired together. Nine months ago, he’d cared for her here when she’d cut her foot. Now it was her turn.
CHAPTER 48
ICKY THUMP
Phoenix
SATURDAY MARCH 30
The street was visible from the main windows of the living room. Betsy and crew came outside soon after Phoenix pulled into their driveway.
He stepped out of the car, stiff from sitting for the last hour and a half. He was missing Dad, unsettled by an emptiness he couldn’t quite articulate.
His cousins Harry and Stew greeted Phoenix with half-hugs, back slaps and high fives. Aunt Betsy pointed at the open door to the ground floor. “I put you down here, as your mom requested.”
Just like Mom to make a big deal over me. Something about being back at the spot he’d last visited with Orchid, or maybe the increasing keen of physical discomfort, was making him irritable.
“Great, give me the gimp floor.”
“Well, you look wonderful.”
Phoenix grabbed his bag, then looked up to see Caleb bounding down the porch steps. At his elbow was a dark-haired beauty he wasn’t expecting to see. Her kohl-rimmed gaze darted to him then back to Caleb.
No freaking way! Caleb and Orchid?
Caleb paused on the stairs to place a hand behind Orchid’s back and whisper something in her ear. She listened intently then leaned her head against his shoulder. Even in her betrayal, she was gorgeous.
Thunderous denial boxed his ears.No, no, no.The whole son. The uninjured brother. The Walker who could walk. Of course. Caleb had what he didn’t. The inequity narrowed his throat until air molecules had to fight to enter single file.
Caleb split off to talk with Stew. Orchid approached. Phoenix eyed the bandage on her forehead, remembering his worry for her in the ambulance. He wondered how the wound was healing.Nope, don’t care. She searched his face, guilt in her expression. She looked sexy in a pair of shorts under a hooded jacket showing slender legs. His fingers curled around his suitcase handle, remembering the feel of her smooth skin beneath his hand. She has some nerve, showing up here with Caleb.They should at least have the decency to date behind my back.
“Phoenix,” she said, voice as soft as if it were only the two of them together. “I’m so sorry. Last time we saw each other—”
Of course she’s freaking sorry.
“Save it,” he huffed, cutting her off. He wasn’t sticking around to hear more. Dragging his bag behind him, he stormed to the open door, calling over his shoulder to his brother. “That didn’t take you long, bud.”
Aunt Betsy hurried to follow him. She pointed down the hall to the first bedroom.
“Thanks,” he said, placing his overnight bag on the luggage rack in the closet.
“Do you need anything?”
“No, thank you.” he said, loneliness compressing in his chest. After all the women in his life, why was the treachery of this ebony-haired woman so painful?
