“Ant used to yell that at me, too. And tell me how I was a useless burden, and he’d be better off if he just left me at the farm to rot.”
I wince. The words genuinely shock me.
In the eighteen months since my sister’s death, I’ve grown accustomed to rationalising her mood swings, her anger, the kindness that would flip in a second into a fully-fledged razor-sharp attack.
But to hear it from Evie, to see her smile though the words obviously still cause her pain, it’s a comfort and a burden.
“You want me to kick his arse?”
“Sure. I’ll suggest it the next time I want to see you beaten to a pulp.”
I laugh, burrowing into the side of her neck to plant a kiss there, my mood still buoyant. “How dare you insult my manhood like that?”
“Oh, if you need your manhood insulted, I’ve got far more inventive ways.” She snuggles closer to me, closing her eyes. “Promise you won’t leave me. Not like that.”
“At the hands of your brother?” I tease, then can’t stand the shadows that form in her eyes. “I don’t want to leave you at all. It’s just sometimes, I need it to stop hurting.”
“But it’s meant to hurt.” Her eyes open wide, searching mine. “If your heart isn’t torn in two when someone you love dies, you’re not doing it right.”
Another laugh bubbles to the surface until she grabs my chin, forcing me to meet her gaze. “Promise me or let me go.”
And I can read the seriousness of her demand. Her expression isn’t hard, not unforgiving, but her eyes don’t waver.
This request is non-negotiable. It should be easy to say yes, easy tolie, but that isn’t fair to either of us.
I can’t let her go but I should.
My eyes drop, a coward until the end. “Even if I promise you, it doesn’t change all the things that are wrong. You’re tolerating me now, but you know I don’t work right. There’s something missing inside me or a connection that doesn’t slot into the correct place in my brain. Most of the time, I can’t give you what you need.”
“Tolerating.” She frowns at me, then glances down where our shared fluids are leaking out of her body. “Yeah. You talk a good game, but I have evidence to the contrary.”
“That wasn’t… I don’t even know why it worked this time.”
“Because I’m awesome.”
I chuckle, cupping her face and kissing her softly. “I agree but you were awesome yesterday, too. And the day before… and the day before… you get where I’m going.”
“Is it the gun?”
My mind fills with the first night, sees her lips parting, feeling the power and the triumphant surge inside me as everything aligned for one moment in a dirty building, in the worst part of town.
And today.
But it wasn’t the same and I don’t know how to frame the difference or explain how I know it’s not right.
“There was something the first night, but I don’t think it’s the weapon, it’s more…” I frown, chasing the thought, chasing the words that scatter, dancing on the tip of my tongue one second, then gone.
“If you don’t know what it is, how are you so confident you know what it’s not?”
“And what if it was?” I snap, the familiar rage slotting back into place. “What if the only time I can get hard for you is when I’m…” But I can’t even finish. The idea is too appalling.
“Then I think we need to invest in a weapon with a safety catch.”
Evie stares at me so earnestly, I can’t help but burst into laughter. “Sure, and that would be some kind of marriage proposal, wouldn’t it? Do you take me in sickness and in health, loaded or unloaded…”
“Single or double action…”
“Always double.”
