Peabody
The second I read it, my spine straightened. My eyes shot up to meet his, which were now half-lidded and glassy.
“Can …” he slurred, lips heavy, “can you tell Dylan I gave you that? So he knows it was me who helped … you know … getting Lacey back home.”
I nodded. “I will.”
“This could be dangerous, you know.”
I knew that. After everything had calmed down tonight, I’d done nothing but think about that. Turning it over and over in my head.
If this brought me closer to the real killer, there was a chance he’d come for me.
“I won’t do anything unless I know it won’t put the kids in danger,” I promised.
And I meant it.
I had a plan. One with no second chances. And if it didn’t work, then that would be it. The end of the road. I’d give up before putting the kids in danger.
Brian stared at me another long moment. His eyelids closed and opened slowly. Then he turned and made his way toward the stairs—and, of course, fell.
I was up in an instant and grabbed him under the arm.
“Why don’t you take the couch?” I said, hoisting him back upright. He usually took the couch anyway, and I took the bed upstairs. Just not tonight. Tonight, I was sleeping on the couch, waiting for him.
I guided him over, and he collapsed onto the couch like a boulder. Passed out before he’d even taken his shoes off.
I pulled them off, one, then the other, then tucked the blanket around him. He didn’t move.
With a sigh, I turned to go upstairs. But then his voice came low and slurred behind me. Barely more than a mumble.
“I love her,” he said into the pillows. “And a love like that can destroy a man like me.”
I turned back to him.
There he lay, all six foot four of him, sprawled across a couch too short for his body. His feet dangled over the edge like a child’s. Even drunk, even wrecked, he still looked like the kind ofman women would line up to ruin themselves for. That jawline. That body. The way he could talk to a stranger like they were already best friends.
When Brian was in a good place, you wanted to be locked in a cave with him. Everyone did.
But when he wasn’t in a good place, which was most of the time …
“I love her,” he muttered again, barely audible now.
“I know,” I said quietly.
I did believe him. But a loving heart can still be a weak and selfish one. That was Brian’s fatal flaw. He couldn’t conquer even the smallest battles in life. Not without Lacey by his side doing everything for him like he was her fourth child.
And a man like that could wreck a family from the inside out.
Then it dawned on me.
If Lacey didn’t make it back—if this whole thing ended the wrong way—it wouldn’t be her who destroyed us.
It’d be him.
And standing here, smelling the booze as it filled the room, I couldn’t help but resent him for that.
“Sleep now,” I said, already walking halfway to the stairs when I heard him mumble one last thing. His voice was warped with alcohol and barely audible, but I thought I heard him say, “I swear … both of them. I love … them both.”
